And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? – Luke 18:7

Today’s Scripture Reading (September 24, 2014): Luke 18

The Ray Rice story seems to be the story that simply keeps on giving. A recent report, and a long report written by the Sports Network ESPN’s “Outside the Lines,” establishes three main facts that everyone needs to know about the handling of the Ray Rice domestic violence incident (and it should be noted that the Ravens deny these reports and accuse them of being written by Ray Rice supporters.) First, it establishes that the Baltimore Ravens, Rice’s NFL team, knew all about the incident within hours of its occurrence. Secondly, the report alleges that Coach John Harbaugh saw the video of Rice dragging his then fiancé out of the elevator (apparently he had not seen the video taken of the actual incident inside of the elevator) and immediately petitioned the Raven’s executives to release Rice. The third point made by the report is that the Raven’s execs decided to ignore their coach and pleaded with the NFL for leniency. They begged the NFL head office for no more than a two game suspension against Rice. The NFL then did very little investigation into the incident and eventually decided to hand down the exact penalty that the Raven executive team had requested. In what has become a very embarrassing incident for the NFL, the evolving story is really about the NFL head office bending to meet the requests of the executives of one of its member teams. Apparently, as has become obvious to most of those who have watched this story take shape, the Ray Rice incident has more to do with backroom pressure and deals than it does about justice for those involved with the situation. And if it wasn’t for the public relations nightmare that has developed, this may have been a situation that would never have been corrected.

Jesus tells a parable that seems to have very similar talking points. In the parable, the unjust judge (read NFL head office and Raven’s executives) only chase after justice because of the persistence of a widow who is chasing after what she feels is right (read public opinion.) The widow refuses to give up until the unjust judge gives in and does what justice demands. It is a story of how this world seems to work. Justice is never automatic - it is something that we seem to have to chase after if we want it to become a reality in our circumstances.

But then Jesus makes the comparison of the unjust judge with God. If the unjust judge makes the right decision only because he badgered into it, how much more will a just God do what is right simply because his children ask him – and God will not make justice wait for public opinion to catch up to it.   

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Matthew 19