Pastor Lloyd
Twitter @PastorLloyd
God’s Standard of Justice is not Relative
What is it about law and justice that captivates us? Why are programs like “Law and Order” and “CSI:” (and their offshoots) so popular? Do we have an inherent need to see bad guys punished and good guys win? For every crime committed, we demand justice. Someone simply must pay or else the universe seems senseless.
While this deep desire for justice appears universal, not all belief systems account for our ubiquitous sense of right and wrong. Our post-modern culture defines truth and justice in relative terms, leaving it up to the individual to determine what’s right and wrong, and what’s to be punished and excused based upon one’s own personal experience.
Daniel Defoe, the author of Robinson Crusoe, expressed the dilemma well when he wrote, “Justice is always violent to the party offending, for every man is innocent in his own eyes.” It’s the idea that if I am wronged, I somehow have a right to retaliate. The wrongdoers should watch their backs! Yet, if I am the one in the wrong, then there must be extenuating circumstances to be considered. In any case, how I feel about a circumstance will dictate how much justice I demand.
Christianity approaches justice quite differently. In Biblical Christianity, not only is there a clear right and wrong way, but there is also a specific outcome for the wrong choices we make. When we sin, the consequence is death. That’s right, the “wages of sin are death,” and such death is defined, in its worst form, as eternal separation from our Creator.
Yet not only is there a price for sin, but there is also a God who paid that price on our behalf. Christ took all human sin upon Himself and died a substitutionary death for us. God demanded justice, and provided it by sending His Son to die in our place.
This message is the very essence of Christianity. It’s what makes Good Friday and Easter different from other religious holidays. Jesus died for sins that we, not He, committed. The resurrection verifies that Christ’s death on the cross provided the justice that God demanded. God received Jesus to Himself, confirming that His redemption plan was complete, and that all believers have been granted forgiveness in Christ.
But why did Jesus have to die? Couldn’t God have simply said, “all human sin is forgiven?” Why didn’t He just issue a deified decree expunging all human iniquity?
The reason for Jesus’ death is that God’s standard of justice, unlike that of postmodernism, is not relative. For sin, somebody’s gotta pay. Someone must die. That someone was Jesus.
In His perfect mercy, God provided justice on our behalf. God’s wrath on sin was simply poured out on Jesus at the cross. The Apostle Paul’s words in Romans 3:23-26 explain it best,
“For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard. Yet God, with undeserved kindness, declares that we are righteous. He did this through Christ Jesus when he freed us from the penalty for our sins. For God presented Jesus as the sacrifice for sin. People are made right with God when they believe that Jesus sacrificed his life, shedding his blood. This sacrifice shows that God was being fair when he held back and did not punish those who sinned in times past, for he was looking ahead and including them in what he would do in this present time. God did this to demonstrate his righteousness, for he himself is fair and just, and he declares sinners to be right in his sight when they believe in Jesus” (NLT).
God is just, and He has justified His creation through His Son’s atoning death and victorious resurrection! We need justice, and we have it in Christ!
So while other ideologies are still figuring out what’s right and wrong, believers in the Lord Jesus have good news right here! At the cross of Christ, justice and mercy have met. Crime dramas aside, in Jesus we find TRUE justice. Here at the cross, an entire world once held hostage by sin has its ransom paid in full.
