The Doctrine of Divine Justice and Vengeance

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COURSE IN ADVANCED BIBLICAL DOCTRINES

Lesson #16

• The Doctrine of Divine Justice and Vengeance
• The Doctrine of Divine Justice:
  • There are some things that the believer must keep a balance in his mind to understand God’s divine justice.
  • #1. Perfect justice is rooted in the nature of God, for God rewards good and does not ignore any sin.
    • Read Isa 40:14
    • Read Psa 33:5
    • Read Psa 37:6, 28
    • Because God usually does not bring instant justice, it sometimes appears that God ignores the sin of the wicked when we see the wicked prosper and the righteous suffer.
      • However, this age old problem has plagued believers throughout the Bible. Many of the Psalms speak to this problem.
      • Read Psa 7:9
    • What the believer must keep in mind is that man sees only a fraction of another person’s life.
      • Sometimes it takes awhile for the root of sin to grow before a person reaps the result of that sin.
      • Sometimes the reaping will not occur until the non-believer stands before God in the Great White Throne Judgment and the books are opened.
      • Read Rev 20:11-12
  • #2. God’s justice is perfect. He will eventually demand an accounting of all evil done in this world from every human ever born into this world.
    • Read Rom 3:5-6
    • Read Rom 9:14
      • Perfect justice means that every sin receives equal treatment.
        • God’s justice is not like man’s justice where one murder is punished by death and another murder is not punished at all.
        • Read Mat 5:45
        • Read Eph 6:9
        • Read Rom 2:6
      • Perfect justice means that every person receives equal treatment.
        • God’s justice is not like man’s justice where a person with money, position, or prestige can escape punishment while the poor person without power or position receives the harshest punishment.
        • Read Act 10:34-35
        • Read 1Pet 1:17
        • Read Deu 16:18-20
        • Read Deu 27:19
      • God cannot be bribed to render a different judgment in the way that human authorities can be corrupted to receive a bribe in order to render a more favorable judgment.
        • The Almighty God is the creator of everything in this universe.
        • Therefore, there is nothing of greater value in this world that man can offer as a bribe to God of which God does not already possess.
  • #3. The Bible speaks about seven judgments in which God is worthy to establish judgment and to sit as judge of all His creation.
    • (1) God judged sin on the cross at the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.
      • Read Gal 3:13
      • Read 2Cor 5:21
        • The redeemer, Jesus Christ, paid the price for every sin ever committed in the past, the present, and the future.
        • Christ’s payment of his blood and his life was sufficient to satisfy God’s justice.
    • (2) In this age of grace, the believer is to judge himself to determine his sin.
      • Read 1Cor 11:31
      • Read Heb 12:7
        • With the help of the indwelling Holy Spirit, the believer is to continually ask God for forgiveness when the Holy Spirit convicts him of sin.
        • In this way, his life grows into holiness to be more like Christ.
    • (3) All believers will stand before God at the Judgment Seat of Christ.
      • Read Rom 14:10
      • Read 2Cor 5:10
        • This judgment is a determination of what deeds God will reward in the life of a believer after receiving Christ as his savior.
        • This is not a judgment of the sin of the believer, for the believer’s sins are forgiven in Jesus Christ when the person is born again. It is a judgment of the determination of rewards.
    • (4) God will judge the nation of Israel during the seven-year tribulation period.
      • Read Eze 20:33-38
      • Read Mal 3:2
        • The purpose of the tribulation period is to put pressure on the Jews so that they come to know Jesus Christ as their personal savior.
        • Read Zec 12:10-11
        • The Jews will receive Christ as their savior in the battle of Armageddon at the second coming of Christ.
    • (5) Christ will judge all nations at the beginning of His millennial kingdom of a thousand years.
      • Read Mat 25:31-46
      • Nations will be judged as to how they treated the Jews and the Christians.
      • Nations will be judged as the degree of the freedom of the preaching of the gospel.
    • (6) God will judge all non-believers from all history at the Great White Throne judgment.
      • Read Rev 20:11-15
        • This is the final judgment of all non-believing people from all of history.
        • Their names are not written in the Lamb’s book of life (the book of believers).
        • The non-believers will be judged by their works.

Those who do not receive Jesus Christ choose to be judged, not by the righteousness of Christ, but by their own righteousness, exemplified by their own works.

However, man’s works are never enough to pay for his own sins. That is why we need the righteousness of Jesus Christ.

