How God Views Sin

The justice of God is something most people really struggle to understand, but I think I’ve found an analogy that may help.

In baseball, we all know that a batter can fail nearly seven times out of ten and still go to the hall of fame. Even pitchers or managers can lose almost half the time and still, if they do that for long enough, go to the hall of fame. Baseball, you might say, is a sport with an extremely low threshold for greatness for everyone on the field. Everyone, that is, except for one: the umpire.

We expect umpires to be perfect. And if they make zero mistakes, they aren’t praised for it. That’s expected. But if, as often happens, they make a big one, that single error can come to define an entire umpiring career. This was the case when Jim Joyce missed the call at first to rob Armando Galarraga of baseball’s 21st perfect game last summer. Despite being widely known as a great umpire, this will likely be his legacy in baseball.

As near as I can tell, that’s how intolerant God is of sin in us.