Justice was Taken

 

Now the passage of scripture the man was reading was this:

“He was led like a sheep to slaughter,

and like a lamb before its shearer is silent,

so he did not open his mouth.

In humiliation justice was taken from him.

Who can describe his posterity?

For his life was taken away from the earth.”

Acts 8:32-33, NET

 

We need to understand justice through the rough-hewn frame of the Cross. God is the God of Instead, who in His mysterious magnificence practices the beautiful principle of exchange. He takes upon Himself the punishment so that we might receive the reward instead.

The justice we long for is beyond our reach. It is too dear, too expensive. Unattainable in human power. Underneath the outcry against injustice is the fear of death.

Death must be defeated to make justice possible.

The Ethiopian eunuch had no idea the impact the words he read would have on North Africans in the future. 

As he sat in his chariot bumping down a desert road, Isaiah’s riveting, disturbing description of the Messiah captured his mind and heart and he wanted to understand.

The Spirit of God, unbound by time or geography, ushered Philip to his side to explain. Initiated by the angel of the Lord and executed by His Spirit, the eunuch’s encounter with truth that day would transform not only him, but peoples, tribes, and nations. The One who is, who was, and who is to come knew the father of Christianity in North Africa would need these power words.

In humiliation justice was taken from him.

Is such a sentence powerful? It seems drained of all power. The raging clamor of injustice falls into sudden silence with these words.

Justice is a fundamental, intrinsic right. The world writhes with agony in its absence. Yet Jesus, the only perfect, sinless human, had that right taken away. #justice Share on X

What implication does this have for those who follow Jesus?

A North African pastor stands before a human judge, charged with terrorism for telling people they are seen and loved by God. A girl stands in chains, condemned to death because she answered yes to Jesus’ invitation to Come, follow me. A mother with her nursing babe is roughly handled and locked in a cell for owning a Bible. A father is dragged away in front of his wailing infant and wife because he bears the name Follower of the Messiah.

In humiliation, justice is being taken from the spiritual descendants of the Ethiopian eunuch.

The persecuted are walking in the footsteps of the Messiah, and it was declared since the beginning that it would be so. We follow a Savior to whom justice was denied. This is a hard truth to accept. But herein lies the Cross, and our unfailing hope. 

Philip knew the sequel to the story Isaiah had begun. The Messiah was denied justice, and He died. Dead is dead. One cannot be both dead and alive. In the face of death, it would seem that human power could bring all hope for justice to an end.

Yet Jesus rose to life again! Death could not finish Him. Injustice was not the end. This is good news.

The eunuch understood. Instead of death, life! Instead of injustice, justice. Instead of despair, hope.

Now as they were going along the road, they came to some water, and the eunuch said, “Look, there is water! What is to stop me from being baptized?” So he ordered the chariot to stop, and both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water, and Philip baptized him. Now when they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord snatched Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him any more, but went on his way rejoicing.

Acts 8:36-39

How might this instruct me as I walk the landscape of the eunuch’s homeland, measure the vast region we call North Africa that was transformed by his reading of these humiliation words on a desert road? What encouragement might we all offer believers who are shamefully having justice taken from them by the broken hands of humanity?

Lord, may our faith be the substance of the justice we hope for, and may we fix our eyes on the cross, the evidence of the justice we do not yet see. Amen.

@audreycfrank

Photo by Dejan Livančić on Unsplash