I want to know what you think about robbery.
(I know, you get asked this all the time, but humor me!)
I know, it’s disgusting, isn’t it?
Atrocious.
But what about if it isn’t your house that’s been robbed? What if the thief had a good reason? What if he didn’t mean to offend or defraud his victim? What if he was merely taking what was his? What if he had no other choice?
Would you prosecute him? Would you sentence him to jail?
What would you do in this situation? Would you sit back and hope it would go away? What if you knew you had to make a decision? What if you knew the whole weight of justice rested on you?
What if you liked him?
My, now that would be some problem! Probably incurable, I’d reckon. Highly inconvenient, wouldn’t you say?
(I know I would say that if I was in that situation.)
Is it possible to be neutral toward the case and yet invested in it at the same time? God was…in your case.
He was fully committed to justice and fully committed to you at the same time. So God subjected His Son to the demands justice made of Him because of you. Jesus Christ represented the Father and He represented you.
For God He was divine and perfectly holy–honoring His Father in all things; for you He was human and tempted by all the pleasures of sin that would cause Him to disobey His Father.
But that is not what He did. The divine part of Him became the head of the human part of Him, directing it; and the human part of Him submitted to the divine part of Him, receiving the other. The two parts of Him worked together making His death and resurrection a pleasing restitution; even becoming the reconciliation of God and man.
So, despite the fact that God had no leniency in His judgments toward robbery, He loved you who robbed Him of His glory and authority in your life.
Yet how fitting that He would resolve the matter with His own “robbery” of heaven. He, who did not belong on earth among us, came down and made His home with us. All of heavens joys and abundance that He once so rightly enjoyed He forsook to claim your sin. Then, when your sin was dealt with, He rose to give Himself and all His inheritance away to you, if the robber should accept.
Isn’t that a joy?
At Home with God 