atonement/justice and forgiveness

Sorry, you lost me when you started arguing that condemnation and judgment are not about justice.

 

The reason choices don't make us righteous is because until we are glorified, none of them come from a perfectly righteous heart, so none of them come from perfectly righteous desires. Once we are glorified, then we will always make perfectly righteous choices from righteous heart with righteous desires. When we are glorified, our choices won't make us righteous, but they will certainly keep us righteous by always being righteous choices.

I'm not trying to squiggle. The law gives us knowledge of sin, yes, but sin includes more than just a list of things to do or not do. Nothing done without faith is pleasing to God. If we think something is wrong (even if it isn't) and we go ahead and do it, it is sin. (Romans 14).

The first commandment is a command to love God. If we don't love the Son, then we don't love the Father.

But to the extent that our desires are sinful, the choices that come from them are sinful.

 

We're just going to have to agree to disagree on this. First of all, rejecting Christ is always a sin. Those who love the Father love the Son. There are no innocent reasons for rejecting the Son.

Secondly, in the case of the work trip scenario, to the extent that the choice to go on the trip was made from wrong motives, the choice is sin. And our motives are never perfectly righteous in this world. There will always be a little bit of self-promotion, for instance, or bits of other sinful motives.

I assume you mean "Is God's wrath always an expression of his justice?" Yes. Justice means giving someone what they deserve. In the case of God's wrath, it's meting out the hurt (not the best term, but it's late, and I can't come up with a better one) that people's sin earns them. Since God will never give someone worse (or more hurt) than they deserve--that would be injustice--God's wrath is always in accord with perfect justice, and as such is the perfect expression of justice.

God will give people better than they deserve--that's grace--but never less than they deserve--that would be injustice. So on the benevolent side of things, he will give better than they deserve, but on the wrath side, never worse. If God poured out his wrath on people who had nothing left on their account for which the wrath was deserved--no crimes or demerit--then that would be unjust.

Revealing justice is expressing it. God expressed his justice in Christ on the cross, and to the extent that justice was actually satisfied on the cross, it will not (indeed cannot, if God is just) be expressed on the sinner.

Yes, it's because they suppressed the truth. But it's also because of their sin. Scripture attributes it to both, and I posted all the verses. It doesn't have to be one or the other, as if they are mutually exclusive. They can both be true.

 

Sometimes judgment is just deciding something. But even then, if God is just, the decision has to be in accord with justice. It can't be unjust.

But the sort of judgment we're talking about here is condemnation, and condemnation has everything to do with justice. Condemnation presupposes a crime for which the condemnation comes.

And as you say, paying twice would unbalance the scales. Yet in Romans 2, we're told that on the Day of Wrath, God will render to each person according to their works. The wrath of God on the disobedient will be giving them what they deserve for what they have done. They will be paying.

So either this passage is wrong, along with all the others that say God condemns or pours out wrath on people because of what they've done, or your interpretation of Hebrews 2:9 is wrong. Somethings not adding up.

Look at the New Testament. All those words--justification, justice, justify, just, righteous, righteousness come from the same word family, and in the case of just and righteous, and justice and righteousness, from the very same words. That's why, for instance, in Romans 3: 26, the ESV translates the words righteousness, just and justifier; the NIV uses justice, just, and one who justifies, and Young's Literal Translation says righteous, being righteous, and declaring righteous.

Mercy triumphs over justice? I'm not sure what you mean by this. Mercy is always given in a way that accords with justice. That's the whole point of Romans 3: 25 and 26. That's why Christ had to die: so God could give mercy in a way that is just. So that God could remain righteous and still give mercy to those of faith.