God’s Justification

By Odon Bulamba (24 January 2003)

We are going to talk about a common point, JUSTIFICATION! When someone is arrested the very first thing they do is justify themselves, Michael you broke the glass, no it wasn’t me, justification. Even a child justifies themselves in front of their parents, but why justify yourself? Is justification a synonym to being correct? If I steal Michael’s radio and Zoe saw me, she will tell her mum straight away. Although Zoe is young and accuses me I will have to justify myself. Sometimes our justifications can intimidate others, “Zoe shut up, if you carry on you’ll be punished”. We do this just to hide our sins. We won’t talk about this kind of justification but God’s justification.

There are 5 types of justifications in the Bible. 1. God’s justification. 2. Justification by faith. 3. God’s justification of life. 4. Justification by blood. 5. Justification by acts. We are going to talk about God’s justification. Since God created man, man has always been a sinner. Man didn’t obey God’s law but God still wanted a relationship with man, so He thought that it would be better if man was justified. What is justification? Justification is when someone pays the price for the mistake we have done.

God saw that man kept on sinning and as you know, Satan kept on accusing. Satan talked to God about man sinning all the time, so God said, “Who is going to pay the price?” God found that the price had to be paid by blood. God created man in His image so He didn’t want His image to be destroyed, so He chose for them to be redeemed. When a man sinned they had to kill an animal but this was not enough for God, although the blood covered the sin, the sin would still be there. God thought that it would be better for something to clean it completely so that He could forget that sin existed. So God asked a question in heaven, who is going to die for these people? Maybe Abraham said, “not me Lord I’ve had enough of earth”, maybe Noah said that he built a big ark on earth and now he is tired, maybe Adam said, “not me Lord I’ve had too much sweat already”. Everybody said no in heaven.

So the Bible said, who is going to free mankind? Even the Cherubim’s and angels were afraid to go. The Bible says that Jesus took up the offer. As above I said that the animal’s blood would cover the sins of man, but God was not satisfied with this. We as man sin everyday, we lie, ask God to forgive, then 5 minutes later we lie again. God is not happy with this, so what can remove this bad habit of lying in our lives? What can take away all the roots of sin in our lives? What are you going to sacrifice so that you can change your life? What can pay the price for our sins?

It is true that Jesus blood is with us but do you accept it or not? Sometimes we say to God that He created us weak so we blame Him for how we are, others say that with their nature they can’t change, to the point where thieves say thank you Lord because I wasn’t arrested. After all this God thought that there had to be something of great value to redeem our sins, unfortunately there was no one in heaven willing. Who accepted to justify us in heaven? Who accepted to die for man when God asked this question to everybody? Only Jesus accepted and Jesus Christ is the living God. Jesus is the Lord our God, it means that nobody accepted to die for man except God Himself.

The Bible says that God left His throne in John chapter 1. Jesus left the throne and bore the physical body we have so that He could justify and pay the price that man couldn’t pay. Because man doubts and asks how can God dwell on earth, God said He would be called Emmanuel, “God with us”. When God lived on earth people had ears but didn’t listen, they called Him the son of the carpenter, or Jesus of Nazareth but nobody called Him God.

How many times do we redeem what was lost in our lives? When you sin can you pay the price for this sin? Do you think about God’s justification? God asks us as living people to make a decision, when you say that your weakness is reading the Bible, God asks us to leave the throne where we sit and make that step forward. As God left His throne in heaven to come to earth, we also have to leave our throne and humiliate ourselves by coming before God. Kneel down and say to God, God from now on I will really learn the Bible; I want you to give me the ability so I can understand Your Word.

Christians want to pray like Billy Graham and perform miracles like Benny Hinn, but when it comes to kneeling down they say that their knees are sore. Christians always justify themselves when it comes to reading the Bible or praying, laziness and sleepiness are a common justification. When people go to church they fall asleep during the preaching but when it’s over their eyes are wide open, and when you ask them why they were asleep they say, “it’s too boring and it took along time”.

