In light of the recent riots and looting, we must begin to consider the underlying issue of justice, and what justice actually is.
What you recognize as an injustice and how you respond to an injustice says everything about your personal worldview of justice. Justice is always rooted in your view of ultimate reality. Does the buck lie in the person and character of God or is it reduced to individual subjectivity of our own created reality. If we see evil done, and out of a sense of justice do more evil, then evil wins creating more injustice and only fosters the propagation and perpetuation of injustice.
We must begin to see the value of people thru the image of the Creator in whose Image they bear and no longer based in creed, race, sex, religion, etc. We can’t see humanity in terms of black and white, police or civilian, or in any other categories apart from the reality that all are in need of transformation and redemption. Evil becomes a form of justice in an unredeemed world which is no justice at all. Evil can’t trump evil, but only make it flourish the more. It’s the bumper car effect kicking the can of self-righteousness wrapped in its wounds which perpetuates evil down the road.
If justice alone is the only thing offered to an injustice then sheer restraint is necessary to control the perpetuation of evil, and we must ask whose justice is being served at this point anyway, but if love and forgiveness are offered, which takes the greatest strength of all, in conjunction and alongside justice served then redemption takes root. God is both love and justice and in God’s World these two never work separately. God is not in the business of merely restraining evil but in the business of transforming evil into good. What we need more than evil battling evil are simply ears that will listen on both sides of the divide with humble and open hearts, but when hearts are hard ears normally are closed.
Let us all pray for unity, peace, conversations to really begin, and hearts open to the redemptive message of the Gospel that can take any person, ANY PERSON, and give them an eternal “do-over”. You will never be open to forgiveness until you see your own need of it. May we see justice thru our own brokenness and see love in the person of Christ offering a second chance because He took the ultimate justice of God against evil to offer hope and the light of truth when times of darkness, like these we see on TV, reign so prevalent in a society. Praying for all the lives that have been hurt or taken during this time. May God be with their families.
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