Advent: Day 7

Not only did God promise that His Messiah would be a prophet like Moses, but that He would also be a righteous Judge of the world, from the line of King David: 

1 There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse,
    and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit.
2 And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him,
    the Spirit of wisdom and understanding,
    the Spirit of counsel and might,
    the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord.
3 And his delight shall be in the fear of the Lord.
He shall not judge by what his eyes see,
    or decide disputes by what his ears hear,
4 but with righteousness he shall judge the poor,
    and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;
and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth,
    and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.
5 Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist,
    and faithfulness the belt of his loins. (Is. 11:1-5)

Our Savior is the Messiah who will Judge the world in righteousness. This is good news to the believer because we have been given His righteousness (Ro. 4:1ff) and are judged on the basis of that imputed righteousness (Ro. 5:12-21). Advent should remind us that for this to be good news, we must be in Christ. Those outside of Christ are also judged in righteousness, but since they are not righteous (Ro. 3:10-13), the righteous judgment on them is condemnation. It should remind us that we need to spread the good news of Christmas to the world.

By His Grace,
Taylor