Unconditional Love and the Paradox of Judgment
Part 2
In Part 1 we explored the difference between common judgment that is healthy and the kind of judgment Jesus teaches us not to judge with. We saw how Jesus came into a world full of judgment in order to set us free from it as he specifically said he did not come to judge the world. The questions we will explore here are:
“What about God judging cities or nations? Isn’t that clear in the bible?”
“What about Jesus’ seemingly harsh treatment of religious leaders? Isn’t that judgment?
Let’s begin with whether Jesus, someone who teaches us not to judge, was then rejecting his own teaching and judging religious leaders.
Jesus continually taught that the measure of judgment people use would be measured back to them. This is important because it is not God measuring judgment back to people in a retributive sense but it is their own freedom to judge returning to them. One way to look at sin is to understand God does not punish sin because sin is its own punishment. People are punished by their sin, not by God (Psalm 103:10, 2 Cor 5:19, 1 John 14:8).
God seeks to free people from their own sin and judgment, and of course, their consequences.
The religious leaders were people who judged with a much larger measure of judgment than many because they claimed to know God or at least speak as ones who had authority on God. Jesus met them at their level of judgment to try to help them see its destructive nature. He wanted them to see how damaging their own reasoning was by their judgments of God, others, and themselves.
From a human perspective, God has to be a little stronger with these kinds of leaders because of the influence and authority they have over vulnerable people who believe them. If religious leaders are teaching people falsely about the nature of God, then those who listen to them can become twice removed from the reality of God’s nature. Not only are they starting from a foundation that is not who God is, they then build on top of that foundation with an authoritative narrative that double-walls or blinds them from reality in the name of God.
This is why he called some of those leaders “blind guides.” (Matt 15:13-14)
One time Jesus said:
“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single convert, and when you have succeeded, you make them twice as much a child of hell as you are.” - Mathew 23:15
I will explore that concept in deeper detail elsewhere, but here the basic point is: When you believe untruth about God, while zealously traveling and teaching that untruth to others in the name of God, you make people twice removed from Reality if they believe you! The more walls that are built up the stronger God appears to come in trying to tear down those walls to set people free. The more walls that are built up in judgment the greater the blindness to the nature of God and the greater the measure of destruction the fruit of judgment brings.
This is similar to what is happening today in what has become known as “deconstruction.” While there are unhealthy forms of deconstruction, this term can describe what God is doing in uprooting the untruth that has double-blinded people from who God actually is. Some judge others as falling away when they are actually turning away from what blind guides have taught them. As the first wall of blindness crumbles there remains the question of whether God’s nature is really Unconditional Love. How can one reconcile this nature of God with all the teaching that uses scriptures and authority to teach against it? Yet when one trusts God’s nature, the second wall comes tumbling down as no dividing wall remains between you and God.
“For he himself is our peace, who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility.” - Ephesians 2:14
This is what Jesus was doing. He was not judging people, but he was judging the dividing walls of hostility that people believed and taught to others. He knew the battle was not against flesh and blood, but against the false ideas people believe about judgment and the nature of God. When Jesus tears down walls it can feel like a judgment on those walls to those who think they should be there, but it is the kind of judgment that benefits everyone restoratively, as it is not retributive. However, those who value retributive judgment will reap what they sow since that is the freedom God gives them with the ability to be alienated from God in their minds and lives.
Let’s go a bit deeper inside this dynamic.
Once, Jesus entered a temple and some religious leaders came to challenge him as they did not believe the authority by which he did things (Matt 21:23-46). Jesus messed with them by asking some of his own questions they could not answer. Then he started telling stories to teach them about their heart.
In one story, he challenged them by pointing out that the kind of people they judged as unworthy of God were the kinds of people that were figuring out God’s nature before they were. Then he makes up a story about a master of a house who leased his vineyard to tenants. When the master eventually sent his servants to gather the fruit, the tenants beat and killed some of them. Then he sent his own son thinking they would respect him, but they killed him too, thinking they would get the master’s (God’s) inheritance through their judgment. Then Jesus asked them what they thought the owner and master of the vineyard would do to them when they returned? He answered them according to their own judgments, saying the master would kill them and give the vineyard to those who would bear the fruit of love and service instead of judgment and death.
When he finished, the religious leaders “knew he was speaking about them.”
It is really important to understand Jesus is dealing with “their projections” of who they think God to be in how they judged God and others. He is not saying that God is actually going to come and kill them, but he is saying that is what their idea of god would do, while also sharing the natural consequences of their judgments that will lead to death. He was trying to meet them on their level to get them to see how harmful their understanding was. These were the kinds of people who judged others so harshly that they would kill them. They eventually did by getting Jesus arrested and killed because this was the kind of people they were.
When Jesus was killed did God actually come and kill them?
No. Jesus forgave them just before his death after he had been tortured by their judgments. He uttered the words, “Father, forgive them they know not what they do.” You see, even when Jesus was sharing the parables, he was trying to help them see what they did not know. He was trying to free them from the judgments that will hurt others, and especially come back to hurt themselves, but they were not willing.
The religious leaders did not know their judgments blinded them to the nature of God’s love and forgiveness, and because of it, they were blind guides harming countless people by their religious ideas. They were double-blinding people from God’s nature in the name of God. They were also living in a time in history when the city of Jerusalem was about to experience one of the greatest judgments in the history of the world. This leads to our second question.
Does God Judge Cities?
“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! See, your house is left to you desolate.” - Matthew 23:37-38
Jesus consistently warned his direct audience of a coming situation in their world where wars were going to break out leading to the destruction of Jerusalem if they refused the ways that made for peace. But how often do humans listen to the call to not judge? This coming destruction would not be a judgment from God as God does not destroy cities. People do. History proves this again and again.
And it happened as Jesus said.
Around 70 AD, Jerusalem was attacked and destroyed by the Roman armies, including the beloved religious temple Jesus said would be left desolate. To understand the significance of the temple being destroyed cannot be described adequately. It would’ve felt like the death of God or a nation. In a sense it was. It was to be the death of a false god of judgment that had led to humans judging and hurting one another, while the true God was going to resurrect Jesus from the dead to prove a better story and a better Way. The resurrection revealed that judgment cannot actually kill God.
Love is stronger than death and Love never fails.
God was revealing that when the world judges each other, it leads to death and dysfunction, but there is a Way that makes for peace. God warns of the consequences of living in judgment. Again, this is not God judging. Humans judge another using different measurements, whether from petty judgments on appearances to greater measures of beating or killing others. Humans use death for power, while God uses death to show us a better and more powerful Way.
That better Way is Unconditional Love situated in non-judgment. It is laying down our judgments, hence our life, for others regardless of their judgments. It is becoming an unconditional human who lives in Reality instead of being double-blinded by judging others or by building our lives on religious ideas about God that are not true.
Let’s close with the following recap.
God teaches us not to judge because it is not in God’s nature to judge destructively like humans do.
God warns us of the consequences of judgment and sin, because we are punished by them and many will punish others for them. God seeks to set us free from this dysfunctional cycle.
God seems stricter with religious leaders who claim to speak for God because they do greater damage to themselves and others in their misconceptions of God’s nature. These leaders are addicted to judgment, the very thing that blinds them from God’s love. People who judge with greater measure typically need a greater measure of understanding their own dysfunction in order to be set free from it. However, Love covers all if one simply surrenders all.
God does not judge cities or nations, people do. God continually invites us to the Ways that make for peace if we are willing, which can avoid the destruction of lives and cities.
In part 3, we will talk about the Last Judgment and why it is important for how we live our lives here and now.
In Love,
Preston Hall
