Throw the First Stone?

This is a bit of a follow up on an earlier post, but I feel that it is much more relevant now than ever. Today my youth pastor challenged me a bit with a bit of an extreme example to get my attention. Today he was talking about the recent assassination of Osama Bin Laden and wanted to hear my thoughts on it. Initially I thought about saying how the political and historical benefits of … but then I realized something about him, and any enemy I have, they along with me are a creation of God and in the same boat. Now, Osama Bin Laden was a terrible man who did terrible things and it’s good he’s gone, don’t get me wrong anyone as evil as him shouldn’t be allowed to continue in his evil, but who am I personally to claim the final judgment on his life. Is not that God’s job? While Osama may be terribly evil, I am not perfect either. To go even farther, compared to God, let’s say we set Mother Theresa and Osama Bin Laden on a scale of goodness, well looking at that stacked up to God Mother Theresa wouldn’t come even close. But that’s the problem with comparing ourselves to others, we start getting the impression that while we are not perfect, at least we’re not as bad as Joe Schmo over there. The thing I loved most about the AP exams was that they were graded on a curve, that conceivable I could get 60% of the questions correct and a perfect score. Why is this? Because compared to others I did pretty well, sure some genius got an 80%, but a majority got 50% so my 60% looks a lot better. Well guess what, God doesn’t grade on a curve; when perfection is the standard there is no “Hey, at least I did better than him.” That’s why salvation is so necessary because we are all in need of it. Now, how is this related to loving our enemies? It’s that compared to God I am no better and have no right in making final judgments on their lives because I am in no position to do so. Without the grace of God I am no better than the most wicked man on earth, and even with it I still fall short. In Ezekiel God says 18:32 “For I take no pleasure in the death of anyone…” all I can say is if God doesn’t, then why should I if I deserve the same fate?