Prayer (Mar 2026)
"...let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!"
I am writing this post with the Rape Gang Inquiry particularly on my mind. Though it could of course have been written even if none of those crimes had happened.
For there is no shortage of contexts in which to pray for justice, even in the context of just the UK. The victims of the covid era spring to mind: those who died as a result of “healthcare protocols”; those injured or killed by the so-called covid vaccines; and those who suffered — and are still suffering — as a result of lockdown.
Isaiah 1:17 springs to mind:
Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. Take up the cause of the fatherless; plead the case of the widow.
Nowhere in the Bible does God, or one of his apostles or prophets, tell his people, “You just need to preach the gospel” — a mentality that Rev Dr Joe Boot describes as “a reflection of the collapse of the biblical world and life view within the church”. Christians are not only called to preach the gospel; they are called to be concerned with the things with which God is concerned: including justice.
And in that context, I am reminded of Jesus’ parable of the persistent widow in Luke 18 (emphasis added):
Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said: ‘In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared what people thought. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, “Grant me justice against my adversary.”
‘For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, “Even though I don’t fear God or care what people think, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually come and attack me!”’
And the Lord said, ‘Listen to what the unjust judge says. 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? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?’
These words of the prophet Amos (emphasis added) also spring to mind. I find them particularly striking in the context of the world today:
…I know how many are your offences and how great your sins.
There are those who oppress the innocent and take bribes and deprive the poor of justice in the courts. Therefore the prudent keep quiet in such times, for the times are evil.
Seek good, not evil, that you may live. Then the Lord God Almighty will be with you, just as you say he is. Hate evil, love good; maintain justice in the courts. Perhaps the Lord God Almighty will have mercy…
Therefore this is what the Lord, the Lord God Almighty, says:
‘There will be wailing in all the streets and cries of anguish in every public square…’
Woe to you who long for the day of the Lord! Why do you long for the day of the Lord. That day will be darkness, not light. It will be as though a man fled from a lion only to meet a bear, as though he entered his house and rested his hand on the wall only to have a snake bite him. Will not the day of the Lord be darkness, not light — pitch-dark, without a ray of brightness?
‘I hate, I despise your religious festivals; your assemblies are a stench to me. Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have no regard for them. Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps. But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!
God evidently has a particular concern for justice. And he teaches us to be persistent in prayer. But I wonder in how many churches across the UK people have prayed for justice in the context of either the covid era — or the scandal of the rape gangs.
Related:
Previous posts on prayer:
February: “…give your servant a discerning heart... to distinguish between right and wrong”
January: “Be still before the Lord and wait patiently for him...”
December: “His mercy extends to those who fear him…”
November: “When I called, they did not listen; so when they called, I would not listen”
October: “Your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear”
September: “They stood in their places and confessed their sins...”
August: “Put on the full armour of God... And pray...”
July: “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine...”
June: “…deliver us from the evil one”
Intro: “You do not have because you do not ask God”
Previous posts on prayer can also be accessed here.
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Some posts, including a version of this one, can also be found on Unexpected Turns
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