The Christian Response To Injustice Series

Injustice is an evil that has been so universally despised that one

need not depend on Christian authors alone to attack it. Cambyses,

the king of ancient Persia, had a keen sense of justice. When he

discovered that a close friend was taking advantage of his secure

relationship to him by selling his decisions to the highest bidder, he

ordered arrested and to be skinned alive as a warning to others. To

prove it was only out of his love for justice that he was so severe he

permitted the son to succeed the father in his office of high honor.

Here was a pagan who loved justice, and many are the pagan

philosophers who agree with Seneca who said, "A kingdom founded

on injustice never lasts." Even Ingersoll, the famous infidel said,

"There is but one blasphemy and that is injustice." This is an

overstatement, but it shows that one can even be anti-Christian and

still despise injustice.

Christians are not unique in their opposition to injustice, but we

find their uniqueness as we examine the response they are to make

to unjust acts against them, and the reasons for making this

response. Peter is writing to first century slaves who are under

entirely different circumstances then we are, but the facts of

injustice are still present and call for a Christian response. The

principles that Peter establishes are as relevant and valid for us

today as they were in his day. The two questions that the Christian

needs to have answered are: What is to be my response, and why?

Peter gives us the answers in that order. First,

I. WHAT IS THE CHRISTIANS RESPONSE TO INJUSTICE?

Peter begins with a clear principle. Here is a way a Christian

slave should behave toward his master. He should be submissive.

There were 60 million slaves in the Roman Empire, and Christianity

spread rapidly among this class, and so it is understandable why

there is specific instruction to slaves in the New Testament. Without

this instruction from the Apostle to guide the slaves in their attitudes

the Gospel could have easily produced a revolution. The Gospel

brought to the slaves a sense of their own personal worth. They

were not mere property, but persons with eternal souls equal with

all men before God, and this included their masters. They were

children of God, and it would be so easy for the slaves to become

victims of pride, and then conclude that as children of light they

should not be serving a master who was a child of darkness.

Jesus said that people cannot serve two masters, and this could

have been misinterpreted as a justification for rebellion.

Christianity was never in a better position to promote a revolution,

but we see instead that it promoted submission. Non-violence is the

Christian attitude. Christianity was unique in that it turned the

world upside down by the power of the Holy Spirit in love and

moral strength rather than by physical violence. There are many

books written to defend violence by an appeal to Scripture. The

favorite passage is where Jesus in anger drives out the

moneychangers from the temple. This is a weak argument, for there

is no evidence that anyone was injured, and this was a unique act of

Jesus revealing His messiah-ship. Nowhere do we get the impression

that He did this as an example for His disciples to follow. If He did,

they missed the point, for they never did likewise.

Peter was the sword swinger, and he would have been the first

to promote rebellion if that was what he learned from Jesus, but he

urges slaves to be subject to their masters. And not just to the good

and gentle, but to those who were over bearing. The Christian is not

to operate on the natural level, but he is to be different. Peter is not

concerned with the civil rights of the slaves, but with their Christian

witness. His aim is not political but spiritual. He is not concerned

about the feeding the opponent, but in winning him for Christ. Any

heathen slaves can be a rebel, but a Christian slave is to be

submissive in order to convince his master that Christ is a saving

and transforming Lord.

This does not mean that no non-Christian slave could be

submissive, for just as there were some good non-Christian masters,

so there would be some very loyal and submissive non-Christian

slaves. The point is, a Christian must be submissive even if it is

against his natural personality just because it is God's will that he be

so. This means that a Christian may inwardly rebel but still be

submissive because he desires to obey God rather than the leading of

his own nature. It is the motive of wanting to obey and please God