We have only superficially covered the judgment of God, but it is one of the two basic foundations of spiritual authority. The other is righteousness, as we are told: “Righteousness and justice are the foundation of Your throne” (see Psalm 89:14). Therefore, as we grow in His authority we should also grow in our knowledge and obedience to them.
We must first establish that righteousness is what the Lord says it is, not man. We also must establish that justice is what He says it is, not man. Therefore, our devotion to understanding these should be through His written Word, the Bible, which He gave us for establishing doctrine.
As we have covered, the entire church age was allowed for the purpose of the Lord finding a people who would seek Him and serve Him even when it meant going in the opposite direction of the rest of mankind. These will rule and reign with Him in the age to come when the earth is restored. This time of “training for reigning” was not intended to be easy for those who have such a high calling.
Those who have been called to be trained at the end of the age, and the time when “darkness will cover the earth and deep darkness the peoples” (see Isaiah 60:2), have been given the greatest privilege of all. As the next verse continues, “the Lord will rise upon you and His glory will appear upon you.” Even the prophets of old desire to see these times, and we have been honored to live in them. Then we have the great encouragement of the next three verses:
“Lift up your eyes round about and see; they all gather together, they come to you.
Your sons will come from afar, and your daughters will be carried in the arms.
“Then you will see and be radiant, and your heart will thrill and rejoice;
because the abundance of the sea will be turned to you,
the wealth of the nations will come to you” (Isaiah 50:3-5).
The light wins! Regardless of how dark it becomes and how the people are overcome with the “deep darkness,” the light will prevail. The result of the ultimate clash of light and darkness at the end of the age is that the nations will turn to the light. Our children will come back and the wealth of the nations will be brought to those who are the stewards of the Lord.
As Isaiah 60 and other texts make clear, we are headed for the ultimate clash of light and darkness. This is an ultimate separation of those who worship God and obey Him and those who do not. The deep darkness that comes upon the people is the result of having rebelled against God, and we must settle in our hearts that we will not follow those who do not follow Him or ever compromise His truth that we have been entrusted with.
This also indicates that those who walk in the light will walk in more and more light until the glory is revealed through them, and those who turn to darkness will get darker and darker. As we proceed, the distinctions between those who walk in the light and those who walk in darkness will increase.
As we see in the Book of Revelation, when the judgments come upon the world, the response of the rebellious will be to curse God, not turn to Him. This should not surprise us. There will be a time when the nations turn to the light, but we can also see by the biblical prophecies that this is not going to happen at first. Consider the following warning that Paul gave about these times in II Timothy 3:1-5:
"For men will be lovers of self, lovers of money, boastful, arrogant, revilers,
disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy,
"unloving, irreconcilable, malicious gossips, without self-control, brutal, haters of good,
treacherous, reckless, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God.
"holding to a form of godliness, although they have denied its power;
and avoid such men as these."
Sound like your neighborhood? These characteristics have been growing dramatically in the last fifty years. The media of movies, television, and music have become the basis of the spiritual and moral education of the emerging generation, and they are inculcating rebellion and lawlessness in increasingly extreme and diabolical ways. As the saying goes, “If you don’t change your direction, you will end up where you are headed,” and the whole world is headed for a meltdown into chaos and lawlessness. The nations that repent and return to the Lord do not have to end up there, but America and Europe have been turning from the Lord instead of to Him. Has the salt lost its saltiness and the light been hidden?
In-depth studies show that there is no distinguishable difference in basic morality and integrity between believers and non-believers. If you even begin to mention the judgment of God now, many in the church will jump you even faster than the heathen. Why are so many Christians so reticent to see this very basic part of God’s nature, His works, and the most basic biblical explanation of our own times? This we must seek to understand. As we were warned, an increasing number of Christians will not endure sound, biblical doctrine.
