38. The Nature of Justice
The Nature of Justice
Chapter V In any discussion of justice, we are thinking in that realm where God’s holiness expresses itself in the maintenance of strict and undeviating righteousness. We are considering that moral condition which ought to be. We are therefore dealing with the life that is in perfect obedience to God’s will at all times. Such a moral condition describes the lives of all the angels around the throne of God. But we are also thinking of the relation that such a righteousness must sustain to lives that ought not to be, in that they are out of all harmony with God’s will. We are thus considering the action of justice in the presence of unrighteousness, and are asking the question: How will justice proceed when confronted by such conditions? What must justice do in relation to such a life? The answer is obvious. It must act, for the simple reason that it can never cease to act; which means, the demands of justice must be enforced. But in order to understand the principles on which God is compelled to enforce those demands, we need to look a little further into the nature of justice.
1. The Nature of Justice
Justice is that provision of God’s love for the sinless which insures the permanence of their moral well-being, no matter at what cost. In the first place, therefore, justice must accomplish the perfect and continuous enforcement of those conditions which secure the permanence of their well-being. This is self-evident.
Then what is that condition which will infallibly insure the permanent well-being of the sinless? That which provided for it in the first place. By what, then, was it provided for in the first place? By God’s holy and loving will for them. His love led Him to purpose their well-being, and His will is that holy purpose at work.
Therefore, God’s will must be enforced. For in so doing He is maintaining the permanence of His provision, on their behalf, for the well-being of those who are within the realm of its operation.
God’s will, then, being the law of His moral government, demands the maintenance of that government in absolute and undeviating righteousness throughout the universe, since it is public, not private. In no other way can the welfare of the sinless be secured to them.