God is just. He is completely just. He is completely righteous. All His ways are perfect. He does not in the least condone fraud, deceit, or trickery. He is bound by the very essence of who He is to punish any, every, and all evil in the universe. God and sin cannot coexist together. God is light. Sin is darkness. Light destroys darkness when it is shone into a dark place. God cannot overlook any sin. In any way, shape, or form. If the sin is big, God cannot ignore it. If the sin is little, he cannot sweep it under the rug. God is righteous. Sin is not righteous. If God is in a place, there can be no sin. He cannot tolerate it. He is bound by His very nature to completely do away with sin eventually. Every conceivable sin and every conceivable instrument of sin must and will be destroyed. Every person who sins must, by God's very nature, be cast away from His presence eventually.
God is merciful. He delights to show mercy. Mercy is another part of the very essence of God. He is merciful and He is gracious and it brings Him immense pleasure to show love to people. He wants so much to restore what was lost in Genesis 3 and to gain His beloved back to Himself. He wants so much to show her mercy. He wants so much to delight in her and to see her filled with all the fullness of His Spirit. He longs to forgive and to love and to redeem and to lavish His grace on His people. Forgiving brings God such great joy and He wants more than anything to show this attribute of Himself for the rest of eternity.
So you see... there is a complete impasse. Man has sinned. God cannot condone sin in any way. God longs to forgive. His very essence dictates both that He punish eternally and that He also forgive. These are both essential parts of who God is. Two things God delights in: showing His righteousness and showing His love and grace. It's a dead end. There is no way God can do both of the things He delights in. He must either punish sin without mercy or show mercy and sin profoundly against His justice and righteousness.
If it hasn't sunken it yet just how absolutely hopeless any thought of resolving this absolute theological quandary, reread up to this point and meditate on how irresolvable the whole situation truly is. You must see no hope in the situation for the cross to be seen in all its beauty. If there is any hope of another solution the cross will appear dull and unimportant. God's people will not see the beauty of what God has done unless they see completely how truly, devastatingly hopeless the entire situation is without it! So when you think of the cross of Christ think of this situation from which there was no escape and that our God made a way where there WAS NO WAY!
