Can God Be Judge?

Billions of the lost were scattered on a great plain before God’s throne. Some of them talked heatedly—not with cringing shame, but with belligerence.

“How can God judge us?” Said one. “What does He know about suffering?” Snapped a brunette.

She jerked back a sleeve to reveal a tattooed number from a Nazi concentration camp. “We endured terror, beatings, torture, and death!” In another group a black man lowered his collar. “What about this?”

He demanded, showing an ugly rope burn. “Lynched for no crime but being black!

We have been suffocated in slave ships, been snatched away from loved ones, and toiled till death gave release.” Far out across the surface of the land were hundreds of such groups. Each had a complaint against God for the evil and suffering He permitted in this world. How lucky was God to live in heaven where there was no weeping, no fear, no hunger; no hatred!

Indeed, what did God know about what man had been forced to endure in this world? So each group sent out a leader, chosen because he had suffered the most. There was a Jew, a black, an untouchable from India, an illegitimate, a person from Hiroshima, and one from a Siberian slave camp. There were others who had also suffered inhumanely from different ages.

So they gathered and consulted with each other. At last they were ready to present their case. It was rather simple: before God could qualify to be their judge, He must endure what they endured.

Their decision was that fairness demanded that God be sentenced to live on earth as a man! But since He was God, they set certain standards to be sure He could not use His divine powers to help Himself.

Let Him be born a Jew. Let the legitimacy of His birth be in question so that none can know who His father really is. Let Him stand for a cause so just, but so radical, that it brings down on Him the hate, condemnation, and efforts of every major traditional and established religious authority to eliminate Him.

Let Him try to describe what no man has ever seen, tasted, heard, or smelled. Let Him try to communicate God to man. Let Him be betrayed by His dearest friends. Let Him be indicted on false charges, tried before a prejudiced jury, and convicted by a cowardly judge.

Let Him see what it is to be terribly alone and completely abandoned by every living thing. Let him be tortured, and let Him die not an ordinary death, or a silent death, but as a common criminal!

As each leader announced his or her portion of the sentence, loud murmurs of approval went up from the great throngs of the people. But when the last had finished pronouncing sentence, there was a long silence.

No one uttered another word. No one moved. For suddenly, all knew. God had already served His sentence.