Isaiah 33:22–What Right Does God Have to Judge

Isaiah 33:22: "For the Lord is our judge; the Lord is our lawgiver; the Lord is our King; He will save us."

I hear this complaint more often than I can count about sin and justice.  Although it finds itself in many variations, it usually renders itself as something like this: "what right does God have to judge me?"

While it can be easily ascertained that the heart content of this protest is one of pride and deflection, its sincerity should not be quickly snubbed.  To be honest, it is a simple and good question to ask.  One that does demand a verdict of the highest order.

The answer comes to us, at least in large measure, in the above verse.  God, being the Creator of all creation–not the least which being humans–has it in His full rights as Creator to set certain parameters, specific guidelines for His creatures to adhere to.  We call them commandments and laws.

By virtue, then, of His position as the supreme Creator, He also takes the stand as supreme Judge. This means, most acutely, that God has the right to judge us as He sees fit.  The importance of this assertion cannot be overstated so I'll try to say it another way: God is not obligated to judge us by our own standards.

So, as we would like to be judge and jury of our own lives, when we face down the ultimate righteousness of God Almighty, we can only quake at the reality of that judgment and rest our hope not in our own goodness, but in His graciousness as a good and loving judge.

In the end the answer to the question "what right does God have to judge me?" is that God's right comes quite simply: He's God and we're not.  We should never, not ever forget this basic truth.