2007 picture of Ray Sparre

Insightful Musings on the Scriptures

by

Raymond P. Sparre
Northwest University class of '67



July 5, 2012

Good morning, special ones.

Beautiful morning out there. I need to hurry again…as a lady is coming by any minute carrying a black walnut log in her pickup. She’s wanting me to zip it up into some form for drying and furniture making.

Our hands are still full overseeing these grandkids. I sure was pumped with urgency during our breakfast time devotional. What a challenge to successfully impart Biblical principles of godliness and wisdom to minds that habitually operate in the other direction. Lord, help us!

May your day be overshadowed by His approval and blessing.

Love, Dad/Ray


05 July
2 Thessalonians 1
“God is just.” 2 Thessalonians 1:6.

Only three little words, GOD IS JUST, but the message contains a tremendous amount of valuable information and inspiration that should serve as a kind of anchor for our faith. Say it again: GOD IS JUST. You and I are entirely right to not only tremble at the thought, but also recognize with deep gratitude the grace and security this truth affords.

Let’s make it as an exercise to process this truth by emphasizing its three word parts:

GOD is just. It is His nature to be just. And He has every right to impose that standard upon His creation. Yet man is unjust, by the spoiling influence of his sin nature. Isaiah gives a description of the affairs of unregenerate man: “No one calls for justice; no one pleads his case with integrity. They rely on empty arguments and speak lies; they conceive trouble and give birth to evil” (Isaiah 59:4). Can you see, then, why God’s Word is so vitally important? It is man’s only hope! Psalm 19 says that “The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul…The ordinances of the Lord are sure and altogether righteous” (Psalm 19:7-11). Peter declares that by our proper absorption of God’s Word, we can actually “participate in the divine nature and escape the corruption in the world caused by evil desires” (2 Peter. 1:4).

God IS just. It’s not that God has been just in the historical past, or that He will be in the future. He IS just right now in spite of how things may appear. Little ignorant men often accuse God of being unjust, or at least uncaring. They complain, “If God is fair and just, how can He permit all this corruption and injustice to prevail in the world? How could a just God allow my teenage daughter to be kidnapped and abused? How could He tolerate my father being killed by a drunk driver?” I certainly don’t like what I recently read that “less than 2% of street crimes in New York city are brought to justice.” Sometimes the world looks like a chaotic mess of injustice. But we need to back off and reckon that history is HIS STORY—and His story is not finished yet. He says, “I will repay” (Romans 12:17-19). And that’s that!

God IS just. It’s not that God has been just in the historical past, or that He will be in the future. He IS just right now in spite of how things may appear. Little ignorant men often accuse God of being unjust, or at least uncaring. They complain, “If God is fair and just, how can He permit all this corruption and injustice to prevail in the world? How could a just God allow my teenage daughter to be kidnapped and abused? How could He tolerate my father being killed by a drunk driver?” I certainly don’t like what I recently read that “less than 2% of street crimes in New York city are brought to justice.” Sometimes the world looks like a chaotic mess of injustice. But we need to back off and reckon that history is HIS STORY—and His story is not finished yet. He says, “I will repay” (Romans 12:17-19). And that’s that!


“Never be diverted from the truth by what you would like to believe.”