So Sam Warburton was sent off in today’s RWV semi-final for a (semi) spear-tackle. Did the tackle warrant a red card or should it have just been yellow? There’s loads of debate in the papers and doubtless in the pubs and rugby clubs up and down the land. Whatever happened in the tackle and the ref’s on-the-spot decision, the best team lost and the whole British nation, not just the Welsh, were left trying to make sense of what seems like a great sporting injustice. On this judgement day, at the World Cup semi-final, the ref was found wanting, or was he? People will be talking about it for a while.
There will no such lack of judicial clarity on the great day of judgement. Every mouth will be shut tight, there will be no murmer of disapproval or post-match analysis, as God’s perfect justice is served.
Now we know that whatever the law says, it says to those who are under the law, so that every mouth my be silenced and the whole world held accountable to God. Romans 3:19
No one will emerge from God’s judgement day looking rosy. All will fall short. But more importantly, the ref won’t make any mistakes. God judges justly and will be seen to judge perfectly. We instinctively know this is true. That’s why we need a Saviour and that’s why Christ died on the cross; so that we might escape the perfect, inscrutible justice of God as we repent and place our trust in him.
