Grace trumps justice

Folks are looking for one thing, it seems, and it ain't more money or more meat on their hamburger.

They are searching far and wide for that elusive thing we call justice. Or fairness. Or moral walking on the right side.

In Missouri, late at night, they're shouting and shouting and plundering for justice, justice for Michael Brown, and they will sooner of later get it. Count it and put it in the bank. The wrongness of someone shooting an unarmed man six times will somehow be righted by information about the moment we haven't had before, information about what Brown was doing when the fatal shots were fired.

Justice. It's the realm of the dead. The realm of the difficult. The realm of pain. The realm of a loss of justice in a world crying out for justice.

It's a front story in USA Today this morning.. The beheading of a US citizen is, after all, front page news in anyone's newspaper. Still. And Forever.

James, "Jim," Foley -- held captive by others,  had suffered through the slings and perhaps literal arrows of God only knows who and why and what. The actions of the kidnappers, ISIS they call themselves, was enough to pause and Jim, of course.

As imaginations go, mine's pretty large and wide-ranging, like grass land on acres and acres. But I can't begin to imagine a father and mother having to comment on public television about what they had gone through after their child was killed for what amounts to absolutely nothing.

But there they were, in their yard, talking about their son being beheaded ... on camera ... on live TV. I rarely watch the news, but this story gripped me, held me, allowed me to think about what a incredibly difficult time this must be.

I must tell you, it doesn't much give one a big ol' slab of hope in the morning to hear such a thing. But it does allow one to ponder.

I recall President Obama saying this yesterday: "No just God would stand for what they did yesterday or every single day," he said.

Seems Foley was a "devout Catholic." HIs parent's said it was his faith and prayer that kept him going right up to the end.

But let's unpack that major-league statement this morning. "No just God would stand for what they did..."

A just God wouldn't? Wow. What wonder ensues? According to the Prez,  eitherGod is not just or apparently God is ready to do some major-league stomping.

Is God just? Give that a moment to fester.
A just God would not allow such a moment, says the O. But a just God would, at least in the way I read the material. He would allow such terrible things as the Holocaust, or any unnamed calamity. He would. But the scriptures say he would take care of the payback.

A just God is a mover and shaker and some wrath throwing is about to commence, a shaken and angry head honcho said. Oh, gas prices are about to go the way of the Hindenburg because the just God we worship is about to cause a crisis in Isis. Isn't that it?                                                                                      

A just God is worried more about the tears than the fears He could bring.
We have a just God.

But here's the great Gospel, the wonderful good news.

He is just, fair, but he does not -- hear me, does not -- give us what a just God would normally. No, he gives us what we do not deserve. He slathers us with grace instead of justice.

Thank God.