"What About Justice?"

I Will Bless The Lord at all time. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul shall make it boast in the Lord. The Humble shall hear it, and rejoice. Oh, magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together. Shelby stand, this wee singer him a free.

Are holy God. We come before you, praying for your help and guidance in our decisions. For our congregation, we are about to step out and see plan for a future as we do soon. Maybe do this with you in a heart made, whatever project he chews, help us to keep you for most in hearts in mind. We pray, Lord for our country, our servicemen, and women, who sacrificed so much that we may remain free. Lord, we pray for those who don't know, you allow us to speak boldly about you to them. We come into your house this morning to worship you, sing your praises and find the peace. That only you can give Amen. Will you join me in the Lord's Prayer? Our Father who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come thy will be done on Earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day, our daily bread and forgive us our debts. As we forgive our debtors and lead us not into temptation but Deliver Us from Evil. For thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever.

Welcome everybody. This morning. I hope you had a good week. Enjoy the Heat.

I understand we're supposed to have a cool down. What is it, 9088? Wow, if anyone wants their picture taken today, please see, Paula, if not there will be two more opportunities to get your picture taken for the directory. And we surely want everyone to have their pictures taken as couples as family because I think it would really be nice when we get our new director. He's made. We haven't had pictures taken a long time. I can testify to the one I have hanging up. I look so much younger in it. But anyhow so it if you want one today it was fall asleep. Let's see family dinner right after worship and we also are we it's in the planning stages but are planning on having Vacation Bible School, 18th through the 20th, 6, to 8 p.m. I'm usually alone character. We need everyone to volunteer to do something. I volunteered to eat if you can do teach supervise help with anyway, just let Nancy know. play, as there any other announcements,

No excuse.

Nautica.

May we are firm in our face. I believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the Living God,

Would you balance prayer with me?

We're God, We Gather in this holy place to lift up your name on high to take just a few moments of our time and pay respect to you. You are a God and we owe you our time and devotion. We pray for those on our prayer list that you would bring healing to their lives. We especially lift up Ron and Kathy NADA, we lift up Brenda Eskridge. There are others, we should highlight, you know, their names. We pray for the people of Ukraine that you would bring peace to that land and an end to the war. We left at those who have been affected by violence, we pray for our government and our military. We pray for those who struggle with kovid. That we would be ambassadors of your love and grace through Jesus Christ, I pray.

The Apostle Paul wrote some of the most beautiful words about the Lord's. Supper, in 1st Corinthians, 11:23 226, and you wrote about 20 years earlier than those who wrote the Gospels. I received from the Lord, what I also passed on to you, the Lord Jesus on the night. When he was betrayed took bread and winning a given thinks he broke in and said, this is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me in the same way. After supper he took the cup saying this cup is the New Covenant in my blood do this as often as you can in remembrance of me or whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim, the Lord's death until he come. let us examine our hearts as we prepare for the Lord's Supper by singing, our Hymn of communion Number 434.

Loving God, our creator, father of mankind.

Christ came to save us from our sin. We pray for the lies and Souls Lost to abortion. More than 20 million worldwide this year loan. As we share in the things and the taking of Holy Communion, may we like Christ live our lives serving and loving others. Thank you for Jesus. Our savior, whose name we pray.

You're the father. We thank you today. You many blessings to give us We pray you be with us and you guys this coming week where I should be those who are sick in the whole country and give her Jesus Christ name we pray. Amen.

Google.

Thank you, Clara.

The sermon today. What about Justice? Taken from Jonah 4 9 through 11.

Then God said, to Jonah. Is it right for you to be angry about the plant? and he said it is right for me to be angry, even to death But the Lord said you have had pity on the plant for which you have not labored, nor made it grow which came up in a night and perished in a night. And should I not pity Nineveh that great City and which are more than 120,000 person? Who cannot discern between their right hand and their left. And much livestock.

May the Lord bless the reading and hearing of his word.

