Where Is the God of Justice?
This article reflects on the painful unfairness of life through the lens of Scripture, especially Ecclesiastes, Revelation, and the justice of God revealed in Christ. While life is filled with injustice, the article points readers to God’s character, the coming judgment, and the grace given through Jesus.
- People have long asked why God allows injustice and unfairness.
- Scripture affirms that life is not always fair, but God remains holy, true, upright, and just.
- Jesus brings justice, endured injustice himself, and offers grace to a broken world.
By David Faust
More than 400 years before Christ, people were asking, “Where is the God of justice?” (Malachi 2:17, New International Version). Many today are asking the same question.
It’s Not Fair
A drunk driver swerves his vehicle into the path of another car. He walks away unharmed; a young mother and her children die in the crash.
A faithful employee works long hours, sacrificing precious personal time. But when it’s time for a promotion, she is bypassed in favor of a less qualified employee who is skilled at office politics.
Thugs attack an old woman as she walks home with a bag of groceries in her arms. They beat her up and steal her purse.
A middle-aged man jogs every morning and eats healthy foods, skipping the French fries and rich desserts his friends enjoy. One day while jogging, he has a heart attack and dies.
Classmates make fun of a second grader’s skin color.
A devoted husband and wife want to be parents, but they are infertile. A 14-year-old girl gets pregnant after one sexual encounter with a 16-year-old boy she will never see again.
A white-collar criminal who bilked victims out of millions of dollars emerges from court smirking as he prepares to serve a light sentence that amounts to little more than a slap on the wrist.
Life is filled with injustice. Solomon observed, “The race is not to the swift or the battle to the strong, nor does food come to the wise or wealth to the brilliant or favor to the learned; but time and chance happen to them all” (Ecclesiastes 9:11). Why does God allow so much unfairness? Will he ever correct what is wrong? Solomon continued, “Moreover, no one knows when their hour will come: As fish are caught in a cruel net, or birds are taken in a snare, so people are trapped by evil times that fall unexpectedly upon them” (v. 12).
God Is Just
In John’s vision of heaven, he saw “the souls of those who had been slain because of the word of God and the testimony they had maintained.” Martyred for being faithful? How unfair! “They called out in a loud voice, ‘How long, Sovereign Lord, holy and true, until you judge the inhabitants of the earth and avenge our blood?’” (Revelation 6:9-10). Notice: The saints asked an honest question about justice, yet they referred to God as the “Sovereign Lord” and called him “holy and true.”
Life isn’t fair, but God is.
Jesus championed justice and treated people fairly whether they were rich or poor, powerful or weak, well-known or unknown. He came to “bring justice to the nations . . . and establish justice on earth” (Isaiah 42:1-4; Matthew 12:18-20). He called justice one of “the more important matters of the law” (Matthew 23:23). He declared that judgment day is coming (John 5:24-30), and that day will make it clear that the Lord is “a faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just is he” (Deuteronomy 32:4). Jesus himself suffered an unfair trial, insulting accusations, and an undeserved death sentence. But when he died on the cross, he gave us something far better than fair. He gave us grace.
Where is God in an unjust world? In Christ, reconciling this broken world to himself. And in us, giving us grace to persevere.
This is the eighth in a series of articles based on the book of Ecclesiastes.
Author: David Faust
David Faust serves as contributing editor of Christian Standard and senior associate minister with East 91st Street Christian Church in Indianapolis, Indiana. He is the author of Not Too Old: Turning Your Later Years into Greater Years.
