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He shall not judge by what his eyes see,
or decide disputes by what his ears hear,
but with righteousness he shall judge the poor,
and decide with equity for the meek of the earth;
and he shall strike the earth with the rod of his mouth,
and with the breath of his lips he shall kill the wicked.
Righteousness shall be the belt of his waist,
and faithfulness the belt of his loins.
– Isaiah 11:3-5

The prophet Isaiah told the people of Israel to expect a Messiah who would bring justice to the world.

Think about what the world would be like if there was complete and total justice. A world where everything is made right, a world where everything works out, where societies function fairly. A world where we do what we know we’re supposed to.

A sense of justice is knit into our humanity. That’s why it can be painful to watch the injustice around us. Perpetrators of terrible crimes get off. Some people buy their way out of prison. Victims are abused, and sometimes the criminals never get caught.

In Romania, I came to know people lived under the thumb of a dictator who had made life a living hell for most of the citizens. Then, after Communism fell, the new leaders were just as unjust and corrupt as the previous regime. Government couldn’t bring justice to the nation!

And somehow, even as we cry out for justice, even as we are thirsty and hungry for justice (Jesus promises that those who hunger and thirst for justice will one day be filled) – we know that the line between injustice and justice isn’t just a matter of us versus them. The line of good and evil runs right through each of us. We ourselves are both just and unjust. The evil we see in others is present in ourselves. The evil we see perpetrated against us is often the same evil that we manifest towards other people.

So now, the justice of God is not only a comforting thought (imagine a world of perfect, fairness, righteousness and justice); it’s also a scary thought. Will we be able to inhabit such a world? If God is fair and righteous and just, then we realize that our hope for God’s justice brings us to the point where we too must face the punishment and penalty for our unfairness, unrighteousness, injustice.

Two sides to one coin. Relief on the one hand and horror on the other.

Of course, the farther we travel on our journey with Jesus, the more we discover that Jesus not only brings the justice we desire, but he provides the justice we need in order to be part of God’s new world. He dies an unjust death, paying the penalty for our sinful injustice, and in the same moment, he clothes us in the fullness of God’s righteousness.

Prayer: God of Israel, you judge the peoples with fairness. You are the God in whom we find the standard of righteousness and justice. Comfort us when we are the victims of injustice. Forgive us for the sins we commit against others. Thank you for the perfect righteousness of your Son, Jesus Christ, our Lord.

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