Condemnation

Condemnation.

What you might expect from someone who was better than everyone else. I don't just mean better; I mean perfect.

And yet...

Romans 8:31b If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 33 Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Jesus will not condemn us. He will and is interceding for us.

His purpose was not condemnation, but salvation.

John 3:17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son.

Why is it so easy for us to cast the first stone? We are not without sin. Jesus was. And yet again he says "I do not condemn."

John 8:10 Jesus straightened up and asked her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?" 11 "No one, sir," she said. "Then neither do I condemn you," Jesus declared. "Go now and leave your life of sin."

Lord forgive me for every moment that I think I'm better, and that I should bring down judgment on someone else's mistakes and sins. Help me understand what it means to desire mercy and not sacrifice.