Fully Just. Fully Love.
A Transformational Truth for Easter Sunday
“Then the angel spoke to the women. “Don’t be afraid!” he said. “I know you are looking for Jesus, who was crucified. He isn’t here! He is risen from the dead, just as he said would happen. Come, see where his body was lying. And now, go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and he is going ahead of you to Galilee. You will see him there. Remember what I have told you.”
—Matthew 28:5-7
HE IS RISEN!
(He is risen, indeed!)
I can hear the echoes of the church in response to the pastor’s exhortation as I have year after year. Maybe you’ll hear it today, too. It’s a beautiful response—albeit maybe a cheesy “Christianese” saying—because it encompasses so much in one four-syllable phrase.
God is active, living, moving, and breathing. He came to us in human form to live among us, die for us, and defeat death once and for all so He could be with us for eternity.
Christ may have died the most gruesome death on the cross, but, true to His word, the grave couldn’t hold him. He is ALIVE. In God’s kingdom, death is not the end.
NOTHING has power over our God, and therefore, nothing can separate us from His love and victory.
From the beginning, God’s goal was a relationship with you, and this was the best avenue to accomplish that.
You may wonder why it had to happen this way. Why did God send Jesus to die for our sins to take the punishment we deserved, if God is the one who ultimately has control over everything? Couldn’t God just snap His fingers and decide we’re clean from our sins so we can be with Him?
“But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was on him,
and by his wounds we are healed.”
—Isaiah 53:5
Today’s culture loves to think about the loving God who created this world and all the living creatures in it. The God who came down to earth to be with us and gave us freedom and eternal life in Heaven.
Some people don’t like to think about that same God as a completely just King who is so holy He must enact justice on all. Do not miss that—it is the SAME GOD.
I’ll keep this brief so you can get to your Easter festivities.
Without God’s justice, He is not fully loving.
If God IS love, then He must also be fully just.
Justice and love cannot exist without the other. What kind of loving father would let one child get away with killing another without any punishment? While at the same time, what kind of loving father (and I am talking about the purest form of love here) would refuse to give the child who killed their sibling a chance to be redeemed?
After all, that child is still his beloved, and if reconciliation and healing are possible, wouldn’t that be the most desirable route? Simply dismissing the sin is not just, and that would not be loving to the child wronged. There has to be another way.
God’s justice enacted throughout all Scripture reveals the intrinsic characteristic of love because love demands justice for the oppressed, for the neglected, for the abused, for the faithful, and even for the unfaithful at times. God’s judgment of humanity’s sins through the life and death of His son, Jesus, reveals His characteristic of love because it was a way for justice to be enacted THROUGH the greatest example of love.
The alternative was an eternity apart from God because He cannot be in the company of our unholiness. As we see throughout the narrative of Scripture, God created us to be in relationship and closeness with Him—love—so He needed a resolution to the impending separation—justice.
This is Resurrection Sunday. We know Jesus came and died for our sins, took the weight of judgment upon Himself, and conquered death for our benefit.
The resurrection is the epitome of loving justice, the only representation of true, pure, holy, and incomparable loving justice that we’ll ever know.
It would have been just for us to die and spend eternity apart from God because of our sin, but it would not be an expression of the fullness of love if there were no other alternative. Because love keeps no record of wrongs.
It would have been just for Jesus to have been released instead of Barabbas. But His love for us stood in the gap where human justice lacked and said, “I’ll suffer so they don’t have to.” Therefore, we were justified through love like no other.
It would not, however, have been just or loving for Jesus to stay buried. In order to complete the greatest act of love and justice, death could not have the last word.
When I said “keep this brief” you didn’t think I meant THAT brief, right? This is not a brief recollection. This is the most revolutionary relationship ever witnessed, the most present and compassionate God ever experienced, and I hope you don’t get lost in the brevity that is our current cultural expression of Easter.
May God gently tug at your heart as you celebrate today to remember the sacrifice, receive the unearned grace, and rest in the goodness of our Savior who draws near, justifies us to Himself, and invites us into the abundant life of freedom, light, and love.
God is worthy because of who He is. He deemed you worth it because of who He created you to be. We praise the living King today and forevermore!
HE IS RISEN!
(He is risen, indeed!)
From the Blog
Since you wrote this before the Easter service I’m so impressed how closely you mirrored the sermon. I mean it shows you’re such a trustworthy author ✍️ as well!