Justice & The Weightier Matters
Micah 6:6-8 & Matthew 23:23-26
Main Idea: Christians are called to do justice as a reflection of God’s character & an expression of his grace.
I. Justice & God’s Character
“Justice” is central to God’s self-disclosure of himself in his Word to his people. A few examples:
Ps. 89:14: “Righteousness and justice are the foundation of your throne; Steadfast love and faithfulness go before you.”
Deut. 32:4: “The Rock, his work is perfect, For all his ways are justice. A God of faithfulness and without iniquity, Just and upright is he.”
Ps. 146:7-9: [He] executes justice for the oppressed,
Who gives food to the hungry.
The Lord sets the prisoners free;
the Lord opens the eyes of the blind.
The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down;
The Lord loves the righteous.
The Lord watches over the sojourners;
He upholds the widow and the fatherless,
But the way of the wicked he brings to ruin.
Deut. 10:17-18: For the LORD your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who is not partial and takes no bribe. He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the sojourner, giving him food and clothing.
“More than half of the books in the Old Testament speak of justice as an attribute of God & a responsibility of His people. We can’t know God without understanding His heart for justice… He is a just God. He is the source of all true justice… seeing God in this way helps define & root justice in the Lord. To ignore justice is to ignore God. Justice isn’t God (we don’t worship justice), but His justice is one of his key attributes.” ~ Eric Mason
II. Justice & God’s People
The people of Israel were to showcase this attribute of God by having a society that embraced a “holistic” justice. This included:
Punitive Justice: Punishing wrongdoers & protecting victims of wrongdoing (ex: Lev. 24:19-20)
Structural Justice: Treating others fairly in the context of right relationships; not showing partiality, creating just societal structures (ex: Lev. 19:15-18; 24:22)
Restorative Justice: Speaking up & advocating for the vulnerable, oppressed, overlooked (ex: Prov. 31:8-9)
“The righteous are willing to disadvantage themselves to advantage the community; the wicked are willing to disadvantage the community to advantage themselves.” ~ Bruce Waltke
Generous Justice: Practices such as “gleaning” (Lev. 19:9-10), Sabbath years (Deut. 15:1-18), & the Year of Jubilee (Lev. 25:8ff)
“If you are trying to lie a life in accordance with the Bible, the concept and call to justice are inescapable. We do justice when we give all human beings their due as creations of God. Doing justice includes not only the righting of wrongs, but generosity and social concern, especially toward the poor & vulnerable. This kind of life reflects the character of God. It consists of a broad range of activities, from simple fair and honest dealings with people in daily life, to regular, radically generous giving of your time & resources, to activism that seeks to end particular forms of injustice, violence, and oppression.” ~ Tim Keller
This vision and expectation of “justice” from God helps us to appreciate why Jesus is so confrontational with the Pharisees in Matthew 23. They were “hypocrites” (actors with a mask) because they gave the impression they were righteous while neglecting the “weightier” matters of the law.
III. Justice & God’s Son
Luke 4:18-19: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
Because he has anointed me
To proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives
And recovering of sight to the blind,
To set at liberty those who are oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
Any conversation about justice & mercy in the Bible has to find its center at the cross. At the cross, every form of biblical “justice” meets the mercy of God toward the undeserving.
“By becoming one of the poor who was deprived of his rights, by dying as one of those robbed of justice, God’s Son submitted to the utmost extremity of humiliation, entering into total solidarity with those who are without help… even more astonishingly, however, he underwent helplessness & humiliation not only for the victimized but also for the perpetrators… Who would have thought that the same God who passed judgment, calling down woe upon the religious establishment, would come under his own judgment and woe?... Perfect justice is wrought in the self-offering of the Son, who alone of all human beings was perfectly righteous.” ~ Fleming Rutledge
There is an intrinsic link between our “justification” at the cross of Christ & our call to “do justice.” When we begin to grasp the depth of God’s mercy toward us in Jesus Christ, we will keep him at the center of justice. Because we are changed we will want to do justice as we follow King Jesus.