I was in the cleaners. Dropping off some clothes to be laundered on September 11th 2001, When I looked toward the small television, they had in the clerk was going about her business behind the desk, settling up, another customer's request. So, I looked in the direction of the small television and saw what. I now know to be the second plane that flew into the World Trade Center. At the time, I must say that I thought that they were replaying a story from another event in the past somewhere else, or I thought it was a freak accident, it was not until I arrived at work that the commentators begin. Speaking of this as a possible terrorist threat. Will since that day over 21 years ago, I remember Aaron Brown on CNN, new covered. What have been called Ground Zero in? What looked to me like a war zone? I watched presidents from his from his far back as three decades ago, Gather in the National Cathedral for a prayer service. I watch former mayor. Rudy Giuliani make endless, tours of the side and endless press briefings. I watch the tireless efforts of the firemen policemen and other relief workers, who risked their lives working through the debris, Do it sticks, in my mind, the most are those people to line the street the first days after the tragedy holding pictures of their loved ones, believed to be missing, many of these persons had contacted about every hospital in the area. And many of them had a hope that their loved one was alive. Either unconscious in a hospital or in an air pocket beneath all the rubble and almost immediately the question of Justice. Came to my mind. Not just in my mind but the country's mind most of us wanted to see Justice and all of this. The question for me was what do we mean by Justice? And want a much smaller scale, but equally as important, how do we handle perceived personal in justices and how does God fit into the equation? Of course, Justice is not always served and it it did depends on our definition of justice, doesn't it? I suppose we all have some similar and different ideas about what Justice should be in certain situation. I want to make some Reflections using Jonah as our lens into God over perceived issues of justice and in gist Jonah was a man concerned about Justice. Jonah, finally fulfilled, his mission preaching a Revival in Nineveh. Remember before he had run from his mission. No wonder. It was an assignment to the greatest Syrian Capital. It was a pagan and evil empire and it was Israel's most dreaded enemy. The Assyrians flaunted, their power before God and the world through numerous acts of Heartless cruelty. It was in modern-day Iraq. You might be like the missions committee. If we had one asking our congregation for a volunteer to travel overseas, the witness to the Taliban and their countrymen, I had a friend from college who became a missionary in Turkey, which is in a country to the north of Iraq. And somewhat dangerous. You can, are you used to be able to be imprisoned or worse for being a missionary there? So possibly, we can see why Jonah ran in the opposite direction. The Jonah fills this mission to Nineveh and the people heed his warnings. Listen to chapter 3 verses 6 to 9 when the news reached the king of Nineveh arose from his throne took off his Royal robes covered himself with sackcloth and sat down in the dust. And then he issued a proclamation in Minnesota by the decree of the king. And his Nobles do not let any man or beast herd or flock case. Anything do not. Let them eat or drink but let man and Beast be covered with saclaw. Let everyone called urgently on God, let them give up their evil ways and their violence. Who knows? God May yet relent, and with compassion turn from his Fierce anger, so that we will not perish. And then verse 10 of chapter 3, reveals that God relented, when he saw that, none of it changed her ways. And he showed Mercy on her by not allowing for the destruction of the city. In some ways, this action made little sense why the Israelites have been treated more harshly at time even though they had repented, what was the method to this seeming Madness? Should not these pagan people. Pay a price for their many crimes against God and Humanity that seems only fair. But instead God lets them off the hook. Jonah was angry at the Lord's compassion. What about Poetic Justice? You know what comes around goes around human nature, Longs the Poetic Justice? It is an inbred Instinct I believe in if God does not act with our interpretation of Justice, if he refuses to hand out the punishment, we deem appropriate, then we to sometimes become angry with God. But then the Lord asked a question of Joan. Have you any right to be angry? He does not respond to that question. Jonah waited to see if anything would happen to the city of Nineveh. Possibly, God would change his mind and come to his senses. Maybe God had forgotten. How really cruel these Assyrians had been, but the decision by God, to spare, the city of Nineveh remain the same and Jonah's. Anger increased even more Goddamn provided a bush to protect Jonah, from the heat of the Sun. But at the morning the scripture say that a worm appeared and shoot at the at the bush Dunedin it with her than the heat was so great on Jonah's head that he cried out to the Lord and curse of the Bush and beg to die. Didn't listen to Chapter 4, verses 9 to 11, which I believe is our scripture passage. Then the Lord said, do you have any right to be angry with the Vine? I do Jonas said, I am angry enough to die but the Lord said you have been concerned about this Vine though. You did not tend and make