“What if some did not believe? Will their unbelief make the faithfulness of God without effect? Certainly not! Indeed, let God be true but every man a liar. As it is written: ‘That you may be justified in Your words, and may overcome when You are judged’” (Rom. 3:3,4).
God is now accused by Satan of injustice and indifference, and even of cruelty. Thousands have echoed the charge. But the judgment will declare the righteousness of God. His character, as well as that of man, is on trial. In the judgment every act, both of God and man, that has been done since creation will be seen by all, in all its bearings. And when everything is seen in that perfect light, God will be acquitted of all wrongdoing, even by His enemies.
God is Himself on trial before the universe, and Satan and evil men have always charged Him with being unjust and arbitrary. But in the judgment all the universe will say, “Just and true are Thy ways, Thou King of saints” (Rev. 15:3 KJV).
Satan himself can never find any fault with the way of salvation as being in any sense unfair. He deceived and overcame man, as man stood in the glory and image of God with all the blessings and the power and the goodness of God on his side. Now, when this second Adam comes into human flesh at the point to which Satan had brought the whole race by sin, and in this weakness [He] enters upon the contest, Satan can never say that “You have an unfair advantage. You have come here with too strong a panoply about You, with too many safeguards, for it is to be a fair contest.” There stood Christ in the very weakness of the flesh to which Satan had brought man. And in that weakness our Brother won! He won it!
Thank the Lord!
When Jesus is crowned before the universe, then every knee from Lucifer unto the last man that has rejected Him, will also bow and confess that Jesus Christ is Lord; and they will do it to the glory of God the Father.
Waggoner, Waggoner on Romans, p.76
Waggoner, General Conference Bulletin, 1891, No. 2
Jones, General Conference Bulletin, 1895, pp. 447, 450
