Fair is about balancing how much you get.
Love is about imagining how much you can give.

If I am a helpless sinner without hope,
If God has given me undeserved forgiveness,
If God was willing to sacrifice His own son,
If God has adopted me as His own child,
If the riches of His eternal Kingdom are mine,
If He has filled me with His own Holy Spirit,
If He has taught me the true secrets of the universe,
If I will never, ever die,
Then what right do I still believe is infringed?
What hope am I being denied?
What does anyone have that I can demand as mine?
What more power do I think I deserve?
What higher gift do I still desire?

How can I possibly look at the meager crumbs of my starving neighbor and still demand that he share them with me, who is so undeniably rich?
How can I say another race or another sex or another nation has too much when our common Father above has created them all?
How can I, who is so great an example of undeserved forgiveness, demand more justice?
To what higher judge shall I take my claim?
Under what greedy and corrupt law is my statute?

And who in this entire wretched world is my witness?
Who in their poverty and chains will stand with me against God?
Who will claim that I in my borrowed robes of purest white have any stain of injustice?
Who will come to the cross and demand one more cleansing drop of blood from the Lord God who hangs there in my place?
No one on this entire mournful planet can rightfully claim that I deserve even my next heartbeat!

How, then, shall I claim injustice? How can you?

Love does not think of such things.
Love looks at the needs of others and offers help.
Love sees the broken person and offers bandages.
Love sees the hungry and says I have bread and fish to share.
Love sees the weary and gives up its bed.
Love sees the lonely and offers companionship.
Love looks at injustice and offers mercy.
Love lifts up the one who stumbles and carries the lame.
Love eases this world’s anger and speaks of peace.
Love seeks mercy on top of justice.

If we refuse to see the blessings that we have then we will always be poor.
If we, who have been given such mercy, cry for more justice, then we will always be at war.
If we sit at such a great feast and demand the dry, moldy crust of our neighbor, then that is what God will give us. And that is all we shall have.
If we demand justice rather than the merciful riches we have been given, then God shall rain down justice from the heavens like a storm. And we will pay the last penny of our crushing debt. We will be imprisoned without hope until our final day is served.

We do not want justice. We want to become gods. And pitiful, corrupt, merciless gods we would be. We would place a burden on our brothers and sisters that no one can bear. We would reign as tyrants who are never satisfied. And the living, breathing injustice of our very existence would be a curse on all the earth.

We cannot bear justice. For we deserve none.

Instead, let us place our hope and trust in love and forgiveness.
Let us look, not to men, but to the unending fountain of mercy from God above.
Let us see that we have, in our hands, enough to share.
And in the giving let us learn that God will replace what we give from His abundance.
And let us not give dry crusts of bread that we have stolen, but God’s bread of life that satisfies our hunger forever.
For those who grasp for the levers of power are clinging with hands that will turn to dust.
In the eternal God of love may we place our trust.

Love is not fair, thank God. Love is better than fair.

Much better.

 

(Dennis Ritchie is currently posting on Gettr)