Isaiah 45:21ip a just God

I bring to you just the words, a just God and if that is all you see in God’s character and personality, you miss His reason for being a just God. Here is the full quote.

Isaiah 45:21 Tell ye, and bring them near; yea, let them take counsel together: who hath declared this from ancient time? who hath told it from that time? have not I the Lord? and there is no God else beside me; a just God and a Saviour; there is none beside me.

Note the call to gather and discuss. Do not make so important a decision about the character and personality of God on your own. Seek wise counsel. He is a just God and a Savior. He is both, equally and dependently, not independently. If you see Him as just and not a Savior, then you miss the whole point of His being a just God.

Being a just God is not His primary characteristic, love is and it isn’t even His secondary character. His secondary characteristic is He is a Holy God.

Joshua 24:19 And Joshua said unto the people, Ye cannot serve the Lord: for he is an holy God; he is a jealous God; he will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins.

Let me be clear on this point so there is no misunderstanding, God forgives people not sin. I have transgressed, I have trespassed, gone where I should not have gone. How do I get back? You cannot come back with your sin, your transgression, and the reason why is God’s holiness.

No sin may approach God because it is a danger to God’s holiness. If sin could touch God, He would no longer be holy and no longer God. That will never happen.

Proverbs 16:2 All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes; but the Lord weigheth the spirits.

There is motive behind everything we do, good or bad. We want what we want and motive is the reason behind our approach towards getting what we want. God is no different.

I chose this verse to illustrate motive because in yesterday’s ending I said we might not understand God’s motives for what He does. In this verse we can see the just side of God. Weighing the spirits is the purist form of judgment. It looks to the heart of a man.

If this is your first or perhaps only view of God’s motives, your opinion of who God is in character is skewed towards punishment. You see God as a vengeful God. You would be justified in your hatred of God if that was all that God is in character and personality. Justice is not God’s primary character.

1 John 4:8 He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.

You will never love a God that does not love you first. Love is the first and primary motivation in all that God does in character and performance.

1 John 4:19 We love him, because he first loved us.

God created the universe and all that is in it to provide a place where we could live and love. The primary attribute of love is to share, to have an object of affection to pour out itself upon another that is capable of responding to love by loving in return. True love has an expectation of return on investment.

If you refuse to understand that then your hatred of God is a waste. Our trash is labeled refuse, pronounced a little different but the idea is the same, that which is rejected and cast aside. If you reject God’s love that is on you and it is not God’s intention to reject you. He loves you.