“If God knows everything that will happen, how can we be accountable for our sins?” “If God knows we will sin, why would He create us just to punish us?” “Why would a loving God create laws that He knows can’t be kept? Does that mean He wants to punish us?” These are questions I’m often asked when evangelizing and they can be difficult to answer. Many of the answers can easily convict us and make unbelievers misunderstand God. Here, I will attempt to provide honest, biblical answers to these questions, explaining God’s justice.

The Bible tells us many of God’s attributes, and one of them is just. He has the right to judge and deliver justice to His creation. He created His eternal law to show our depravity without Him, to reflect on our requirement of Him. He is aware that we can’t perfectly follow His law, so that means we deserve the wages of our sin which is death. To let justice play out, someone needs to pay those wages, and for every person’s sins to be paid for, the payee needs to be innocent of the crime.

That was the purpose of Jesus coming to live a holy, perfect life: He paid the fine for all of us who accept the sacrifice to be washed clean of our sins. God did it this way so that He would still have righteous justice. For those who refuse Him: who don’t want a life with Him, He will let them suffer the consequences of their choices. For Lord God almighty will see justice play out… He will have His vengeance on sin.

To understand God’s justice, you first need to understand how bad sin truly is. Jesus tell us that even to lust for a person outside marriage, is committing adultery in your heart(Matthew 5:28). Even to be angry and hate a person is as if you have committed murder in your heart(Matthew 5:22). To a Holy God, our heart posture is most important: our Spiritual health is what matters. It doesn’t take much of this emotional and spiritual sin for it to turn into physical downfall. Cain’s anger got his brother murdered; David’s lust made Him commit adultery. Sin is serious in the eyes of our Holy, righteous God and He cannot let it continue in His presence. Justice must be had.

Isaiah 1:16-20

“Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; Put away the evil of your doings from before My eyes. Cease to do evil, Learn to do good; Seek justice, Rebuke the oppressor; Defend the fatherless, Plead for the widow. ‘Come now, and let us reason together,’ Says the Lord, ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, They shall be as white as snow; Though they are red like crimson, They shall be as wool. If you are willing and obedient, You shall eat the good of the land; But if you refuse and rebel, You shall be devoured by the sword’; For the mouth of the has spoken.”

• Do what is right in the Lord’s eyes; practice righteousness and be rewarded. Your sins will be forgiven and washed away by Jesus’ sacrifice and you can live your new life in righteousness.
• Obey the Lord: He knows what is right and best for every person. Obedience keeps you from practicing sin and helps you to draw near to Him. It can protect others around you as well! Only God understands every aspect of how our sin impacts those around us, so by obeying His will we can protect the people we care about.
• He tells us what rebellion causes — we know it even in our hearts, that’s why the world hates Him. Even those who don’t believe use His name as a curse word! We also, deep down, know the consequences because hell is often a concern with disbelievers. They continue to refuse Him and many will openly admit their concern and fear of the pit.

Micah 6:7-9

“Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of rams, Ten thousand rivers of oil? Shall I give my firstborn for my transgression, The fruit of my body for the sin of my soul? He has shown you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you But to do justly, To love mercy, And to walk humbly with your God? The Lord’s voice cries to the city— Wisdom shall see Your name: ‘Hear the rod! Who has appointed it?”

• Nothing we have can pay the fines for our sins. There is nothing we ourselves can do to please Him in return for what we have done wrong. Humble yourself before Him and see that only He is righteous and innocent enough to pay the wages of all our transgressions. He has the right to make the call and He did that day on Calvary’s cross!
• We know right from wrong — even man’s law reflects God’s!
• We should show and love mercy, something Jesus demonstrated to us. He embodied the fullness of the Godhead(Colossians 3), and showed the mercy of God. He embodied mercy and grace in the most full way: so love the Lord and His justice and you will love the mercy He showed in it.
• Wise men will recognize God’s mercy in the justice. He will see and respect God for who He is, thus also respecting God’s law. Wise men will fear God in the way He deserves.

Proverbs 21:15-16

“It is a joy for the just to do justice, but destruction will come to the workers of iniquity. A man who wanders from the way of understanding will rest in the assembly of the dead.”

