The Just Judge- Do I Want Justice

I am preaching this weekend on Luke 18:1-8. The passage is the Parable of the Persistent Widow:

1Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. 2He said: "In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared about men. 3And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, 'Grant me justice against my adversary.'4"For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, 'Even though I don't fear God or care about men, 5yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won't eventually wear me out with her coming!' "6And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. 7And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?"

Jesus gives his disciples this parable in the midst of news about the future that is massive and overwhelming. He says that there is going to be a massive battle in front of them and in front of the whole of human history. Evil is going to war against good. And, there are going to be times when we will think that the war is too big, the battle too long, the enemy too full of resources. But, he tells us in this passage to NEVER stop praying. Why? Well, because we matter. And, because our choices and our actions, and our fears, and our emotions, and our inclinations, and especially our faith in what is outside our circumstances, matters. It is not going unnoticed. In fact, God is not like an unjust judge who answers pleas for help to get us off his back because he is sick and tired from hearing from us "widows."

Instead, he is a loving Father who ends up throwing Himself into the bloody battle we are in to bring about fairness. Everything we do matters. Everything we do makes an impact, either for good or for evil because we were made as creatures who can both impregnate history and give birth to real things in this real world of God's making. I am thinking and praying very hard about this passage.

In it all, as I cry out to God, I am asking some very hard questions: When I look at my own life, do I really want God's justice to fall down upon me as I wish it to fall down on others? What if he gave me what I deserve, even as I wish him to give to those around me what they deserve? Do I want justice or do I want mercy? And even deeper into this, is it possible for us to have both? What does the Gospel have to say about injustice and the need for those of us who suffer under it and are guilty of it, to have justice reign?