Justice & Mercy

by Brian Kim, Parent and Family Support Coordinator

The Lord has shown you what is good.

    He has told you what he requires of you.

You must act with justice.

    You must love to show mercy.

And you must be humble as you live in the sight of your God.

Micah 6:8 (NIRV)

Our world is demanding justice in many areas right now. Our faith shows us clearly that justice alone is not sufficient to transform hearts and systems. We are required to show mercy and to live in humility and intimacy with God.

These devotions will help guide our children towards these concepts and allowing the Holy Spirit to form them into ones who will always be just and merciful as they follow Jesus.

Devotion 1: Justice

For this devotion, has a small snack ready for each person, including yourself.

Read Micah 6:8 together. Then, tell your children that you are going to explore the idea of justice today. Justice is often thought of as the same as fairness, but it is not quite the same. Being fair means doing the same thing for each person. Like, it’s fair if I give each person in a group the same amount of snack. And being fair is important, but it is also important to be people who do justice.

So how is justice different? Justice is making things right when someone has less of something. It could be something like snack but let’s take a look at what other ways it could look. Here is a picture of what fairness looks like and what real justice looks like: in the first picture, everyone is given the same box to stand on, it’s fair, right? But, how does that make you feel for the short person?

In the second picture, what’s changed? Right, it looks like the tall person gave his box to the shortest person. So now, each person can see over the fence so the tall person was showing kindness, but what if there was only one box or no boxes at all? What do you think you would do if you were the tall person? What about if you were the shortest person?

In the final picture, the fence is removed, so each person can see without any help, that’s what true justice works towards: the ability for all people to have the same access to good things!

Here’s another example: what if I got a snack for each of us, but it was really high up where you couldn’t reach it? How about up here (put the snacks somewhere high up and unreachable for your children). Each person is getting the same thing, so it’s fair right? No? What do you mean? Ah, it’s not really fair, is it? That is what it means when something is unjust.

Justice here would be to bring the snack to a place where each of us could reach it easily, right? Maybe we can eat this snack now and think about how we can be people of justice. Ask your children to consider ways to bring justice to our world by asking a few questions: Who do you notice around you that maybe has less access to good things sometimes? Why is that? What would it look like to bring justice to that situation and person?

Finish with a short prayer, asking for God’s help to be people of justice.

Devotion 2: Mercy

Read Micah 6:8 again.

Start a conversation: Yesterday we talked about justice, today we are going to talk about the second part of this verse, mercy.

In that same picture we looked at yesterday, we saw in the second situation that it looked like the tall person gave his box to the shortest person. That is what mercy looks like–it’s giving away what you have to help someone else. At times, that can be really hard, because we all like good things.

The Bible tells us this about showing mercy in Luke 6:31 & 36, “Do to others as you would have them do to you” and “Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.”

Yes, God is always with us and He wants to help us show mercy. When we can first receive love and mercy from God, like this (hold your hands out with palms facing up), we can then have that same attitude towards others (turn to your children and feel free to give them a hug!)

Let’s practice being people who receive and give mercy this week! Let’s take a few seconds to first receive love and mercy from God. So, let’s get quiet and now hold our hands out like we just practiced. Now let’s say together, “God I receive your mercy.” Ready? God I receive your mercy. Hold it there and take a few deep breaths. Now, let’s listen to Him: God is there someone I can show mercy to today or some way I can be merciful this week? (Pause for a few seconds of silence and to listen). Thank you God that you first show us how to be merciful and loving, help us do the same. Amen.