Attributes of God - God is Righteous

We see many of the attributes of God reflected in humanity.  Righteousness however is an attribute that humanity does not seem to possess.  We are riddled with guilt from nearly the time of our birth.  We are selfish and violent.  If you doubt this, you need only visit a nursery school to be reassured of this fact.  There, you will witness children fighting over toys, over attention, and all too often fighting for reasons that do not seem to exist.  Stronger children often take toys from weaker children in a macabre survival-of-the-fittest display that is unfortunately reminiscent of the war-torn world that we live in.

Selfishness is the hallmark of the human condition.  Selfishness could be characterized as the polar opposite of righteousness.  Where selfish humanity is concerned with itself, righteous God is concerned with humanity, trapping Himself temporarily in the bonds of mortal flesh in order to free us from those same bonds.  In saving us, God commits the ultimate act of mercy by allowing us to choose to follow Him out of the failings of flesh and into the eternity that He has prepared or to continue on our own path that leads inevitably to an eternity solely in the company of oneself.  Apart from God, there can be found no joy, no companionship, no fellowship, just the horror of realizing an eternal separation from the source of all that is good.

It is worth remembering that it is not so much God sentencing people to eternal separation as allowing people to exist apart from Him.  A righteous God does not force us to love Him but gives us the choice to determine our own destinies.