Posted on 10/16/2021 7:36:11 AM PDT by rebuildus
“If you love only those who love you, why should you get credit for that? Even sinners love those who love them! “
Luke 6:32 New Living Translation A minister I used to listen to would often discuss the difference between loving justice and hating injustice. Of course, if you think about it for a moment, you’d see that they have nothing in common with each other–they are two completely different things.
And therefore, it’s about time we separated the “sheep from the goats” regarding this issue.
There will likely be many who read the title of this article and be inclined to answer “Both! I love justice AND hate injustice!” Yet, if they’d but scratch the surface of how they really operate day to day, it would be clear that they live primarily in one camp or the other.
Love and hate, after all, are two completely different things.
I’m caused to think about this issue because my sister recently passed. She had been battling cancer, and had lived much of her life also battling what she perceived as injustice.
My sister and I had some political disagreements, which unfortunately did negatively affect our relationship in the latter part of her life, which I regret. I wrote about her, and our relationship here, in a post called Dear Suz…
All of us at one time or another have reacted angrily to injustice, or perceived injustice. Suz was no different.
In my post, I referenced a piece in the VC (Ventura County) Reporter called Fighting the Good Fight: Senior Advocate and Local Government Watchdog Suz Montgomery Has Never Stopped Working For Her Community, where a reporter interviewed my sister just weeks before she passed.
My sister was passionate about her beliefs, and tirelessly worked to “right the wrongs” she saw in her life and in her community of Ventura, California, where she was well-known and respected. She was admirable in many ways.
The article started off with a quote from Suz: “Sometimes I think about how much easier it would have been if I hadn’t been such an angry woman; it’s what fuels me.”
Now as I said in my first piece, I do not know if Suz ever came to a point of transcending the anger she felt toward injustice in her life. I certainly hope that she did give it up before she passed from this earthly plane.
And I totally understand the anger that she carried. As I said, we’ve all experienced it. And anger can feel like a necessary emotion to provide us that fuel to fight that Suz spoke to the reporter about.
And yet, I also understand that that anger can destroy us if we do not give it up.
My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires.
James 1:19-20 NIV I’m saying all this to speak to everyone (including myself), because we have seen an epidemic of anger in the divide–Americans vs. Americans–each believing that he or she is right, but in giving way to human anger toward our brother or sister, each showing that he or she is wrong.
I “identify” as a conservative, which once had as a central tenant that we not only loved our country, but we also loved the people in it. After all, there was a spiritual base undergirding our beliefs.
When I look around at many of those calling themselves conservatives, or patriots today, I see that that spiritual base is not there. This is the real reason that America has fallen out of favor with God, and finds itself on the brink of extinction.
And this is largely the fault of those of us who have not found love in our lives, and therefore not passed it on others around us, and to the next generation.
So breezily commenting that you both love justice AND hate injustice isn’t going to cut it. As I’ve said, we’ve all hated injustice, so it’s nothing to be proud of, and does not encourage good to come forward.
Not that we should accept injustice–no way! It’s just that we must find a new fuel to fight with.
“Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.”
Romans 12:21 NIV But HOW do we overcome evil with good? Frankly, I’m not an expert on this yet, myself, I’m still a student. But I have seen this principle at work in my life, and at times God has worked through me to bring good about. I’m sure you have seen God do the same in your own life.
One thing I know that is essential in learning how to “overcome evil with good” is to keep guard that anger does not seep in and overtake us. I have employed prayer and meditation toward this end, as have many others.
God would not tell us to overcome evil with good unless we had the power to do so. And we do.
But we all need to get off our high horse–judging everybody who doesn’t see things our way. There’s nothing “Christian” about acting like this. And even if you don’t call or consider yourself a Christian, there are UNIVERSAL principles that run the world, and like it or not, you need to access these principles to have a successful, and peaceful life.
Beyond that, you could be taken from this world at any moment, as my sister was. And I would much rather “take my chances” entering the next world in peace, rather than in turmoil. I’m sure you would too.
