"Do Justice"

"Defend the poor and fatherless: do justice to the afflicted and the needy." (Psalms 82:3) Taking what Peter was saying to heart, one would think having compassion might be one of the actions that would be part of our new way of life; after all, without God's mercy on us, where would we be? We serve a great God of mercy and love, so too, we should be all about mercy and love; it's our new standard! It reminds me of the "sheep and the goat judgment" that Jesus spoke of in Matthew 25:31-46. In that, He showed two totally different kind of people, one was good and one was bad; however, the good ones were amazed at His statement that they had fed Him, gave Him water, clothed Him, or visited Him when He was sick or in prison, saying, 'Lord, when did we do all of that?' When we are powered by love, it just does not appear to us to be work! People come up to me all the time saying how special I am for how I have continued to care for my wife. Granted, there are many that would not do this, I know better than most how true that is. But it's not about anything more than love, the love that I promised her that day we made our vows to each other. Isn't that what love is all about, being committed? It's not based upon feelings or happiness or any other emotional experience; it's based on making a commitment to love someone, regardless! Isn't that how we are loved by God? In spite of all of our sins, and in spite of our thumbing our nose at Him, He still loves us! And then you have those bad people, the ones who were surprised how Jesus accused them of not feeding Him when they saw Him hungry, and not giving Him water when they saw Him thirsty; not taking Him in when they saw Him a stranger, or clothing Him when they saw that He was naked; when they saw Him sick or in prison, they visited Him not. How dumbfounded they were, as they exclaimed, "Lord, when saw we thee hungered, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee?" Man, sometimes we can be so blind...
""And he will answer, 'I tell you the truth, when you refused to help the least of these my brothers and sisters, you were refusing to help me.' "And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous will go into eternal life."" (Matthew 25:45-46) NLT