Equal Justice

There is a lot of noise being made because the Department of Justice is not going to prosecute President Biden for mishandling classified documents.  Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was not prosecuted for mishandling classified information either.  Yet, President Trump is being prosecuted. 

Although there are some differences between President Biden’s case and President Trump’s, to the untrained eye it looks like Secretary Clinton obstructed justice as much, if not more than President Trump.  To many Americans, there appears to be a disparity between the way President Trump is being treated compared to the way President Biden and Hillary Clinton are.  It looks like unequal justice under the law. 

These folks are all big shots.  What about ordinary Americans? 

Kristian Saucier was a machinist’s mate abord the nuclear attack submarine USS Alexandria who took photographs of classified areas of the vessel’s interior.  In 2016, he was convicted of unauthorized retention of national defense information.  He was sentenced to a year in prison.  President Trump pardoned him in 2018. [1] 

Does there appear to you to be a difference in the way justice is applied to the political elites, and cases involving ordinary Americans?  Do we have more than a “two-tiered justice system.”  Is it multi-tiered? 

Equal justice under the law means everybody gets treated the same. Right?  Apparently, we have got a lot of fixin’ to do. 

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[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kristian_Saucier

A More Excellent Way

In 1Corinthians, Chapter 12 the Holy Spirit inspired the Apostle Paul to teach us about the various gifts of the Holy Spirit, and the diverse functions individual believers have in the Body of Christ.  He ends Chapter 12 with a lead-in to Chapter 13. 

Now you are the body of Christ and individually members of it.  And God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healing, helping, administrating, and various kinds of tongues.  Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles?  Do all possess gifts of healing? Do all speak with tongues? Do all interpret?  But earnestly desire the higher gifts. 

And I will show you a still more excellent way.                               (1Corinthians 12:27-31 ESV) 

 

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.  And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.  If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. 

Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.  Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 

Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away.  For we know in part and we prophesy in part,  but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.  When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways.  For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. 

So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. (1Corinthians, Chapter 13:1-13 ESV) *

 

*  https://biblehub.com/esv/1_corinthians/13.htm

The Fruit of the Spirit

When a person trusts Jesus Christ, and Christ alone, for their salvation the Holy Spirit comes to live in them.  As disciples of Jesus Christ, they are yielded to God’s direction. God gives them the desire and the strength to do His will.  The believer no longer lives to please their old sinful human nature.  They live to please the Spirit.  The believer becomes God’s new creation, who willingly does the good things that God prepared in advance for them to do. 

The gifts of the Holy Spirit are abilities that the Spirit gives to believers.  The presence of the indwelling Holy Spirit shows in the life of the Christian and is called the fruit of the Spirit. 

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,  gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.  And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. (Galatians 5:22-24 ESV) *

 

*  https://biblehub.com/esv/galatians/5.htm