2 Thess 1:5-10. Leave Plenty of Room for the Vengeance of the Lord.
length: 62:43 - taught on Jul, 19 2023
Class Outline:
Wednesday July 19, 2023
Theme: Vengeance is the Lord’s at His return when He will recompense the deeds of mankind.
It is very common for people to want revenge. It is very uncommon for people to forgive and give the grace that God gives to us all.
Years after her release, Corrie ten Boom had finished giving a talk in Munich. She had been giving many of these over the years, using her experience in a Nazi concentration camp as a background for the gospel. She spoke on how Christ died for all mankind and all who believed had their sins forgiven through the blood of Christ. After this particular talk a man came up to her to thank her. It was the guard at the prison who was assigned to the showers where the women were stripped naked and inspected. There he was, unmistakable. He held out his hand to thank her as he said, “How grateful I am for your message, Fraulein. To think that, as you say, He has washed my sins away.”
She relates in her book what she did. Before you read on, what would you do?
“And I, who had preached so often to the people the need to forgive, kept my hand at my side. Even as the angry, vengeful thoughts boiled through me, I saw the sin of them. Jesus Christ had died for this man; was I going to ask for more? ‘Lord Jesus,’ I prayed, ‘forgive me and help me to forgive him.’ I tried to smile, I struggled to raise my hand. I could not. I felt nothing, not the slightest spark of warmth or charity. And so again I breathed a silent prayer, ‘Jesus, I cannot forgive him. Give Your forgiveness.’ As I took his hand the most incredible thing happened. From my shoulder along my arm and through my hand, a current seemed to pass from me to him, while into my heart sprang a love for this stranger that almost overwhelmed me. And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world’s healing hinges, but on His. When He tells us to love our enemies, He gives, along with the command, the love itself.”
“And so I discovered that it is not on our forgiveness any more than on our goodness that the world’s healing hinges, but on His.” [Corrie ten Boom]
God requires this forgiveness of all of us [new humanity]. His forgiveness. [pic of Cavizel on a cross]
“But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, 28 bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. 29 "Whoever hits you on the cheek, offer him the other also; and whoever takes away your coat, do not withhold your shirt from him either. 30 Give to everyone who asks of you, and whoever takes away what is yours, do not demand it back. 31 Treat others the same way you want them to treat you. 32 If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. 33 If you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? [He literally says, “What you?”] For even sinners do the same. 34 If you lend to those from whom you expect to receive, what credit is that to you? Even sinners lend to sinners in order to receive back the same amount. 35 But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for He Himself is kind to ungrateful and evil men. 36 Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”
Be as merciful as your Father. Be perfect as your Father in heaven is perfect. Your reward will be great. You are just going to have to do it if you want to see what the reward is.
We ought always to give thanks to God for you, brethren, as is only fitting, because your faith is greatly enlarged, and the love of each one of you toward one another grows ever greater; 4 therefore, we ourselves speak proudly of you among the churches of God for your perseverance and faith in the midst of all your persecutions and afflictions which you endure. 5 This is [Here is] a plain indication of God's righteous judgment so that you will be [or “for the purpose”] considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which indeed you are suffering.
For after all it is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you, 7 and to give relief to you who are afflicted and to us as well when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, 8 dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.
Repay - literally means to give back in return or deliver back.
Vengeance is the Lord’s (DEU 32:35).
But here we are shown both forms of recompense - rest and eternal life in the kingdom, as well as, affliction.
Both forms of recompense (to the evil and the good) find echoes in Isa 66 and Psa 137.
Thus says the Lord,
"Heaven is My throne and the earth is My footstool.
Where then is a house you could build for Me?
And where is a place that I may rest?
2 "For My hand made all these things,
Thus all these things came into being," declares the Lord.
"But to this one I will look,
To him who is humble and contrite of spirit, and who trembles at My word.
3 "But he who kills an ox is like one who slays a man;
He who sacrifices a lamb is like the one who breaks a dog's neck;
He who offers a grain offering is like one who offers swine's blood;
He who burns incense is like the one who blesses an idol.
As they have chosen their own ways,
And their soul delights in their abominations,
4 So I will choose their punishments
And will bring on them what they dread.
Because I called, but no one answered;
I spoke, but they did not listen.
And they did evil in My sight
And chose that in which I did not delight."
5 Hear the word of the Lord, you who tremble at His word:
"Your brothers who hate you, who exclude you for My name's sake,
Psa 137
By the rivers of Babylon,
There we sat down and wept,
When we remembered Zion.
2 Upon the willows in the midst of it
We hung our harps.
3 For there our captors demanded of us songs,
And our tormentors mirth, saying,
"Sing us one of the songs of Zion."
