God’s love based on righteousness restores free will to mankind

For sinners, sinning is not an option. People don’t become sinners through exercising their own free will. In fact, in the most fundamental of all issues, whether to be born in sin or perfection, mankind has had no free will to express itself. As a consequence, the provision of free will in all other matters, subject to the influence of inherited sin, becomes just a pathetic exercise in self-delusion and irrelevance.

The only exception to the futility of free will occurs, when the opportunity is presented to exercise it to put faith in Christ’s ransom sacrifice. All people have heard of the historical event, but it is only at the point of divine revelation of the meaning of this event in a person’s heart that he can truly exercise his free will to accept or reject Jesus. At this point God has discharged his righteous obligation to the person concerned. It is now up to the individual to do the right thing by God in accepting the propitiation, or appeasement offered in Christ’s sacrifice, putting faith in God’s goodness by imputing good motive to his selling mankind into slavery to sin, which had forestalled their exercise of free will.

Propitiation cannot be directed at a law or principle that has been violated, but only at a person who has been aggrieved, and whose trust has been broken. If there was some way for God - other than sacrificing his son - to undo the injustice done to all those of Adam’s offspring who, given a choice, would reject sin - being condemned to death through no fault of their own - Jesus would have persisted with his despairing plea: ‘Father, remove this cup from me.’

Yes theoretically all things are possible with God, but he chose to put his love for justice above even his love for the only-begotten son. That this is for the greater and eternal good of all creation will be manifested at the re-creation when God will undo all the suffering and misery that he has permitted, as he compensates people for the injustice and betrayal of being brought into existence in sin, instead of the innocence first given to Adam and Eve. The love of a God that loves anything, including himself, more than justice, would be utterly worthless! But the love of a God that has given evidence that he loves us more than his own soul is indeed compelling.

Treating God with partiality

God-botherers and self-appointed guardians of spiritual correctness, in their zeal to abolish the stumbling block of the torture stake of Jesus have been speaking unrighteousness and deceit for God himself, sycophantically treating him with partiality by contending for him at law all through the ages.

A case in point is when the sages in the east tried to reconcile the injustice of mankind’s suffering with the notion of a God that is just. How can God be righteous and yet permit injustice? They deemed it blasphemous to suggest that he was accountable for all the unrighteousness that he allowed. Seemingly defending God’s righteousness, they concluded that the suffering that happened to people must be their own fault, a just punishment for sins they committed in a previous lifetime, and from which it was their responsibility to extricate themselves through their own strenuous efforts in law-keeping and do-gooding.

Thus the teaching of re-incarnation came into existence where God does not need to provide a ransom for failing to protect mankind from the consequences of Adam’s sin. People could gain a righteous standing with God through taking personal responsibility for their lives, becoming eligible for praise according to how well they were doing in their self-improvement.

God didn’t owe anything to mankind other than to admire their virtue and will-power. Such too, was how the world of the Pharisees functioned, and all organised systems of worship all through the ages, right down to God’s people of today. In their rush to be offended, these ransom-obfuscators will soon be falling upon this stone of stumbling, and this rock-mass of offence will pulverise them.

Ungodly people to be declared righteous?

To the hasty thinker, ungodly people ought to be rejected by God for their ungodliness. How, then, can God declare the ungodly ones righteous simply by their putting faith in Jesus, without working their way up into God’s good graces? Even further, how can God himself be righteous in so doing? Isn’t he supposed to declare the godly ones righteous? This certainly flies in the face of perceived wisdom and righteousness, and can only be intelligible if it be admitted that God himself is responsible for subjecting mankind to this ungodly condition. Imperfect humans did nothing to become sinners, so why should they do anything to try and undo it?

Sin was imputed to them even before they were born, so why should not also righteousness be credited to them for believing that God shouldered his responsibility for our predicament by sending the exact representation of his very being to pay the price for our sin, both original and subsequent? God showed his implicit trust in us, that despite all evidence to the contrary, we would respond to his apology and put faith in his good motives, thereby justifying him through the ransom sacrifice of Jesus.

Yes the sacrifice covers our sin but also God’s omission of protecting us from inheriting it in the first place. In the heavens he arranged things so that one angel’s sin did not automatically condemn another, let alone all of them. In choosing not to protect mankind from wholesale disaster, he created an opportunity to demonstrate to all intelligent creation his love for justice upon which his love for them is eternally established. For not out of his own heart has he afflicted or does he grieve the sons of mankind.

God’s righteousness revealed

With the exercise of free will comes accountability and hence, culpability for any and all consequences such choices may lead to, especially as affecting others. This is a matter of moral responsibility, one that applies with even greater force to the originator of such ethical thinking, the Almighty himself.

Unlike humans, he is not limited in foreseeing even the most far reaching and minute consequences of his choices, be they acts of commission or omission, thus making his personal accountability infinite, in direct proportion to his foresight. His liability is as extensive as his might, as implied in his title The Allmighty!

He originated and committed himself to this code of ethical thinking, planting it deep also in our hearts. Satan is interested in obscuring this sense of justice, trying to invalidate the sacrifice of Jesus, by challenging the legal necessity for his death. Even the disciples of Jesus were slow to grasp that the Law of Moses made “it necessary for the Christ to suffer,” to become sin for us and to face its ultimate consequence, to be totally forsaken by his father, to experience the full wrath of God. (Lu.24:25, 26, 44; Mat.27:46)

Satan’s system tries to misrepresent God’s love as vain sentimentality, as if he can’t help himself indulging in this feel-good, unconditional, ego-pampering love that exists even between criminals, and that does not base itself on righteousness.

Along with this twisted sense of love comes a distortion of justice, fueled by pride, whereby people are lead to believe that it is perfectly just to suffer the consequences of Adam’s sin in their own bodies, thus assuming responsibility for the transgression of Adam. Now, we all suffer the consequences of Adam’s sin, but it is entirely an exercise of free will to give consent to this travesty of justice. Paul certainly disowned the inherited sin within him, recognizing it as, and blaming it for hijacking his so-called free will. Whose responsibility was it to rescue Paul from this injustice? Nobody but the very one who subjected him to this futility, even Jehovah God himself by revealing his righteousness, through the sacrifice of his son Jesus, appropriated through faith by Paul. Where, then, is the boasting? All glory to God! (Ro.7:14-20)

Those who are happy with suffering the consequences of inherited sin, this heritage of sin, are also likely pleased with sin itself and its temporary enjoyment and pride that it engenders – such people have no use for Christ to suffer for them, they are perfectly content to do so themselves. In fact, they are quite offended that someone should infringe on their free will and personal accountability by offering to carry this sin for them. Such ransom-deniers are seeking to establish their own righteousness, thereby invalidating God’s righteousness through the faith in Jesus Christ, promised before the founding of the world.