Divine justification asks us to fight against all these stumbling blocks so that the presence of God can be justified in us. When Jesus came to earth He accepted to die but because Jesus is God, God doesn’t die. (Reference John 18). Where was Jesus arrested? Gethsemane. How many times did He go to Gethsemane? Jesus use to go there often with His disciples, that’s why Judas knew where Jesus was when he betrayed Him. Who was with Judas at Gethsemane? Soldiers, Chief Priests and Pharisees. What were they carrying? Torches, Lanterns and weapons. Were they going to war or not? How can we justify this to a pagan? If a pagan asks you, if all these people came to arrest Jesus why didn’t they send 10 soldiers instead of a whole army?

They were afraid of Jesus; everything they had on them was to justify themselves. If they were attacked then they could use their weapons. This is the human justification that covers itself by defence. What did Jesus ask them? Who are you looking for? How many times does God ask you, “who are you looking for?” What is your answer? Oh God I’m looking for money, oh God I’m looking for friends, oh God I’m looking for a better life on earth. It is often rare for God to hear someone say, “I’m looking for you God”, this is sad but true.

What happened when the people asked they were looking for Jesus of Nazareth? Jesus answer made them fall. What happenned to the soldiers in the army, they were more ready for war than Jesus was, yet Jesus said 3 words and they fell? Was Jesus a magician? How can you explain it? Jesus knew their intentions and knew what question to ask them.

If we saw a crowd with weapons knowing they were coming to get us, what would we do? Flee in haste I think. When we cross a situation don’t justify yourself by fleeing the problem or asking 1000 questions about what you’re going through, just open your mouth and call on the name of Jesus Christ because in front of this name every knee will bow.

This is our divine Justification. When Satan attacks you, use the name of Jesus and he will flee. When you fight Satan do you cut him off completely so he can’t come back, or do you just cut off his ear like Peter did? Whose ear did Peter cut off?

Even though this high priest served God he still wanted God arrested, imagine that. How many times do we attack God? How many times do we threaten God with our actions? How many times do we live in confusion like Judas’ people? Sometimes preaches cut our ears which represents the sword but we wait for Jesus to heal our ear and carry on like nothing had happen.

When the preacher says change this and that, we as Christians think he is attacking us. So instead of accepting divine justification we justify ourselves against the Pastor or preacher. Because Jesus is love He keeps putting our ears back in place, it means that we have to keep on listening to the gospel for grace is still here, but one day it will be gone!

Do you accept to die for others? Do you accept to carry other people’s burdens to help them? God’s justification was to leave His throne in heaven to come down and die for us. How do we practice this divine justification? Do we leave our own interests for the interests of others? Do we stop praying for our own problems and start praying for other people’s problems? Do we have time to think about other people’s lives in the Lord? Why did Jesus come? Jesus came for you, why? Think about these questions. Think about why Jesus didn’t come for the Lions or Elephants who are stronger than us and think about why He didn’t come for the Gorillas or the trees that can live for 2000 years. So why would Jesus come for someone who is weak like you and me? How can you justify this? How can you justify Jesus giving His life for you and me? What can we as Christians give in exchange?

Sometimes we think we have all the answers, but that’s not the way. Learn things slowly and don’t be in a hurry. 6 years ago I asked a servant of God who was making a film about Jesus, and in it Jesus had nail cutters when He was washing His disciples feet. I thought, what could this teach us? I thought that nail cutters didn’t exist in Jesus time but in Ecclesiastes it is written that everything existing has already existed.

The Bible says that Jesus washed His disciples feet but it is not written that He cut their toenails. I told God’s servant to remove this part of the movie but he became angry, he wasn’t angry because he was right but because he was wrong. As Christians we must fight against anger when we are wrong. When a brother or sister comes to you when you have made a mistake accept it, this is divine justification. Jesus didn’t discuss with Pilate about the wrongs He was accused for, instead He accepted to give an answer later when the time was right. If you have been told you have made a mistake, humiliate yourself and repent, don’t discuss for anger is not a gift from the Holy Spirit.