If we can take these words with complete confidence, we will have found the Lord. But the last thing unbelievers can do is to trust the Lord. They are full of questions, doubts. You will not get to this state of trust by just shutting your eyes to the difficulties, like those who think they must trust God blindly. The Bible shines a great light into our minds, so that we trust God based on his revealed truth, and come to him. Today we are surrounded by distractions which prevent us seeing things for what they really are: TV, entertainment, the hustle and bustle of life; they are like a city that shuts in our view and prevents us from seeing into the distance.
Because of propaganda of this world we actually become so impertinent as to accuse God of making mistakes. Never project yourself into God’s place, or imagine God to be like us. The Babylonian gods were all just like men: ill tempered, bickering, fighting, full of self-aggrandisement; they were the inventions of men. We charge God with making mistakes when we ask, ‘Why does he do this?’, as if he was prone to get it wrong, as if he was a God who tolerates sin. Many have a God like a benevolent grandfather – lenient, who doesn’t see all we do, and so we can put ourselves across to him. We have put ourselves in God’s place – as if he is weak. Some think God can do U-turns, and is an opportunist.
He is the perfectly qualified judge. He is supremely fair. No one will ever be wrongly accused, but nor will anyone get away with sin unpunished. God’s authority is unassailable. Of course he has the right to judge us. He has engravened his standards on our constitution. He has the authority to give ultimate sentence. We hear of judges who give light sentences, and anyway the maximum tariff is set by the law, but God’s sentence is without limit. He judges the heavens as well as the earth. There is no person, no place, no age in history that is not under his jurisdiction. All who stand before Christ will be humbled to the dust. On earth we cannot guarantee that a judge has good character, but Christ is without sin. He is a non-hostile judge, not hostile by nature. He has a soft heart within, and feels for us in our sin, but he must reflect the severity of the law in his demeanour. If only we would communicate with him before that final day! He has been called the weeping judge. How foolish to snarl at him! People avoid justice on earth – if they can get away with it, but the greatest will come before him. Isn’t it amazing that all who come into the world has a huge sense of justice from the youngest age? To God, sin is like a bad smell. In patience he will bear it for so long like a blocked drain, or like a wound that has become infected. In the city of Sodom no one brought charges because of the evil practices going on there, but God charges us from heaven for our sin. Maybe no one brings charges on earth but God won’t forget. God is a communicating judge. A judge can be approached while sitting in chambers, and you can settle out of court, but if you drive him to final court he will be severe.