Saturday, November 10, 2007

Justice (10) - Reasons for Lack of Justice

2. Bad Laws
Justice can only be as good as the laws that judgements are made against. Bad laws will usually be stacked in favour of the rich and powerful. These laws will work against the poor and the weak.

God’s law is best. It is holy, just and good (Rom 7:12). The best justice will be in accordance with God’s law. The prophets railed against those who ignore God’s law and applied bad laws.

But my people do not know
the requirements of the LORD.
How can you say, "We are wise,
for we have the law of the LORD,"
when actually the lying pen of the scribes
has handled it falsely? (Jer 8:7,8).
Woe to those who call evil good
and good evil,
who put darkness for light
and light for darkness,
who put bitter for sweet
and sweet for bitter (Is 5:20).
Many modern Christians have a serious problem. They believe in justice, but they have no standard of justice, because they hate God’s law. This leaves them in a situation where they have not choice but to push for humanistic standards of justice.

3. Judgment not Enforced
The two previous reasons result the truth not being declared. This reason prevents remedial action. If judges are unable to enforce their judgements, justice has failed. Declaring a righteous judgement is only half justice. If remedial action does not take place, the victim has not received justice.

Justice must be supported by the entire community. If the people do not support them, judges will lack authority and their decisions will not be implemented. Justice must be seen to be done, and justice must be done.

4. Kings and Governments
When kings and government behave in unjust ways, justice is very difficult to obtain, even if judges are honest. The main reason why justice is inadequate in many parts of the world is that rulers and government are unjust. Unjust rulers will not allow true justice to function, because their own behaviour would be exposed.

This full series can be found here.

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