God The Judge Of All

by S. J. HILL | Category: General | Apr 1933

(We call attention to this article as a contribution much in season at the present time.-H.E.)

In all things we must start with the fact of God. Of Him are all things and unto Him are all things. The Scriptures show that the world was made by Him, and that then He made man in His image, according to His likeness, as the head of the earthly creation. Here man was installed as God's representative; like the Centurion in the Gospel-a man under authority, having others under him.

We know that Adam failed to appreciate this great fact, he asserted his own will at the instigation of the tempter and fell; but while sadly fallen he was not deprived of his position of authority, though he found that even as he failed to obey God, so those under him would fail to obey him.

While man has fallen from his high estate, yet he is still responsible to God, and will continue to be so. We must be clear that although sin has come in, yet God has not relinquished His Ownership, and He still holds the "tenant-in-chief" responsible to Himself the Divine Owner.

The measure of responsibility varies according to the standard of knowledge of God which different men and peoples possess. All have a responsibility, but in different degrees.

Comparatively early in the world's history, men so completely failed to recognise God and the moral obligations known to them, that, after waiting years in long suffering, God swept the old world with a flood. This He did because He was Proprietor and Judge, and man was in a position of responsibility to act according to that standard of knowledge of His will which he had.

Later, we have a signal example in the doom of the Cities of the Plain. God's longsuffering had been shown, but without result-except that they despised it; and instead of leading them to repentance they had gone more deeply into sin, and then the overwhelming judgement of God came upon them.

Again, the inhabitants of Canaan had grossly abused their blessings, and after long waiting, when the fearful iniquity of the Amorites had come to the full, then God (He using human instruments for His purpose) cast them out and cleansed the land from their abominations; and yet again, the very nation which had been used to destroy or expel these sinners, eventually became as bad or worse than those whose place they took; and finally, after God had again and again warned by His prophets, they also were expelled.

Thus, in these instances we have witness clearly borne to the fact that God is the Proprietor of this world; that man here placed in a position of privilege and also of responsibility, and that if man persistently abuses his privileges he is deprived of them. We may add that the same principle is still working in the rising and falling of many nations and kingdoms-privileges abused-God ignored, inevitably brings deprivation and judgement.

Coming to a specific circle, we draw attention to the fact that it pleased God to separate a certain people from the, nations and to bring them into covenant with Himself. We are familiar with the fact that the children of Israel were saved from Egypt's doom by the blood of the Passover lamb; and from Egypt's authority by the "baptismal" waters of the Red Sea; and in the wilderness were brought into covenant with God to be His people and eventually they were brought into the land of promise. Under that covenant, and in that land which was the Lord's land, they were under obligation to obey His word. To destroy idolatry, to keep His sabbaths, and so on, according to the Law. While provision was made for sins of ignorance, the man who deliberately broke these commands was liable to punishment, even, in certain cases, to death itself.

It could not be contended that all should do as they pleased, and it could not be said that if such punishment for wilful sin were inflicted that it would be religious persecution. No-~ mankind generally were amenable to God and to His judgement according to the standard of knowledge granted to them, but those who had been brought into covenant with Him were more particularly liable to judgement if they transgressed.

Because God did not always inflict punishment, but bore much and long with the sinning people, this did not prove He had not the right to do so, and indeed, we know that eventually when God's longsuffering failed to influence them for good, judgement descended, and they were scattered and devastated, and so signal was the infliction that it became known to all the nations.

It is sometimes suggested that such like dealings with men belong to an inferior age to the present, and that in the progressive revelation of God those things have been left behind; but we must insist that God is now, as much as ever, the Proprietor of this world, and that the ignoring of Him and the setting aside of His authority by men now, is so much worse than in former times because of the greatly increased measure of light and knowledge given in the New Testament Scriptures:

so that the responsibility of men in so-called Christendom is so much greater.

Doubtless the characteristic feature of the present dispensation is grace, and judgement is exceptional, though the ordinary working of God's providence is seen in the fact that nations and individuals reap what they have sown; and that many nations have risen and then fallen because they appreciated not the purpose of their privileges. But a day is coming when God's judgements will be poured out on nations which have turned their back on Him and His Christ, and have turned to demon worship and the doing of every vile thing. The judgements of the past-the Flood, that upon Sodom and Gomorrah, and so on, will be greatly exceeded in the day to come, as witness the book of the Revelation.

The great truth should be recognised that God is God, and man is man; that God is still, as much as ever, the Proprietor of this world, and that man, as much as ever, is responsible to Him: that the judgement may tarry, yet it will undoubtedly come, and not only will peoples be involved, but every person of understanding age will be held responsible for the light God has given and will be called upon to give account.

A little earlier we referred to the fact that God separated a special people from all other nations and gave to them His righteous law and brought them into a covenant of obedience. We also pointed out that wilful transgression was punishable, in some cases even by death.

Now in the present dispensation since Pentecost, God has been doing a work of a parallel kind, but different in character. God now sends forth the word of the Gospel, and if men (in every nation) hear and receive the Gospel, it is His will, and their obligation, to obey Him in all things, and this they should signify at the outset by being baptized in the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Instead of bringing such out of Egypt, they are brought out of the world morally, and instead of being brought into Canaan, they are brought into a sphere of spiritual blessing and responsibility.

Now, as in Israel, if a person wilfully transgressed God's law he was punished or even stoned; so now, if a person in the Assembly of God sets aside the known will of God-as the man in 1 Corinthians 5., he is "put away"; separated from the other believers and deprived of the spiritual blessings of God's house. Now, observe, such treatment is analogous to that meted out to the law-breaking Israelite, yet it is different; in the former case it was a physical punishment, now it is spiritual.

The Roman church seeks to justify its punitive dealings by copying the methods which obtained in Israel; and so, if it were in their power so to act, they would now, as they have done in former times, kill, even by burning, such as reject their doctrines. Even if their doctrines were divine (which they are not) they would have no justification for so acting; all they could properly do would be to separate the heretic from their Communion. That they have used physical violence even to death against men, proves that they have utterly perverted the Word, and that they have taken upon themselves the authority of the civil power and employed it to carry out their own beliefs. In things pertaining to civil life, it belongs rightly to the civil power to punish in a physical way (even unto death in the extreme penalty of the law); but in the Church of God, all that can be done in the most extreme case is to excommunicate the wrong doer-" put away from among yourselves that wicked person."

But we observe that many Nonconformist bodies-who, like the Romanists, claim political power, though not the right to persecute-are singularly careless as to both the doctrine and practice of those numbered amongst them; and it seems almost a proverbial and generally accepted sentiment that people can

believe what they like, and almost do what they like, and yet maintain a standing in their "churches." This laxity is most reprehensible, and shows a singular indifference to the will of God; and in relation to "Church" matters, a more manifest carelessness than with the Romanists.

Finally, let us be clear that men as men are responsible to God: that whether they profess to believe in Him or not, He will hold them to account; for every man shall give an account of himself "To Him that is ready to judge the quick and the dead," and "There shall be a resurrection both of the just and the unjust."

Further, that in the sphere of God's people, separated from the world, discipline and punishment there must be; but it must be of a spiritual sort. "Let us also fear

S. J. HILL | Apr 1933
General