Judgment

koot van wyk (DLitt et Phil; ThD)

Kyungpook National University

Sangju Campus

South Korea

Conjoint lecturer of Avondale College

Australia

3 September 2010

Judgment is considered by nearly all people as something negative. For most people it is a critical assessment of something or somebody. There will be good points and bad points. Good points will be welcomed with open arms but bad points will receive negative treatment by society. Nearly all people are doing their best to "stay out of trouble". The opposite is to be involved in some form of judgments, whether debt related, whether crime related, whether moral defects related, whether misunderstandings or interpersonal quarrels. It is like going to a doctor and sitting in the waiting room knowing that your time will come soon to receive your injection. You listen very carefully if anyone is screaming in there.

The Scripture was given by Christ to all the prophets and also Jesus had lots to say about judgment.

Even if you had zero debts and zero court case records on computer on this earth, there is a judgment awaiting all. The names, actions and whole life history of all is to appear in a judgment.

To use the words of Edward Heppenstall in Our High Priest chapter 6 paragraph 6, "there is accountability for all in the judgment" and he based it on the same words in Ecclessiastes 12:14. No one will escape judgment. Sorry.

There are some judgment passages in the Scriptures. Let us start with the classical one in John 5:24

"Truly, truly, I say to you that the one who hears My word and believes in the one Who sends Me, have everlasting life and into the judgment, he/she does not come, but has passed [metabebēken] out of death into the Life."

Does this means that for those who are in Christ, condemnation is removed and they are not coming into judgment and they will be a special dispensation of people who are not considered part of the "all" of Ecclessiastes 12 who will be in judgment? By no means.

The judgment of John 5 is after resurrection. That is very important. The person has been resurrected to live forever and not to die the second death which comes about by judgment.

John 5 also tells us that God the Father "gave Him authority [exousian] to do judgment, because He is the Son of Man" (John 5:27). This must ring a bell to all who read the Old Testament very well. There is a judgment scene in Daniel 7 that say just that:

"And I kept looking in the visions of the night, with the clouds of heaven, like the Son of Man was coming" and He came up to the Ancient of Days and was given "dominion [shulthan]" (Daniel 7:13-14).

The clouds of heaven Jesus associated with His second coming and anyone who has studied the book of Joel 2:1-11 will know that the same vivid scene is in mind. The clouds are the angels, "like the sound of chariots on the mountain-tops they leap" (Joel 2:5).

Because of receiving from God the Father the authority to carry out the judgment, we need to ask ourselves, in the context of the link between John 5 and Daniel 7, what kind of judgment authority did Christ receive? "His [Christ = Son of Man] kingdom is one which will not be destroyed" (Daniel 7:14). In the alternative, all wicked and evil kingdoms or agencies were destroyed (see Daniel 7:11-12). With them slain and destroyed in Hell or the Fire that the Old and New Testament are talking about, we know that all might serve Him (Daniel 7:14). Jude 1:14-15 links the angels coming "with many thousands of His Holy ones" (verse 14) with the judgment "to do judgment upon all and convict all those who are ungodly according to their ungodly works" (verse 15). He [Jude] definitely understood Daniel 7:13-14 very well.

This is very important. There is a day when the equilibrium of the whole universe will be restored. That is to say, after Hell. Christ came and died for us and supplies us with the essence and core of this victory. Slowly, all events follow His plans and the end will be when He will eradicate evil that is now dwelling on this earth.

Evil is now dwelling on this earth. This is a fundamental building block in our biblical view of ontology, the science of being. You can argue "I am, therefore I exist" or "I exist, therefore I am" until you are blue in the face, the reality of the Scripture is, "I am not alone". There is a crucial phrase in 1 John 5:19 that end with "For I know out of God we are, and the whole world lies in the evil one". This is very important. With this discussion of existence, must be the wider context of others who are out there, the Thou of the Universe, God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, last One who is assisting us here. But, also, are we surrounded with the evil one and his angels. They are not yet destroyed. They will be, in the executive judgment.

Coming back to John 5 and the statement that those who believe in Christ will not come into the judgment, this much we know, the believers will not come into the executive judgment.