it grow. Its spring up overnight and died overnight, but none of us has more than 120,000 people. Who cannot tell their right hand from their left and many cattle as well. Should I not be concerned about this great City? That question. Is the conclusion of the book of Joe. Destruction dust comes not upon Nineveh as Jonah desires, but on the bush which had become precious to Jonah. Even this small Bush and protected Jonah from The Wretched, son, how much more valuable were the people of Nineveh to God even though they were Pagan Spinners. Jonah's, unreasonable as unreasonable nest and fully unmask, he can be merciful yet, he is unwilling. That God should be merciful the lesson is this. The justice of God is not always on our timetable or according to our demands, God rarely asked for our feedback or advice. You know, I think of the terrible Injustice has of the Hitler regime. I think of the terrible loss of human life because of covid and many other incurable diseases. I think about terrorism that has become so much a part of our world. I think of the countries stricken by poverty. And sometimes I asked, where is the Justice in all of this? Justice may not always be immediate by our demand or even in our way of understanding. I'm reminded of the parable told of the weaving of life and if we look to the stitches being woven on the underside and try to make sense of it all, God sees the pattern coming together on the upside according to his Sovereign plan. I cannot explain a lot of theological issues. I would like to have answers to You know, it's interesting that the little Book of Jonah seems to end without completion. It ends with a question from God to Jonah. But, in reading it one would think that the narrative might continue the dialogue between God, and Jonah, just conclude yet. Maybe the story is complete for, it does not stop with Jonah. The question of God's justice and compassion is for us as well. Some of us had those same questions, let me make an observation. In our lives, it is easy to become complacent. Self-centered and interested only in Justice for ourselves. It becomes easy to develop a poor me attitude until we begin to really look at the round, the world. If it comes easy to concentrate on the one or two and justices, instead of remembering the daily justices that happened in our life. If we think that we are worse off than others, we have probably overlooked the vast majority of society. This is not to imply that I'm making light of personal problems and obstacles that we face every day. It is to assert that. There are those who have chosen to live beyond the Injustice, his life has thrown their way, and remember the many acts of justices. Of Justice they have experienced. Now I question God sometimes especially about issues related to justice as I would like to see it in and Why bad things happen? I have developed. Many intellectual property addition to this dilemma and I have read many books on the subject of the problem of evil. This has not proved entirely sufficient for me. What is proven sufficient is to witness the many persons who have every reason in the world to complain about Injustice but refuse to do so. Somehow they choose to get on with life when I worked as a case manager for an MHMR facility. In Greenville Texas, I was assigned to a woman in her forties who had chronic and life-threatening pulmonary lung problems. As well as mental health issues, she lived in a remote. I don't know if you've heard of this town, but in a remote part of Quinlan about 30 miles, from civilization in a beat-up mobile home with no Transportation or phone part, of my job was to help manage her appointments and ensure that she received her medication and transporter to Greenville for an any medical appointment. She had in one day, we sat outside the grocery store, while her husband went in for some odds and ends and she was having one of her, severe coughing spells where she could hardly get a break? And I finally asked her how she did it? Do you ever wonder why me God? in the answer she gave was why not me? She had a healthy concept of God. Dorothy Sayers, addresses the issue. And I, I love this quote of the justice of God quite well when she writes for whatever reason, God chose to make man, as he is limited and suffering and subject to sorrows and death, he had the honesty and courage to take his own medicine. Whatever game he is playing with his creation, he is kept his own rules and played Fair, he can exact nothing from man that has not been exact did from him. He has himself gone through the whole Human Experience from the trivial irritation of family life work in the lack of money to the worst horrors of pain and humiliation defeat Despair and death. When he was the man, he played the man. He was born in poverty and died in disgrace, and thought it well worthwhile

God is just he knows about Justice, and mercy, he has known toll Injustice in the crucifixion of his son and he redeems, what you lost seems unredeemable. He is a sovereign God and we can believe the promise that in the end all wrongs will be made right for now, we must trust in a God who created humankind and have faith that he is in control even when the circumstances seem. So out of control. It is in this. That I find peace.

We were now invite those who would Unite with the church by transfer of membership or confession of Faith to come forward during our Hymn of invitation number 59. Jesus is Calling

Thank you for being in worship today. I hope you have a good week. May the Lord bless you and keep you until we meet again.