As Christians, we worship a God of justice, to whom we will all one day have to give an account as the righteous judge. He is Himself the holy one: one can tell how seriously He takes it by the number of laws He gave to Old Testament Israel. “God is a righteous judge, a God who displays his wrath every day” (Psalm 7:11), David sang. God’s servant “will bring forth justice to the nations” (Isaiah 42:1). “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like a never-ending stream”, Amos writes.
Justice really matters to God; indeed, it is part of the reason he establishes governments in the first place: “For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and you will be commended. For the one in authority is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for rulers do not bear the sword for no reason. They are God’s servants, agents of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer” (Romans 13:3-4).
But how this should work itself out in practice is a matter of debate: within British politics, the main parties sometimes seem to be on a quest to outdo one another in who can sound the toughest on crime and propose the longest sentences. New offences are drawn up which would criminalise relatively innocuous comments and infringe upon freedom of religion and belief. And all the while, some of the most important questions, around the possibility of restoration and redemption, or how we can prevent crime in advance and improve future outcomes for young people, are relegated to the sidelines.
Within Christian thinking, there are two primary approaches to matters of justice: punitive justice and restorative justice. Punitive justice primarily focuses on punishment, as a way of deterring crime in the future (whether for the individual or for others). Its most extreme form – which is not current legal in Britain – is the death penalty; punitive justice does have Biblical backing, and even the death penalty does in some extreme cases, such as murder. We read in Genesis 9:6: “Whoever sheds human blood, by humans shall their blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made mankind.”
Restorative justice focuses more on a criminal seeking to make amends for their behaviour, with the aim of restoring the relationships with the victim and the community, and ultimately being restored themselves too. There is Biblical backing for restorative justice too: in Leviticus 6:1-6, for example, we read of what should happen when a man steals from his neighbour. The wrongdoer is to return what was stolen to his neighbour, and to add on top of that, an additional fifth of the stolen item’s value, to achieve ‘restitution in full.’ He is also to present an offering to the Priest. But instead of being put in prison, he is then reintegrated into the community, with the intention of restoring each relationship.
Restorative justice can be particularly effective for comparatively ‘minor’ crimes, and may provide a way-forward for our creaking criminal justice system. It has proved highly effective in some areas at reducing crime rate, and particularly at preventing repeat offences, whereas reoffending rates within 12 months in Britain are currently high (standing at more than 60%), and prisons are overcrowded.
God cares about the victims of crime: we know that He never sweeps evil under the carpet, but took it so seriously that he would even send his own Son to die to fulfil the righteous demands of the law and to save us. There is nothing which he does not see: “you have stored my tears in your bottle and counted each of them” (Psalm 56:8). There will be nothing, which one day, he will not judge with perfect justice. And one day, he will – in some mysterious way – put everything to rights again, even that which has been most painful: In the New Creation, the “leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations” (Revelation 22:2).
But we also know that God cares about those who do wrong, and even, that He wants us to do likewise. When Jesus came announcing the Kingdom of God, he declared that the Spirit had sent him “to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour” (Luke 4:18-19). He wanted not simply to condemn those who had done wrong, but to bring them freedom.
He taught his disciples that they should love their enemies, and pray for those who persecute them (Matthew 5:44). He even said that his followers could encounter Him through visiting those in prison: “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink…I was in prison and you came to visit me” (Matthew 25:35-36).
Ultimately, the Bible gives examples of both punitive justice and restorative justice, and both are necessary. But in our attitude towards those who do wrong, let us not forget that as Christians, we are people saved by grace, not receiving that which we deserved, but saved by His mercy and kindness. And let us look forward, with hope, to a day when, regardless of the imperfections of human justice and judgement, the righteous judge will hold all, perfectly, to account, and when everything sad will become untrue.
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17If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn’t do it, it is sin for them.
28 God blessed them and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.’
