Weekly Prayer: Justice And Beauty

Opening Prayer:

Gracious Lord, we made it to the keyboard and to this time of prayer.  Salvage us from the wreckage of our busy lives so that we may taste the full goodness of life with you!  Speak to us, fill us with your love and transform us into the kind of people who love beyond reason.  Amen!

Isaiah 1: 21-26


Comments:

Justice is a popular issue at the moment.  Baseball, swimming, and cycling stars are under scrutiny for cheating by using performance enhancing drugs.  Millions of people have stayed glued to the details of the Casey Anthony trial.  Many are angered and disappointed with the verdict.  What is right anymore?  Where is there justice?  Are there any rules to play by anymore or is "win at any cost" really the best way to live?

God uses Isaiah to reaffirm that justice is not only in God's character, it is the foundational structure of all that is good, loving, and beautiful about life!  Notice how unfaithfulness to God and God's rule of justice conjures up ugly words like "whore," "murderers," "rebels," thieves."  What was made by God to be beautiful becomes tainted, dented, dirtied, and poisoned by the choices of those who are unfaithful to God's ways.  "Your silver has become dross, your best wine mixed with water (22)."  A watered down and ugly life that is destructive is the fruit of inattention to God's ways of justice.

Thank God for his saving judgment!  Justice will come!  It may hurt us to see how we lack care for the well-being of others, how we treat others unjustly, but in the end, God wants to clear the dross from the silver, protect the full-bodied taste of the wine, and see that the widows and orphans and powerless people among us are cared for.  Then we will be beautiful again and justice will reign and all praise will be given to God our Savior through the Lord Jesus Christ!

Life Questions:

1.  Do I live by the rules because I care about others and because I love God?
2.  Do I treat others justly and fairly?  Do I pay particular attention to caring for the powerless?

Closing Prayer:

Heavenly Father, when I've been powerless in my sin, you have come to forgive and save me through the love of Jesus Christ!  I am grateful for your justice and mercy to me.  Give me joy in serving the least, the last, and the lost today so that I may grow more beautiful in your sight.  Amen.

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