Biased Justice

In 2021, America watched the sad death of Gabbi Petito at the hands of her fiancé, Brian Laundrie. The two traveled across the United States on a four-month tour in their van, and thousands followed them on social media. Their journey suddenly ended when Gabbi’s body was found in a national park in Wyoming. Brian had killed her by strangulation and later committed suicide.

As horrible as these events were, several others died in the same, during the same months, and went unnoticed. Joseph Ferlazzo shot and dismembered his wife, Emily. Lauren Cho disappeared from her camp, and her body was found within 100 yards away. Sarah Bayard was found dead off a highway where Gabbi and Brian had been a few days earlier. Josue Calderon was found stabbed in his tent. Sadly, the list goes on and on. Somehow, some deaths get more people’s attention than others. The same is true of atrocities worldwide. The war between Russia and Ukraine draws more attention than the mass killing in Myanmar or the Uyghur genocide.

We focus on a few events because they get more media attention, or perhaps our minds can take only a certain amount of sadness and sorrow. Whatever the case, so many injustices go unmentioned, corrected, or punished.

Peter’s audiences would have faced several injustices; after all, they were refugees away from their homeland, without any rights or privileges. They were not Rome’s priorities, and the rulers didn’t greatly care for them. How were they to behave in such unjust circumstances?

Peter began with a ridiculous question,

“Who harms you if you are zealous to do good?” (1 Pet 3:13a)

He had seen Jesus – who did nothing but good things to others – captured, tortured, and killed. Perhaps Peter meant this as an irony, as he continued,

“But if you suffer for doing righteous deeds, you are blessed. Don’t fear their fear, don’t be terrified.” (1 Pet 3:13b)

How can they who suffered for doing righteous deeds consider themselves blessed when they suffered? The answer was in that quote. It was from Job, a metaphor for God who inflicted suffering on Job (9:34). Job’s friends accused him of sinfulness because he was suffering. He denied he was sinful and acknowledged that his sufferings were from God, and as such, he wasn’t afraid of his sufferings.

Peter wanted his congregations to know that their sufferings, although unjust, brought God nearer to them. They weren’t alone amid their sufferings. As such, they were blessed. This was true of Jesus – God stood by him in his sufferings. Although Jesus thought God was absent as he hung on the cross, God was with him and raised him from his death. The same would be true of the Hebrew believers. In their suffering, God’s presence was greater. Paul said this eloquently, “The greater the sufferings for Christ’s sake, the greater the comfort from Christ” (2 Cor 1:5). Suffering when doing righteous deeds would have seemed wrong, unjust, and painful to the Hebrew believers, but Peter wanted them to know there was a side benefit: God’s presence with them amid their sufferings.

I don’t like pain or suffering, and I secretly wish to escape both. But I am a realist who knows pain and suffering are common to all people. But knowing God is nearer to us when we suffer gives me great comfort. May that be true of you!