“Since, therefore, we have now been justified by His blood, much more shall we be saved by Him from the wrath of God.”
Romans 5:9 ESV
It is easy and somewhat comforting to use Old Testament scripture—particularly 2 Chronicles 7:13 & 14— to interpret our circumstances.
But using these scriptures this way is taking them out of context. Those are Old Testament scriptures where God was speaking to Solomon about the Israelites who had repeatedly forsaken Him. Is there a lesson here for us to learn?
Absolutely. God was always faithful to His people, accepting and loving them even in their sin and He is a person of His Word—He brought judgment for their sin. So, let’s learn from that but that is not where the story ends. We can’t stop in the middle of the Old Testament and use that to interpret the circumstances around us today. The scripture keeps going and years later God brought the Messiah that He promised—the Son of David—that saved His people from their sin and His judgment. In the New Testament, Christ was crucified—nailed to a cross—and all of God‘s judgment for sin was poured out upon Him. (Romans 5:8-9, 1 John 4:10, 1John 2:2, 2 Corinthians 5:21)
So, God is no longer judging sin. He judged it at the cross.
The only people that will now have to deal with the eternal consequences of sin are those people that reject Jesus. (Romans 2:5) The New Testament explains that although we will face trials and troubles in this fallen world, God is not doing this nor judging His people.
We need to maintain a repentant heart and we need to surrender to Him. We need to seek Him on a daily basis. We need to pursue holiness and all of the things that He talks about in the New Testament. But when we are born again—when we are His, we want to do that from our new heart and spirit.
Can troubled times help us see our need for God and bring sinners to Him? Absolutely. But according to scripture, troubled times are not punishment for our sins or unrepentance.
There will be plagues and such brought to the earth and things that will happen at the end during the Daniel’s 70th week when God is yet again dealing with Israel for His final time. We can get all the details of this in the books of Daniel and Revelation.
But it’s counterproductive to our testimony and our faith to believe and to tell the world and the New Testament Church that He is bringing coronavirus and locusts and other forms of judgment to the earth at this point.
New Testament scripture shows us that God has not taken anything away from us except for the eternal judgment of our sin. And now we have the choice to accept that free gift and all of of His promises that go along with this newborn life.
Pray and study the scripture in context for yourself. God is just and He does not make us pay for our sin when He already judged Christ for it.
“Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more, so that, as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Romans 5:20-21 ESV
The Offense of the Cross 