When a criminal is executed, the verdict was already given and the court had already finished all their deliberations. By mere logic, we have to say that the Scriptures are following this logic and allocate to Christ a function to judge investigatively in a court scene. Such a scene is again depicted for Christ = Son of Man in Daniel 7:9-10.

The word in the Hebrew saying: "I kept looking until [ad] . . . . " (Daniel 7:9) is very time connected. It is a great divide in time and activity meaning that the time before that point in time and after that point in time is different. It is a major shift in what took place to what is now after this point taking place. It is schedule related. And especially the repetition of this particle ad in Daniel, as one can find also in the long period prophecy of the 2300 years in Daniel 8:14, confirms our guess, God has a schedule and a time frame for all events in events, whether in history in the past, contemporary events, or in future events. Nothing happens due to implosion or explosion of horizontal actions only. With explosion we do not mean killing anyone. God does not kill anyone. He did not spare His Son from the death on the cross but that does not make Him a killer. The Scripture is clear that God does not want anyone to die but that all might have everlasting life through His Son.

In this scene in Daniel 7:9-10, we have an Investigative Judgment set up and we are not wrong in connecting this ad = until of Daniel 7:9 with the ad = until of Daniel 8:14 when it says that after 2300 years the sanctuary shall be cleansed or pronounced righteous [nitsdag].

Edward Heppenstall says it well. God does not need a judgment to know who is saved (E. Heppenstall, Our High Priest chapter 6 paragraph 5).

The purpose of this judgment of Daniel 7:9-10 is to reveal to all who the saved really are (Heppenstall, chapter 6 paragraph 1).

The Great Controversy between Christ and Lucifer/Satan is the overarching theme of our existence or ontology. We are born into this controversy not sitting with the audience in a neutral zone, but on the field with the conflicting parties. That is why investigative Judgment is necessary before executive Judgment will eradicate evil. The unfallen angels and other unfallen worlds [remember Christ said that He has 99 other sheep that also belong to the fold], is part of the jury in this great Court in the Heavenly Sanctuary. Even the earthly tabernacle and sanctuary was judiciary related and atonement was a way to heal or repair broken relationships. The Torah or law was necessary to point out sin and wrongs and sacrifices of animals and of Christ is necessary to solve that problem. It does. Heppenstall warns us of complacency:

"Christ promised freedom from condemnation but not freedom from judgment in John 5:24" (Heppenstall Our High Priest chapter 6 paragraph 48). And this sums up the great truth

by Peter in 1 Peter 4:17

"For the time to begin the judgement from the house of God". The Judgement, the investigative one, will start with the house of God. The house of God expression may make some to think of the sanctuary or tabernacle, but Peter is talking about people, "but if first from us" meaning that the people like Peter and other faithful are standing under the umbrella of house of God.

It is one of the great contributions of prof. Johan Japp of Helderberg College Theological Department, that he suggested that what Christ is doing in the Heavenly Sanctuary for the Holy Ones or Peter's house of God, is in essence the removal of the stigma of sin from the saved. People are saved by Christ's blood as a free gift for their acceptance of Him as their savior, cleansed and promised eternal life. Christ becomes their advocate in this great court and their deeds or works, which is written in books, is opened in the court (see Daniel 7:9-10) for the heavenly beings to see. The result of all this is a cleansing of the sanctuary in Heaven from the stigma existing on the minds of observers who are then convinced that Christ's price, Christ's decision and their salvation is correctly secured.

As Ellen White also said in Great Controversy 480, the purpose is to atone for all who are shown to be entitled to the benefit of salvation.

Different than Calvinists, Seventh Day Adventists have a maximalist approach to the meaning of atonement and atone. Nothing is complete until all evil are eradicated. The deed on the cross is the essence and core of Atonement but more phases (nearly five) were to come. Atonement also means removal, the removal of the penalty of sin, the power of sin, the stigma of sin, the doubt of why saved ones are not in heaven, and finally the eradication of evil itself.

As long as we are grounded in Him as our anchor of faith, we have nothing to fear. He is our big brother Who will take care of all the necessary things on our behalf, and succeed.

Our Judge in Heaven

when our books

are opened for consideration,

confirm Your word

on our behalf

and remove the stigma

that our sins have created,

so that we can join

all the believers

in glorifying your Name.

Amen