The captivating gospel of Christ turns upside down the way we have thought about God and ourselves. God, who we typically fear because we believe he is angry and eager to smite us, is actually eternally loving and full of mercy, even for our worst offenses.
Likewise, we often believe ourselves to be those who are loathed by God because we have sinned. However, we are told that we are God’s beloved children despite our mistakes. This is not what we expect, but the inversion of our assumptions.
The essence of the gospel message is that God has saved us though we did not ask for such mercy. Our rescue is pure gift. In fact, we were dead when this took place and were the enemies of God, upon whom God brings his judgment.
This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil. John 3:19
Notice carefully how this verse subverts our understanding of judgment. Look at what Jesus says judgment is. The judgment is that the Light has come into the world! How did we miss this and dread the judgment?
Let’s be clear, the judgment is not divine condemnation because humans have loved darkness. Jesus is not saying that judgment comes because of our love of darkness, though we almost always focus here and ignore the actual definition. We tend to read past the judgment being the coming of the Light, Jesus.
Loving darkness is our reaction and response to the coming of the Light, but the Light coming is the judgment of God. The point is that God’s way of judging a sinful world is to send Jesus as the Light into the darkness. The coming of the Light reveals and condemns what is evil, but is also the saving remedy for blinded humanity.
Now judgment is upon this world; now the ruler of this world will be cast out. And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to Myself. John 12:31-32
The theology of God’s judgment in John’s gospel destroys our assumptions if we actually see what he is saying. Jesus calls his cross the judgment of the world, because he said these words above when he announced that his “hour” had come, the time of his glorification. As he ascends to the cross to be seated on the right hand of God in glory, the world receives God’s judgment, Satan is defeated, and all men are drawn to Jesus.
God’s judgment upon a sinful world is the cross of Christ, just as it earlier in the gospel is defined as the Light shining in the darkness for our salvation. What we see here is in harmony with what I wrote last week, that judgment is God’s invitation.
With the revelation of God’s true character and self in the person of Jesus, judgment is no longer something to fear. God’s judgment is that Jesus comes to be our Light and ascends the cross for our healing.
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