4 How can we sing the Lord's song
In a foreign land?
5 If I forget you, O Jerusalem,
May my right hand forget her skill.
6 May my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth
If I do not remember you,
If I do not exalt Jerusalem
Above my chief joy.
7 Remember, O Lord, against the sons of Edom
The day of Jerusalem,
Who said, "Raze it, raze it
To its very foundation."
8 O daughter of Babylon, you devastated one,
How blessed will be the one who repays you
With the recompense with which you have repaid us.
9 How blessed will be the one who seizes and dashes your little ones
Against the rock.
There will be tribulation and distress for every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Greek, 10 but glory and honor and peace to everyone who does good, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 11 For there is no partiality with God.
And lovingkindness is Yours, O Lord,
For You recompense a man according to his work.
If you say, "See, we did not know this,"
Does He not consider it who weighs the hearts?
And does He not know it who keeps your soul?
And will He not render to man according to his work?
Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. 25 For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. 26 For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? 27 For the Son of Man is going to come in the glory of His Father with His angels, and WILL THEN REPAY EVERY MAN ACCORDING TO HIS DEEDS.”
Until God repays, we must forgive, do good to all (even our enemies), pray for all, and not take our own revenge.
Let’s look at an OT example in David. There is a situation with a man who is evil. His name was Nabal and his wife’s name was Abigail.
“Please give whatever you find at hand to your servants and to your son David.”
Nabal says no.
Now David had said, "Surely in vain I have guarded all that this man has in the wilderness, so that nothing was missed of all that belonged to him; and he has returned me evil for good. 22 "May God do so to the enemies of David, and more also, if by morning I leave as much as one male of any who belong to him."
Abigail travels to intercept David and stops him. She appeals to his faith that God should take vengeance.
“Now therefore, my lord, as the Lord lives, and as your soul lives, since the Lord has restrained you from shedding blood, and from avenging yourself by your own hand, now then let your enemies and those who seek evil against my lord, be as Nabal. 27 Now let this gift which your maidservant has brought to my lord be given to the young men who accompany my lord. 28 Please forgive the transgression of your maidservant; for the Lord will certainly make for my lord an enduring house, because my lord is fighting the battles of the Lord, and evil will not be found in you all your days. 29 Should anyone rise up to pursue you and to seek your life, then the life of my lord shall be bound in the bundle of the living with the Lord your God; but the lives of your enemies He will sling out as from the hollow of a sling. 30 And when the Lord does for my lord according to all the good that He has spoken concerning you, and appoints you ruler over Israel, 31 this will not cause grief or a troubled heart to my lord, both by having shed blood without cause and by my lord having avenged himself. When the Lord deals well with my lord, then remember your maidservant.”
David realizes that the Lord sent Abigail to stop him from doing something very stupid.
Then David said to Abigail, “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, who sent you this day to meet me, 33 and blessed be your discernment, and blessed be you, who have kept me this day from bloodshed and from avenging myself by my own hand. 34 Nevertheless, as the Lord God of Israel lives, who has restrained me from harming you, unless you had come quickly to meet me, surely there would not have been left to Nabal until the morning light as much as one male.” 35 So David received from her hand what she had brought him and said to her, “Go up to your house in peace. See, I have listened to you and granted your request.”
And God took care of Nabal as He takes care of everything.
Then Abigail came to Nabal, and behold, he was holding a feast in his house, like the feast of a king. And Nabal's heart was merry within him, for he was very drunk; so she did not tell him anything at all until the morning light. 37 But in the morning, when the wine had gone out of Nabal, his wife told him these things, and his heart died within him so that he became as a stone. 38 About ten days later, the Lord struck Nabal and he died.
God will equitably deal with every person eventually. We are to love and forgive and leave vengeance to Him.
The Lord’s coming is imminent.
Most of us are not put in Corrie ten Boom’s position, but all of us frequently face the temptation to seek vengeance on our enemies. We are not allowed to think it or entertain it. It is sin to us.
Our faith has to put all repayment in the hands of the Lord and know that He will do it. It is not a matter of if but of when.
And as Corrie discovered, it is not our own forgiveness that is needed, but Jesus.’ She prayed for His forgiveness and acknowledged that He had to do it in her. But then, she didn’t wait for Him to force her to put out her hand. She didn’t lose consciousness. Once she understood that she had to forgive someone whom Christ had died for and forgiven, she went forward with faith and courage and extended her hand to her oppressor. And when she did, she found that she had a love for him that overwhelmed her, because it was Christ’s love.
There will be no enemies in heaven. There will be no need to forgive there. Jesus said that our reward would be great.
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