Judgment Day Delay? (with audio)

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God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie
(Romans 1:24-25 – ESV)

Often we hear that if people are not repentant then God is going to visit America with judgment, or the church with judgment, or many other variations on this theme. The truth is, judgment is already here, and that is why we see what we do.

In this text those who dishonored God were given up to dishonor themselves. The impurity Paul is speaking of in this text is mainly sexual, sensual disorder. This type of disorder is a prime example of spiritual disorder. In many lives this is the starting place for the downward slide. However, all the disorder we see in the world, in the social chaos, sexual confusion, and sinful carrying on are a judgment of God because we exchanged the value of God for other things; we turned our knowledge of God into images.

Now let’s get the order of this disorder right in our minds. People believe that we do these vile things we see, and so God is displeased, and He is, but the process is vice versa. God is displeased and we do these vile things as a result.

When God speaks of judgment, often it is not that God will lay His hand on us, but take it off us. He will leave us to our own depraved devices. The restraining power of God's grace is being lifted and man is being left to himself (a temporal and an ongoing fulfillment, a parallel of what we see in Romans 1:18-32). Judgment is here, the wrath of God is being incrementally revealed against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold down, or suppress, the truth with their unrighteousness. It is not that these vile things bring God's wrath, but that these vile things are signs of God's wrath. The Hand is coming off but some will be saved out of the midst of this corruption even as the whole is being damned.

When Paul wrote this it had happened before, but he says it was happening then, and it is happening now, the question is, is it happening to you? We make an image of God even as Christians and we serve and worship it instead of God as He has revealed Himself in the Bible, and we only see the Bible as we want to.

Get it right – It is idolatry first, immorality second. Everything sinful hinges upon this exchange in all its forms. We don’t like God as He chooses to reveal Himself, and/or we don’t like the restrictions God places upon us, and we create a god of our own image. Apply this to order your sanctification. Stop the idolatry first, and you’ll stop the sin. We want to stop the habitual sin first, so that we can please God, but we need to please God, and He will stop the habitual sin. Get the order right and you will be in order. We have habitual sin because of how we habitually see God. With God’s guidance you can judge yourself rightly, so don’t delay.

“Living For Today With An Eye For Tomorrow”©