• Those who practice righteousness enjoy justice— they enjoy seeing the righteous acts of God and love to live in the light. Though life isn’t necessarily easy, they will be rewarded by God and will have hope to cling to in the difficult times.
• By saying way of understanding, Solomon is talking about foresight and wisdom. By not thinking about the future, you live in the present, carnal flesh. The moment is temporary, but our souls are eternal. Focus on eternity and choose where you want to spend it: Accept God and humble yourself before Him and live in the light of His presence; refuse God and live in sin, dead in your trespasses, and die in the pit separated from His presence.

Just because God knows the decisions we will make, doesn’t mean He’s at fault for our choices. A just God will see evil be punished, otherwise there is no such thing as morals. We are still held accountable for our personal sin and still have to suffer the consequences of it. God wants us to choose whether we follow Him or not so that those who choose Him will not make the same choice that damned the devil and those who followed their own way with him. We will understand what it was like to suffer and not have a relationship with our Creator, so we wouldn’t want to make that choice again. Justice must be had come judgement day, and sin will be destroyed in the darkness of the pit of fire. Our choices still matter and can impact the way our eternity is. Choose the light today! Choose the One who brought mercy and grace into justice!

Isaiah 30:18

“Therefore the Lord will wait, that He may be gracious to you; And therefore He will be exalted, that He may have mercy on you. For the Lord is a God of justice; Blessed are all those who wait for Him.”

• The Lord is patient to have mercy on us, to wait for us to come to Him. He wants us to choose Him, not for us to be forced into the choice. He doesn’t want unwilling slaves, He wants a family!
• His name will be exalted forever for His mercy! He was willing to step down from Heaven for a time and sacrifice His own life so that we could have eternity with Him and so that justice would still prevail! His name is exalted from eternity to eternity!
• Jehovah is the God of justice, mercy, and salvation and He has made a way for all of His attributes, laws, and children to coexist in perfect unity.

Isaiah 61:8

“‘For I, the Lord , love justice; I hate robbery for burnt offering; I will direct their work in truth, And will make with them an everlasting covenant.”

• The Lord loves justice because it is right. Justice holds the balance between light and darkness, good and evil. As the God of such, He holds the balance and we should trust Him to make the right choice regarding our souls.
• The Lord works our deeds around so that it can be angled towards good. All our wrong doings can be moved so that someone else benefits from it. God knows exactly how to do that! For example: I have been abused and neglected by many of my close family members and instead of making the same choices, I decided to learn from their mistakes and attempt to be different. I take captive my thoughts in Jesus’ name (to the best of my ability) and try to make better choices.
• When we were dead all of our choices were as filthy rags to God, but now we live in righteousness and we can do the right things in God’s sight.

Psalm 37:28-33

“For the Lord loves justice, And does not forsake His saints; They are preserved forever, But the descendants of the wicked shall be cut off. The righteous shall inherit the land, And dwell in it forever. The mouth of the righteous speaks wisdom, And his tongue talks of justice. The law of his God is in his heart; None of his steps shall slide. The wicked watches the righteous, And seeks to slay him. The Lord will not leave him in his hand, Nor condemn him when he is judged.”

• The Lord loves justice, and all other things pertaining to His Holy attributes. He is set high above us and all things rely on Him and His mighty will. Because of His righteousness and Him being our Creator, He has every right to claim His vengeance on all things not of Himself (evil and darkness), and make the just choice to wage justice.
• He loves those who love Him and have accepted what He did to save us! He has never abandoned them! Occasionally, yes there is struggle, but there is a good reason for Him to allow it. He is right there beside us the whole time, even in the pain, and will be for eternity if we follow Him! https://wethepeopletestify.com/bible-study-loss/
• Righteous people live with the Spirit of truth, who gives them wisdom. We begin to understand God’s will a little more the closer we get to Him. The more we understand His ways is impacted more by how much we abide in Him.

Psalm 106:3

“Blessed are those who keep justice, And he who does righteousness at all times!”

• Since God is the only one worthy of claiming justice, we should trust Him to do so! Faith in Him, abiding in His presence and will, and forgiving those who have wronged you are a few ways to live righteously in His sight.
• Practicing righteousness instead of sin is making a habit of doing what God deems as right. Rather than regularly choosing sin, you are giving your life to living as Christ did. It’s not an easy walk but the Lord sees our efforts, knows our intent, and hears our prayers.

