Equity and justice

Psalm 98:9b; 99:4a He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples with equity … The King is mighty, he loves justice – you have established equity; …

There is so much talk in our society and in our day and age about equality and justice, and from what we read in the Bible we know that these are qualities of God and therefore qualities to be sought after.  But we seem to fail so miserably so often that I have sometimes wondered if we will ever be able to attain them in my lifetime.  I think the answer is “no.”  The reason societies in our world will not see the attainment of true equality or justice is because of the third quality of God who, in these verses, is the source of equity and justice, that being the quality of righteousness.  Without righteousness I do not think we can find true justice and without true (righteous) justice, equity will not be possible.  The recognition of God as the only sufficient source of these qualities is the only path to attainment.

Why justice?

Today is the last day for me to read in the book of Numbers and it contained a potent lesson for me.

Numbers 35:34 Do not defile the land where you live and where I dwell, for I, the Lord, dwell among the Israelites.

This verse comes at the end of a chapter in which the Israelites were reminded of principles for fair judgment of crime, and it struck me that the main reason to have a fair and equitable justice system was because of God’s presence in the land.  As I watch my own country struggle over the justice system I see the same principle at work.  As God is eliminated from our lives as individuals and as a nation, justice becomes more and more polluted and ineffective.  

Although this is very true, even more importantly for me personally is the potent reminder to me of the need to keep myself clean and undefiled by sin and worldly influences.  God lives in me and His dwelling place should be holy.  Why were the Israelites to be careful not to defile the land where they lived?  For no other reason than because the Lord lived among them!  Why should I keep myself pure?  There may be reasons of physical and/or spiritual health, but they are secondary to the fact that God is in me.