Justice - or Just Us
Joining Jesus on His Mission - Matthew • Sermon • Submitted
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Illustrations for Biblical Preaching Father, Failure of
The story is told of a young man who stood before a judge to be sentenced for forgery. The judge had been a friend of the boy’s father, who was famous for his books on the law of trusts. “Young man,” said the judge sternly, “do you remember your father, that father whom you have disgraced?”
“I remember him perfectly,” the young man answered quietly. “When I went to him for advice or companionship, he would say, ‘Run away, boy, I’m busy.’ Well, my father finished his book, and here I am.”
Blessed Lord, You have caused all Holy Scriptures to be written for our learning. Grant that we may so hear them, read, mark, learn, and take them to heart that, by the patience and comfort of Your holy Word, we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life, through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death, and you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.
Yesterday, I talked with our Circuit Visitor about the current protests against police abuse of authority and Black Lives Matter, AKA the Social Justice protest movement in America. One of the things that interests me is that much of the BLM website addresses, not issues of race-based injustice, but issues of shifting the boundaries concerning what is right and what is wrong. For example:
“We are guided by the fact that all Black lives matter, regardless of actual or perceived sexual identity, gender identity, gender expression, economic status, ability, disability, religious beliefs or disbeliefs, immigration status, or location.
We make space for transgender brothers and sisters to participate and lead.
We are self-reflexive and do the work required to dismantle cisgender privilege and uplift Black trans folk, especially Black trans women who continue to be disproportionately impacted by trans-antagonistic violence.
We build a space that affirms Black women and is free from sexism, misogyny, and environments in which men are centered.”
“We disrupt the Western-prescribed nuclear family structure requirement by supporting each other as extended families and “villages” that collectively care for one another, especially our children, to the degree that mothers, parents, and children are comfortable.
We foster a queer‐affirming network. When we gather, we do so with the intention of freeing ourselves from the tight grip of heteronormative thinking, or rather, the belief that all in the world are heterosexual (unless s/he or they disclose otherwise).”
In case you didn’t notice, the one group in America that was not affirmed in any of those statements was “men” - that is, unless you were a “man” who was born with two X-chromosomes but decided that you would have surgery and chemical treatments to increase masculine traits and thus, redefine yourself as a male, “we” - the national BLM organization - affirm you.
Now, compare this with
Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.
Or how about
And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one’s wife for any cause?” He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”
Something has happened, in that what once was a clearly defined understanding of what was proper, right, or fitting, has been replaced by an opposite but equally clearly defined conception of what is proper, right, or fitting. The word “justice” which historically was a reflection of Law has now become a function of grievance. To have a grievance is to be a victim of injustice, and “social justice” is defined as “justice in terms of the distribution of wealth, opportunities, and privileges within a society.” (https://www.lexico.com/definition/social_justice).
The Old Testament word that was most often translated as “justice” was “mishpat.” It means “decision, judgement, dispute, case, claim, measure, law.” To seek “justice” to seek an objective solution to an objective violation of a recognized objective standard. It was a standard that was declared by the Law which came from the hand of God, taught by the parents to their children, enforced by those whom He had delegated His authority by virtue of their status as bearers of the “Imago Dei,” and rejoiced over by those who recognized that it was holy, just, and good.
Compare that with Jesus’ words that I quoted earlier from our Gospel reading. Can you imagine a situation that is more contrary to the God’s Law than the words found in Matt 10:21? Families - the building block of communities - ripped asunder, and then the one thing that everyone has in common is their hatred of Christians:
and you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved.
Jesus tells the 12 that they will face obstacles, but not only that, that they will minister in a hostile environment. The problem isn’t “Seeker sensitivity” or the successful meeting of felt needs. The problem is sin and lawlessness. As the Apostle John wrote,
Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness.
We were created to understand the Law, so much so that teaching us to know the Law did not require that we be born again; it only required that we teach it diligently:
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might. And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise.
That’s why being legalistic comes so easily, while being gracious is so hard. That’s why vengeance comes easy, and grace is hard. That’s why it’s so easy to recognize the feeling of injustice and so hard to be ambassadors of reconciliation. The ministry of reconciliation cannot be taught or compelled, it must be god-given, and only people who have been born again of His spirit can serve as His representatives, as it is written:
Being zealous won’t substitute for being born again. The Jews were zealous, as Paul wrote concerning his passionate love for Israel:
Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.
True peace can only come from the hands of the Prince of Peace. Like Adam, and Eve after the fall, we can recognize that we are naked, but we lack the means to properly cover our nakedness. Only God can supply what we lack.
I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation; he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.
Our attempts to defeat injustice, no matter how well intentioned, are doomed to fail because we refuse to take into account our own brokenness, our own inability to see and to know, our own inability to love as Christ loves:
Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
We have not yet come to maturity, nor can we will ourselves into maturity. That is a God-work, done by the Holy Spirit as He takes the Word of God and works it into our hearts. Maybe you can be good-ish without God, but that is about it. To truly be Christlike, and not just “good-ish” requires God to give us in Christ what does not exist in ourselves.
And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes.
God wants justice - He wants it even more than we do, enough to die for it, not as a martyr or a victim, but as the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Through Christ’s death and resurrection, God has secured the justice that we seek after.
Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.
If Christ were not risen, we would have no blessed hope that God has defeated sin and death, we would have no hope of justice, peace, or anything.
But Christ is risen - He is risen indeed, Hallelujah! - and we have a message that does reconcile people, nations, tribes, and tongues. The Gospel of Jesus Christ restores what we lost when Satan deceived us and took away our trust in the Lord long ago in the Garden. The Gospel restores that trust, restores our relationship with our Creator and rolls away our reproach. We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, which enables us to go in peace, to love and serve the Lord, thanks be to God, as we serve one another in love.
So let the peace of God, that passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.