In reflecting on the recent tragic imprisonment, rape and suffering of Naw Bey Bey, I have been reminded of these verses that hold in tension the realities that face us as we face injustice. Most people respond to such horrors with one side of the christian coin....forgive and forget but I think there is more to the picture than that. To not present the whole character of God can cause additional harm to the inner life of those who have been abused. We often present a God who has mercy on the offender but loads down the victim with lopsided scripture verses that paint God out to look like He isn't Just.
Solomon says that so much "under the sun" is mere meaningless and vanity. Our only hope is in the prayer Jesus told us to pray...Your Kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven...forgive our debts as we forgive our debtors...(matt 6:9-13).
I dont pretend to understand the how of all of that...thats why we pray it, it is a work of God that He must be involved in or it cant happen. It has to "come heaven to earth" so to speak. We become the source from which that new kingdom life emerges. We become the epicenter of change, of new values, of new thought, of love.
But we also become the place where Justice also crawls back to her feet. In the streets she may have fallen but in the church she is nurtured back to health and finds strength to once again not just stand, but to even walk in us and through us. For God is holy and His love is grounded in righteousness as well as mercy and grace. He will have mercy on who He will have mercy and the rest will taste of His wrath.
His wrath will be revealed...
"We ourselves speak proudly of you among the churches of God for your perseverance and faith in the midst of all your persecutions and afflictions which you endure. This is a plain indication of God's righteous judgment so that you will be considered worthy of the Kingdom of God, for which indeed you are suffering. For after all it is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you, and to give relief to you who are afflicted and to us as well when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. -2 Thess 1:4-8
I see the ministry that we are called to show being a prophetic foretaste of what is to come. We are in that Kingdom already and He desires the earth to taste of the powers of the age to come as Hebrews puts it. We can say that the Kingdom of God is among us too, not in it's fullness maybe but in the fullness of its King, in whom we move and live and have our being.
That should make a difference around here in my opinion. Jesus suffered at the cross...now He is reigning and putting all His enemies under His feet...the last to be...death.
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