Malachi 2:17 “You have wearied the Lord with your words. ‘How have we wearied him, you ask?’ By saying, ‘All who do evil are good in the eyes of the Lord, and he is pleased with them,’ or ‘Where is the God of justice?’”

            People are confused about the kind of God they want. Sometimes they want a “just” God. Then they complain that he isn’t “just” enough. People have told me they can’t believe in a God who lets innocent children be abused or go hungry. At the very least he should see that the perpetrators are punished. One person who took my Bible information class balked at the idea that God could forgive a murderer and let him go to heaven. I heard comedian Bill Maher take exception to certain Christians who thought that the assassination of terrorist Osama bin Laden was the wrong way to serve him justice. Certainly, he thought, a just god should find this acceptable.

            On the other hand, when the Lord does display his justice, many get upset about that, too. They accuse God of atrocities and war crimes for the way he dealt with the Canaanites in the Old Testament–urging their annihilation. They don’t consider that violence and sexual perversion had infected almost every feature of their culture. For most of them, their worship involved prostitution. For others, they burned their own children alive in the fiery arms of the false god Molech. This was considered an acceptable, normal part of their daily life.

And the Lord was patient with these peoples and cultures for half a millennium or more. But people criticize him when, after hundreds of years, his patience ran out and he served justice on the whole society. What do they think a just God is going to do when Judgment Day comes?

Four hundred years before Christ, Israel had the same confused ideas about God that many people have today. Through Malachi the Lord addressed some of their specific complaints. “All who do evil are good in the eyes of the Lord.” It seemed to them that God somehow favored the people with the worst behavior. They wanted the Lord to bring down justice on their less than holy neighbors. Justice on their own lives? Not so much.

            So, with many people, the Lord can’t win. They are against him when he is gracious and patient, and they are against him when he is just and firm. Here is the irony: a God who is both gracious and just is the kind of God we need. Deep down inside, he is also the kind of God we want. Where is he? In the words of prophets and apostles, and the preachers who preach their message today.