Vengeance is mine says the Lord.
What a mouthful. There is a lot packed in there. One of the more enthralling passages of the Bible for me has always been Jesus cleansing the temple of thieves. He very carefully and purposefully builds a whip. He goes in an cleans house. Along with whippings he delivers a scathing accusation that they had turned the house of God into a house of thieves.
I hate to see the bad guys win and I love to see justice done. A part of me wonders if this is part of being made in the image of God. Another part of me remembers the story of the forgiven debtor who goes out and strangles a guy over a little bit of money.
So if we're supposed to love the things God loves and hate the things God hates (check out Revelation 2:6) where does this leave us. We see Jesus coming back to tread out the winepress of his wrath. We see judging of the goats and the sheep. We see quite a few instances where justice is done. We can read Psalm 73 and see the struggle the Psalmist has with seeing the reality of evil people going unpunished.
It is very hard to not get angry. It is hard to see people destroying innocents or hurting people in the name of my God and not want them to feel pain. This is what makes me think this anger isn't a good thing. Being angry at injustice is ok, but wanting people to feel pain because they have hurt others isn't the end. Wanting people to feel pain because it will bring them to the right path leads to a different place. We should want the pain to be the pain of empathy not the pain of the lash. We should want people to see how their actions have caused destruction for others and themselves.
So how do we get to this place? How can we put aside the desire to see the proud humbled so they'll know they aren't as special as they think? How can we put aside the desire to see brutes hurt so they'll how much we hurt? Well I think the first step is that moment of introspection. Why do I want them to hurt?
If I want people to hurt so then they'll know how they hurt me then I'm being selfish. I just want people to think I'm awesome because of what I endured or to feel pity for my pain.
If I want people to hurt so they'll stop doing bad things, then I'm ignoring the redemption God offers. I just want to control people so they'll do what I want, instead of wanting them to experience change in their lives.
If I want people to hurt so they'll grow and understand and change then we're making progress. Luckily in that case I don't have to do anything. God has already set the world up to have natural consequences for bad actions. I can rest contently knowing that God will deliver whatever pain is necessary when it will do good.
Scratch that. I can go out and do my part which is helping the people who have been hurt. I can bandage wounds. I can tell truth where lies have come in. I can comfort those who are in pain. I can remind those who think no one loves them that there are many people who love them.
Pain is an unfortunate part of life but for most of us a necessary one. We need the incentive to change. We blind ourselves to the pain we cause others so we need to experience it to open our eyes to what we're really doing. But rather than trying to hurry someone else's 'enlightenment' along we need to leave that in the hands of God.
Let's try and channel that anger and passion into helping the victims rather than beating the brutes. I still really hate to see the bad guys win. But I need to be patient and let God turn the bad guys into good guys.
No comments:
Post a Comment