God's Judgment is Based on Truth—Romans 2:2
“Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth” (Romans 2:2)
In the court system, to be a judge, several requirements must be met. First, judges must be experts in our laws, they must be citizens, and they must meet certain residency requirements to serve. Then, when performing their duty, judges must be impartial and fair. Their decisions are rendered based on facts alone, and there is no room for opinion, favoritism, or ignorance of the law. A lot of requirements must be met before a person is qualified to be a judge in our court system.
If we leave judgment to God, we will fully benefit from His mercy.
The same is true in the heavenly realm. There are many requirements for being qualified to render judgment. In the previous verse, Paul has just disqualified mankind from this role. “You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things” (Rom. 2:1). Our participation in sin excludes us from being qualified to judge anyone fairly.
Given this criteria, only God is capable of this role because His judgment is based on truth and this truth is absolute. It is based on both His Word and character, which makes Him just. But in the same way, because of God’s kindness (Rom. 2:4), we can count on Him to be merciful (Rom. 3:25-26). In other words, He will judge fairly, according to His righteousness standards, which means we are all guilty. But because He is also merciful, we can also rest in the fact that placing our faith in Jesus means God’s judgment for our sin was placed on Him so that we could have Jesus’s perfect record. This means, according to the standard of the Law, we have beenjustified (a legal term meaning we have been credited as if we had never sinned and had always obeyed).
This is good news for us. If we leave judgment to God, we will fully benefit from His mercy (Rom. 2:3). Today, take a moment to appreciate that God’s judgment is based on the truth of His character and we will benefit from his kindness to us.
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Original article published June 2, 2009.