The Justice and Goodness of God. Thomas R. Schreiner. 2024. 160 pages. [Source: Review copy]
First sentence: Why would anyone want to write on the final judgment? It might seem that anyone who writes on this theme is obsessed with the negative, with hate instead of love, with punishment instead of mercy, with crankiness instead of joy.
For a theological book, this was a short, quick, "little" read. The subject is the justice and goodness of God. How does God's goodness relate to God's justice? Would God be good if he wasn't at the same time just? The justice of God is not at odds with his attributes--obviously. A good, faithful, holy, loving, merciful God HAS to be a JUST God, a God of justice. This little book traces the justice of God throughout the Bible. He tackles this generally and broadly in the first few chapters. In the middle chapters, Schreiner focuses on justice in the New Testament. The book concludes with further implications of God's justice. How should we as Christians respond and live in light of God's justice AND goodness. The final chapter is "Salvation Shines Brighter," and indeed it does. Christians are done no favors when theologians--pastors, preachers, writers--pick and choose which of God's attributes to "allow" or preach upon. Christians need the whole counsel of the Word of God, and the Bible has a LOT to say about God's justice AND God's goodness. This book also speaks of God's holiness.
Chapter titles:
- Only a Holy God
- The Ugliness of Sin
- Judgment in the Gospels and Acts
- Judgment in the Epistles
- Judgment in the Book of Revelation
- Living in Light of the Judgment
- Salvation Shines Brighter.
Quotes:
I am writing this book for missionaries, for pastors, for Christians in ministry, and for all Christians to remind us that judgment is fundamental to the message we proclaim so that we will not be ashamed of or neglect speaking about judgment. Indeed, I hope Christians will rejoice in judgment, not because they long for the punishment of others (since we pray and hope that all will be saved) but because judgment displays the holiness and goodness of God. Without judgment, God would not be good, and life on earth would be without meaning since our moral decisions would not ultimately matter.The Lord loves justice because his very person, his very nature, is just. He doesn’t love justice as something outside of himself.
If the Lord is righteous, loves righteousness, and rewards righteousness, then the converse follows as well. His love of righteousness also means that evil will be frowned on and punished.
Righteousness and goodness are compromised if evil is tolerated, ignored, and overlooked, especially when one has the power to resist wickedness. Even though judgment is often thought to be cruel, the opposite is the case. An authority who indulgently allows evil to occur without any consequence is not righteous but wicked.
As with holiness and righteousness, justice isn’t a virtue to which God conforms. Instead, God is just; he is intrinsically and inherently righteous so that justice constitutes God’s very being. Psalm 89:14 avers, “Righteousness and justice are the foundation of your throne.” Because God is just, we are not surprised to read that he loves justice (Ps. 33:5) and that he delights in justice (Jer. 9:24), which is really another way of saying that the Lord delights in himself.
Judgment doesn’t take place in a vacuum; it is not arbitrary, whimsical, or capricious. As we saw in the previous chapter, judgment takes place for a reason, and the reason is human sin. Sin deserves judgment: it denies God’s lordship, deforms human beings, wars against truth, and destroys human community.
God set up the universe to function as he willed, and he isn’t absent from the world he created. He is always and ever the personal God, recompensing both the righteous and wicked according to what is right. We see here an example of retributive justice in that punishment and iniquity are bound together in a package.
When we feel and sense that we deserve judgment, the beauty and loveliness of God’s mercy stands forth in all its splendor. Forgiveness isn’t cheap or trivial but precious and costly. In forgiving sinners God does not compromise his justice. The justice of God is satisfied in the atoning sacrifice of his Son.
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