Proverbs 28:4-5

“Those who forsake the law praise the wicked, But such as keep the law contend with them. Evil men do not understand justice, But those who seek the Lord understand all.”

• By attempting to follow the law, you are choosing to honor God. It is through His Spirit we are no longer working in our dead trespasses. We now work by His Spirit in life, light, and love!
• Willfully living in sin dishonors God, and if you don’t know Jesus and have accepted the sacrifice He made, then you have to pay the wages yourself to make justice still apply. Yahweh is the God of justice, so for His will to play out, our debt has to be paid.
• Evil men have no want to understand God, or His ways and because of that, they can’t comprehend His justice.
• Relationship with God changes the way you see and comprehend things, so then you understand more of His ways. As you grow closer to Him, you begin to be more like Him and you will be able to know His will.

Jeremiah 22:3

“Thus says the Lord : ‘Execute judgment and righteousness, and deliver the plundered out of the hand of the oppressor. Do no wrong and do no violence to the stranger, the fatherless, or the widow, nor shed innocent blood in this place. “

• The Lord told Jeremiah to tell the Israelites to execute righteous judgement(justice) and to live justly. He tells us through the prophets and Jesus to love others, and to cherish the light and His presence.

Romans 3:23-24

“for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, “

• Every human besides Jesus has committed sins, something very serious in the sight of our Holy God. We all have fallen short of His standard and thus deserve to suffer the consequences of our actions. According to His word, the wages of sin is death, and that’s what we deserve.
• As the God of justice, it needs to play out within His will, so He sent Jesus to pay those debts that we could not pay while still surviving.

Galatians 6:7-8

“Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life. “

• God will pay us back for the good we do in our lives, giving us justice for all our good and bad deeds.
• Our Lord is just and righteous to give us what we deserve in His sight, as He is the ONLY one worthy of judging.
• He knows our intent as we are performing a deed and can tell if it is to please man or Him. We should strive to please Him as He is our Creator, Heavenly Father, and eternal judge.

“The only real argument against the Bible is an unholy life. When a man argues against the Word of God, follow Him home, and see if you cannot discover the reason of His enmity to the Word of the Lord. It lies in some sort of sin.” -Charles Spurgeon

Many argue against God’s justice, claiming all He wants is to “be in charge” and have a “power trip”. But if you look at their lives and the way they choose to live, what really is separating them from God? The answer is obvious: sin! They don’t want to change and they feel condemned by His law, but at the same time they likely don’t want to submit. They live in the flesh which is carnal and contrary to God. The flesh doesn’t care about eternity because it knows it will die, while the spirit within us yearns for more because it is eternal. God created them — created us all, so He has every right to judge us by His holy standards and laws. He objectively, from an omniscient viewpoint, knows what is right.

Romans 12:19

“Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath; for it is written, Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,’ says the Lord. “

• God is the only one with the right to have vengeance. He owns everyone and everything, He sets the standards, He is the omniscient one, so He is the one who can judge.
• Every sin is against Him because our very life is about Him. He has the right to claim the just payment for our shortcomings. He has the balance between good and evil, light and darkness on His shoulders, so He is the righteous judge of all.

1 John 1:9

“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. “

• He made a way within His will and law to be able to have just forgiveness. By paying the debt we could not afford to pay, He made it possible for us to have grace.
• He can’t dwell in sin because it is against His nature, so He made a way for us to be cleansed of it.

Amos 5:12-15

“For I know your manifold transgressions And your mighty sins: Afflicting the just and taking bribes; Diverting the poor from justice at the gate. Therefore the prudent keep silent at that time, For it is an evil time. Seek good and not evil, That you may live; So the Lord God of hosts will be with you, As you have spoken. Hate evil, love good; Establish justice in the gate. It may be that the Lord God of hosts Will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph.”

As you can see, His word gives more than enough examples of His righteous judgement and justice. His expectations transcend our abilities to follow them, and He is aware of that fact! But He has made a way through the sacrifice of His Son for justice to play out and for us to be forgiven. He is willing to forgive, all you have to do is submit to His will and give your life to Jesus! Put your faith in Him and experience His grace today!