Posted on by consideringthebibletogether

Names of God – APPOINTED JUDGE – 39

My hope is that this series will offer my readers a chance to consider the names, characteristics and descriptions of our God in the Word.

The remaining Names of God in this series might be considered descriptors, or characteristics of the Lord. We have reviewed the three primary Names of God, along with nineteen compound Names of God in our previous posts. As we venture through these descriptors of our God, I hope we will recognize all the many characteristics of our God that we tend to take for granted.

The Word is truly rich with descriptions of the Living God, and this effort of searching in the Word was quite illuminating. He truly is the ultimate subject of the Word, and His revelation of self-descriptions, or the accolades offered Him by His priests, prophets, kings apostles and faithful truly is a blessing.

May the Name of the Lord be praised, and by thinking on His name, may you have a blessed day.

39
 
APPOINTED JUDGE
 
Acts 10:42 And he commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead.
Our last post we saw that Jesus is the appointed heir of all things, and we are now presented with Jesus as the One named the appointed Judge of the living and the dead.

Yet this appointed position, if I understand correctly, is the position the Son of God shared with the Father in His preincarnate state. Was He not the One who spoke to the people of Israel previous to Bethlehem? Was He not actively involved in determining the actions of the Godhead in bringing judgements upon the nation as they fell into sin over and over again.

I would suggest that the Son of God, from creation to the cradle has been judge. 

The difference in this passage, where Peter preaches to the Gentiles of the good news, is that the Gentiles did not clearly understand the truth of the eternal God as judge. An even greater mystery now being declared by Peter was that the eternal God has now taken flesh, and through His death and resurrection, has been provided the sole responsibility of performing judgement upon both the living and the dead.

No longer do we have to wonder about the character of our Judge, for He is the One who was crucified for us, who not only was buried, but was raised again to take on the judgement of the world.

The term appointed also describes the limits, or boundaries of the “office” He has attained to. He is the judge of both the living and the dead.

It is one thing to judge a situation theoretically, but we can not claim this is the manner in which Jesus judges the living and the dead, for He has entered our life condition, and passed through the experience of death. 

Peter was declaring to the Gentiles the single Judge they would have to come before, and that this lone Judge was One who had experienced both life and death. Judgement for both the living and the dead must be entered into, and while we are alive and breathing, we have the opportunity to come before the Judge to seek His mercy, experience His correction and find understanding and direction for our lives.

He is our appointed Judge, and we should thank the Lord every day for such a compassionate and loving Savior. We have come before the Judge of all and the Mediator of the New Covenant. 

Listen to Him.

Hebrews 12:22-25a
But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.
See that you do not refuse him who is speaking.

Listen to Him. He is the appointed Judge.

I would love to hear of your favorite name, characteristic or description of the Living God. Please leave me a comment, and I will include it in the list!

Thanks again for coming to visit. I hope you found something of interest in this post and would appreciate a comment, to begin a discussion. If you know someone this blog may bless (or challenge), send them a link, so they may join us in our discussion.

Come join us at Considering the Bible