God the Judge

We have a pretty good idea of who is going to be saved. Or so we think. 

We look around at the horrible evils in the world, and we are certain those evildoers are not the kinds of persons God wants around Him for eternity. We're talking about the felons, yes, but we're also talking about the liberals...or the conservatives. The evangelicals or the charismatics. The men or the women. The seekers and the lost. 

We've got all kinds of categories of persons, based on our own perspectives and stories, who just aren't heaven material. At least, not as far as we understand God. 

But such an understanding - if you can even call it that - doesn't account for the vast majority of what God has to say about Himself, of what He told us we need to know about Him. 

One of those things we're supposed to know about Him - perhaps, when it comes to how we evaluate the persons around us and eternal salvation - is this: 

God is the only one who's gonna judge. And He's the only one who is gonna decide who He saves (James 4:12). 

Not you. Not me. Not the headlines. Not the church. Not the doctrine. Not the Bible as we have divided it, rightly or wrongly. None of that. 

Just God. 

And let me tell you something - 

God looks and He sees the sinner. He sees the liar and the worrier and the woman broken by sin. He sees the striver and the judgmental and the one drawn by the pleasures of the flesh. He sees the self-righteous, the righteously angry, the one just doing their best but falling woefully short anyway because that's how the wounded human heart just is, whether we like it or not. He sees the failure and the fearer and the tormented and the hurting. 

He sees her created in His own image, and His heart is moved with compassion. He sees all the barriers, all the brokenness, all the burdens, and still, He says - unlike so many of us - I can still save this one. I will save this one. 

And thank the Lord, for even with all my judgment, my perspective, my self-confidence, my utter arrogance about it, she is the one I also see...every time I look in the mirror.