• • • (7) Believers in Jesus Christ will judge the angels.
      • Read 1Cor 6:3
      • Read 2Pet 2:4
      • Read Jude 1:6
  • #4. God in His mercy gives the non-believer an escape from God’s just wrath against sin and the judgment of the Great White Throne that results from sin.
    • Read Rom 1:32
    • Read Rom 3:26
      • In Jesus Christ, the believer that has a personal relationship with Christ escapes the final judgment because he is justified before God.
      • The payment of Christ’s blood on the cross satisfies God’s justice that a price must be paid for sin. That paid price was Jesus’ death on the cross.
  • #5. God expects human justice to follow God’s pattern of justice.
    • Just laws made by governments should reflect God’s standards.
      • Read Gen 9:5-6
      • After Noah’s flood, this scripture is where God established governmental authority to rule over the affairs of man in regards to capital punishment so as to elevate God’s principle that all life is of supreme importance.
      • Read Deu 1:17
      • Read Exo21:23-25
        • Moses delegates authority to judge with equity in the same way that God judges.
        • Just punishment for a crime became a standard set by God where the punishment must fit the crime. (Lex talonis).
    • Human justice by governments should deter evil and promote good.
      • Read Rom 13:1-5
  • #6. God expects all believers to practice justice in personal relationships and in business affairs.
    • Read Gen 18:19
    • Read Psa 106:3
    • In the New Testament, the love of justice is a virtue the believer should cultivate in his life
      • Read Phil 4:8
      • However, sometimes it is better that the believer should suffer injustice than to bring a lawsuit against another believer thus causing the gospel disrepute.
      • Read 1Cor 6:7-8
• The Doctrine of Vengeance
  • Vengeance is the desire for retribution from someone that committed a wrong against you.
  • The Bible speaks about God’s vengeance against His enemies because God’s character is just and in God’s economy a wrong demands ultimate justice. It is God’s sense of righteousness that demands that the wrong be made right.
    • It is because of God’s sense of justice and ultimate vengeance against wrong, that God initiated the concept of the kinsman redeemer in the Old Testament. Therefore, we see God’s concept of vengeance in the law of the kinsman-redeemer.
      • In early Old Testament Israel, the 12 tribes were governed by the tribal leaders instead of a national government.
      • The family unit was important in maintaining law and justice in society.
    • The system of the kinsman redeemer dealt with economics, social duty, and criminal activity in order to protect the sanctity of the family in society and the continuation of a tribe.
    • What was the law of the kinsman-redeemer?
      • Read Lev 25:23-25, 47-48
      • The Hebrew word for kinsman-redeemer is “goel”. It is a unique part of Jewish culture established by God earlier in the Old Testament (Lev 25:25-55). It is a strange custom to us today because we do not have anything like it. It was God’s way of taking care of his people in that day and that time.
      • The law of the kinsman-redeemer, however, is very important:
        • =1= to an understanding of the book of Ruth.
        • =2= to an understanding of what the New Testament means when we call Christ our redeemer.
      • There were three aspects of the law of the kinsman-redeemer. (Lev 25:25-55)
        • =1= It operates in connection with redeeming land. (Lev 25:25-34)
        • =2= It operates in connection with redeeming poor people. (Lev 25:35-55)
        • =3= It operates in connection with redeeming widows. (Deu 25:5-10) fulfilling the levirate marriage law).
    • The meaning of the words:
      • The word “redemption” = the deliverance or freedom from some evil by the payment of a price.
      • The word “kinsman” = the closest male relative by blood relationship was to be the protector.
      • The “kinsman-redeemer” (goel) = Any close male relative could bring deliverance or freedom to a person or to property by paying the appropriate price.
    • The requirements of a kinsman-redeemer:
      • =1= He must be the nearest male relative.
      • =2= He must be able to perform the obligations.
      • =3= He must be willing to perform the obligations.
      • =4= He must fulfill all the obligations.
    • The obligations of a kinsman-redeemer:
      • =1= If a close relative was murdered, the kinsman must be the “avenger of blood” who would catch the murderer and kill him. (Num 35:6-34)
      • =2= If a close relative lost his land through poverty, the kinsman redeemer must pay to buy it back for him.
      • =3= If a close relative died and left a widow without children, he must marry the widow. The first child would be considered the child of the dead man. (Levirate marriage law)
    • What happened if a close relative refused to perform his duty as kinsman-redeemer? In other words, if he was able to perform but was unwilling.
      • If the man was a near relative and was able to perform his duty, but he was not willing to do so, he must remove one shoe from his foot in front of the elders of the city and give it to the person he was unwilling to redeem. The unredeemed person would spit in his face. Then the unwilling relative must walk without one shoe for a period of time so that all his neighbors would know he was unwilling to perform his duty. It was a social disgrace to be able to perform the duty but to be unwilling to do so.
      • After that, another near relative could decide to fulfill the obligation of kinsman-redeemer. This was the case in the book of Ruth.
  • After Israel became a nation, the work of vengeance passed from the kinsman-redeemer to a function of the government, and it remains so today.
    • Read 1Pet 2:14
    • Read Rom 12:18-20
  • Therefore, man must not take vengeance into his own hands because finally God says that vengeance is His.
    • God’s vengeance is an expression of His displeasure over all unrighteousness.
    • God’s vengeance is an expression of His desire to restore a just balance.
      • Christ’s death on the cross was God’s way of satisfying perfect justice.
      • Divine vengeance against His own son who became sin for us, produced redemption for all believers in Jesus Christ.
  • Therefore, God’s vengeance is not just a desire to punish a wrong but also a means of redeeming and restoring to make it right.