It’s time we returned to being true Americans again. It’s really the only rational path forward.
My prayer is that you rest in peace, my dear sister Suz.
Patrick Rooney is the Founder of OldSchoolUs.com. He communicates clearly and fearlessly during perilous times about natural health, success, and freedom. To reach Patrick, email him at info@oldschoolus.com.
I had a friend who had “I LOVE TRUTH” tattooed across his knuckles.
It’s like asking “Do you love chocolate or hate getting snapped with a rubber band?”.
Lately I wonder if there s a real difference.
The false application of “separation of church and state” is how we got here. The Left tricked Christians into checking their Faith at the door, while the Left systematically dismantled the foundations of the country. Christian’s were never able to get a foothold in fighting back. “Hating injustice” was mocked and ridiculed, and so “loving justice” never had a chance, because the Left was able to define justice.
First, define justice.
To believe in justice, you have to believe in truth.
“First, define justice.”
If you wish: For the purposes of this article, I’m defining it as righting a real or perceived wrong.
There’s a spiritual point in the article, if you are interested, that you may not have noticed. That point is the main point to the article.
Do you love when good triumphs over evil, or hate when evil triumphs over good. Two sides of the same coin.
“Lately I wonder if there s a real difference.”
HUGE difference.
“I had a friend who had “I LOVE TRUTH” tattooed across his knuckles.”
That’s interesting. I wonder if he had to use them :)
The lack of justice IS injustice.
Actually, those who truly love will hate that which is opposed to that which they love.
The Lord, for example, hates sin and unrighteousness. He is “Holy, Holy, Holy” and has provided for salvation at the highest possible price, expressing how serious sin really is in the process. His love does make those proverbial camels able to pass through the eyes of needles.
But back to justice and injustice, the problem is that people confuse providing justice to flesh and blood persons — which is right and good — with trying to provide it to abstractions of persons, mere entities.
This last is properly called social justice.
Now, one can effectively fight against social injustice — which is seeking to harm people because of some abstraction of persons that they are assigned to — by restraining how government uses its police powers, and true small government has little power to promote social injustice.
As an example of how government must be grown to support social injustice consider for a moment that segregation was actually expensive, requiring duplication of physical facilities, additional resources and what not to attempt.
But to use government to pursue social justice requires the expansion of government, and since everything soon becomes a social justice issue that expansion of government likewise soon extends to all circumstances whatsoever and government then eventually becomes the arbitrator of whom deserves what because their group has assigned suffering … or whom deserves naught because their group is assigned guilt.
Our Constitution was designed to help deliver actual justice to flesh and blood persons and not to entities. Injustices against actual persons doesn’t change that.
The Woke have descended into a madness that comes from wanting to service mere abstractions of persons (which is bad enough) to the point that they basically lose sight of actual persons (which is evil). This is the case for their prior attachment to class warfare too.
Exactly!
What makes you think I missed that?
The “and” is the lie.
Two institutions that coexist and are in competition for the ultimate loyalty of the people cannot be mutually separate just as a man cannot serve two masters.
The State can be separate from the church and have the ultimate claim on the loyalty and devotion of its subjects. As a consequence such a State has ultimate responsibility to protect itself from improperly motivated influences as it engages with its subjects … and as such has a logical claim for regulatory powers over religion, to determine what people are allowed to both believe and how those beliefs may be publicly acted on.
This is the way the French Revolution went.
The Church (which is the body of believers, the people) can be separate from the state and the faithful citizens may then act on the basis of consciences however informed and regulate their government and society accordingly.
This is how our system was to work, and what the 1st Amendment supports.
So in summation you can have separation of the State from the church (and the people be ultimately subjects) or you can have the Church from the state (and the people free) but you cannot have separation of Church and State
https://www.bitchute.com/video/DUKlhvUWQPtv/
Or “he didn’t hang himself” — or something to that point — will heard again.
Do You LOVE Justice Or HATE Injustice? (PICK ONE!)
***God didn’t pick one, so I don’t have to.
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