ARE YOU GUILTY OR INNOCENT IN GOD'S EYES?

This is a short post but a very important one. When I saw this video, related to the death of pop star, Michael Jackson, I thought I should share it here. God gave us his law in order to show us something...please click on this video link and take the test "ARE YOU GUILTY OR INNOCENT IN THE EYES OF GOD?"

WHY DO BAD THINGS HAPPEN?

PHILOSOPHERS would argue that GOD cannot exist because evil exists in the world...the fundamental (fun & mental) question becoming: "How could a benevolent, all knowing, all powerful God allow BAD THINGS to happen?"

This is a completely valid question and one for which the Bible has the answer! Let's examine the facts, shall we?

Genesis tells us that when God had completed his creative work, he examined everything and said it was all GOOD! So what happened?

1. 
   
   Rather than worshipful robots, God created his creatures with a free will. The angels have free will and some chose to rebel, Lucifer being apparently chief instigator in that rebellion.


2. 
   
   Lucifer/Satan then tempted mankind in the garden of Eden with disobedience to God's clear commandment not to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil...mankind disobeyed God and became sinners like Satan.


3. 
   
   Romans 5 informs us that this initial rebellion affected all of Adam & Eve's descendants coming into the world...so that all became sinners and sin's death penalty passed unto all mankind.


4. 
   
   Not only that, but the entire world is now under a curse because of our initial and continued rebellion to our Creator!


5. 
   
   Man still has a free will and a natural tendency toward sin...so of course BAD THINGS are going to happen! Man chooses to make bad things happen! There are consequences for our daily rebellion in which we inflict ourselves upon other's lives with consequences.

The whole creation is groaning (Rom 8) and travailing just waiting for God's plan to come all the way around where sin will be judged and put down forever, where Righteousness will prevail and the Redeemed will live forever in a NEW HEAVEN and NEW EARTH. Folks God's plan isn't to renovate what we all polluted with sin. His goal in creation is to do a short work upon the Earth and cut it short in Righteousness (Rom 9)! God made everything good knowing that his creatures would pollute it, that he would have to redeem it, that he would have to come down from heaven in the form of humanity and pay for our sins to do it, and that ultimately he would re-create the heavens and the Earth for the redeemed to inhabit a creation that is ALL GOOD! No wonder the bible proclaims (Rom 8) that "all things work together for good to them that love God, to them called according to His purpose!"

WHO IS THE SUFFERING SERVANT?

WHO IS THE SUFFERING SERVANT OF ISAIAH CHAPTER 53? For Christians this might seem easy to answer...Jesus Christ, of course. However, I had the opportunity to pose this question to a Rabbi not long ago and the answer given surprised me. He said, ISRAEL IS THE SUFFERING SERVANT being referred to by the prophet Isaiah.

Now, you must understand that a Rabbi who doesn't believe Jesus is the Messiah is not going to say, Jesus...in fact, I've found that regarding any Old Testament scripture that must clearly identify Jesus as the Messiah, they will come up with some amazingly absurd answers or simply redirect you to something else entirely! But in all fairness, is it at all possible for the Rabbi to be right in this instance? Let's look...

1. In Isaiah 53 (please blow the dust off of your bible and look :-) we find a servant of God who is suffering for the sins and iniquities of others. The Rabbi claims that Isaiah is referring to the Nation of Israel who suffers for the sins of all of the other nations. FIRST: it must be noted that the nation of Israel habitually rebelled against the Lord from the time they were led from Egyptian captivity unto the present day...not that we heathen gentiles did not, mind you...but for a nation to suffer so that other nations iniquity before the Lord could be cleansed (the innocent suffering in the place of the guilty) that nation would have to be innocent! Neither Israel or any other nation can stand up to that standard. David remarked that "if the Lord should mark iniquity, who would be able to stand?" The rhetorical question clearly answers, NOBODY! Israel could not suffer for the iniquity of others because they were as guilty of national sin before the Lord as anyone one else!


2. Here we need to clarify a very important point as we'll be looking at the personal pronouns the prophet uses in the Chapter: The prophet Isaiah was a JEWISH PROPHET! This becomes important when we look at which group (with the servant or the sinners) Isaiah identifies himself with!


3. Now we see that Isaiah is referring to the servant as (he, him). NOWHERE IN THE CHAPTER DOES ISAIAH IDENTIFY HIMSELF WITH THIS PERSON or in HIS GROUP.


4. Isaiah refers to the sinners in question by pronouns (we, us, our). Notice that each of these shows Isaiah including himself among those guilty sinners whom this innocent servant is suffering for! Now remember that Isaiah is a jewish prophet...is it logical to say that a jewish prophet would include himself among the heathen gentiles? Absolutely not...in fact we can see that by Peters day, he was unwilling even to associate with gentiles. The Lord had to show Peter a "new thing" in order for him to go and witness to the gentile Cornelius.


5. Isaiah, a jewish prophet, is always going to include himself among "His people" Israel and it is Israel to whom he refers when he says this servant suffers for our iniquities! Israel cannot be the suffering servant, for this jewish prophet clearly says the servant suffers for his people, Israel, and their sins...I'm glad to say that He not only suffers for Israel's sins but for the sins of the whole world!

Thus we see that the servant is none other than the Messiah of Israel, the same who is prophecied in Dan 9: 25,26 to be "cut off, but not for himself," obviously to die for others! And Jesus can just as easily be shown from only the Old Testament scriptures to THE MESSIAH...Sorry Rabbi :-)