Woe to unjust judges and those who issue unfair laws.
They deprive the poor of justice and deny the rights of the needy…
What will you do when I punish you,
when I send disaster upon you from a distant land?
To whom will you turn for help?
Isaiah 10.1-3
Behold, the Judge is standing right at the door.
James 3.9
Few things excite God’s wrath more than unjust judges. When those entrusted with upholding truth and justice go wrong, misery is sure to follow. For Americans, “Exhibit A” will always be the awful Dred Scott decision of the Supreme Court in 1857, in which the combined wisdom of nine judges could not prevent them from making one of the dumbest decisions in human history. Roger B. Taney, Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court who oversaw the Dred Scott decision, has been pilloried for his stupidity ever since. The court declared that blacks, whether free or enslaved, “had no rights which the white man was bound to respect.” They were something less than human. The court exacerbated this foolishness by declaring that Congress did not even have the power to prohibit slavery. It took 700,000 American lives in the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln ignoring the Supreme Court twice (his Emancipation Proclamation, and suspending habeas corpus), and three amendments to the Bill of Rights to correct that judicial idiocy.
In 1973, the Supreme Court once again demonstrated the divine judgment that unjust judges can unleash on a society. In the now-overturned Roe v. Wade decision, seven intelligent judges still came to the inane conclusion that killing babies was OK, if they were still in the womb. Both in America and in other countries around the world which followed our lead, the carnage in the years since is incalculable. According to the World Health Organization (a misnomer if ever there was one!), about 200,000 babies are killed in the womb every day – about 73 million every year. In America alone, about 63 million babies have been killed since Roe v. Wade. So entrenched is the ‘morality’ of this killing that in the year after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, over a million babies in the womb were put to death in America, the highest number in a decade.
In this deep darkness of sin and death, a recent decision is a flicker of sanity. A couple of weeks ago, the South Carolina Supreme Court upheld the state’s “Fetal Heartbeat and Protection from Abortion Act,” which bans abortions after a fetal heartbeat is detected, typically around six weeks of gestation. Pushing back even a little from the encroachment of evil in society is something to be celebrated. In a day when a Supreme Court judge is unable to define what a “woman” is, when political leaders embrace the lunacy that boys can become girls, and girls boys, and “marriage” no longer requires a man and a woman, this little flicker of sanity is refreshing. It reminds us to be vigilant in standing for God’s eternal, unchanging truth, in a world filled with lies.
Let me take this opportunity to encourage you to be a “flicker of sanity” in your world. I do not mean arguing moral issues with those who have no standard of truth – that’s missing the deeper issue. Instead, be a flicker of sanity by showing and telling others of God’s love for them, and Jesus dying on the cross for their sin. James reminds us that the Judge – who will determine both eternal destiny, and rewards for service, is “right at the door.” So be a ‘flicker of light’ by introducing someone to Jesus. Once they believe in Him, the Spirit takes up residence in them, and He can guide them into truth.