I take no pleasure in the death of the wicked man, says the Lord, but rather in his conversion that he may live.
I remember this from the prologue to the Rule of St Benedict,
which I first read about 25 years ago.
It is completely upsidedown from the usual perspective. I can't tell you how many times I've heard people talk about God as though he were a policeman. For the phrase "God is watching you," they seem to think that He's looking for an opportunity to send us to Hell.
It's as though they thought God was saying "Aha! I've caught you now. Now you're going to Hell."
But that is the complete opposite of the situation.
If God willed the death of the sinner, he would be dead already. In fact all of us would be dead already.
If He desired the death of the sinner, he would never have sent Jesus into the world to save us! For the surest way to be certain that the sinner dies (and we must address what 'dies' means) is to not send Jesus into the world.
Without Jesus, we don't stand the chance of a snowflake in Hell.
You see, as Jesus says (John 3:17):
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn* the world, but that the world might be saved through him.lGod isn't watching us to catch us sinning, and send us to Hell. No, He watches us, and comes to our aid, to save us from the eternal consequences of sin: death.
Death: the opposite of Life. It was so that we might have life, and have it to the full, that Jesus came into the world. And what is Eternal life?
To know the only true God, and him whom He has sent, Jesus Christ.
On this day let us turn from our immoral acts, repenting of our sins, because God does not desire the death of the sinner, but that he should repent and live. Let us repent of our immoral acts, clinging to the Cross of Christ, that we may come to immortality, and rest in the hands of God where no torment may touch us.
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