“Yahweh of hosts is exalted by justice, and the Holy God shows himself holy by righteousness.”
– Isaiah 5:16
What a great verse. A strong verse. And a beautiful, powerful, awesome picture of God, the Lord of hosts, who is exalted by justice. Think about that. God is just, he’s perfectly just. Bible says all of his ways are justice. Therefore, when we do justice, we exalt God, who is the author of justice, who is the fountain of justice. “The Lord of host is exalted by justice, and the Holy God shows himself holy by righteousness.”
So how can you and I exalt God? Obviously, so many different ways. One of the ways, though, is by doing justice. When we do justice, to use language from Micah 6:8, from Amos 5, when we let justice flow, roll like water, from our lives, and our families, and our churches, and in what we do as citizens in our countries, when we do justice, we exalt God. He is exalted by justice.
Isaiah 5:16 Leads Us to Pursue Justice
So God, we pray that you would help us to go overboard with doing justice. To let justice roll like mighty waters from our lives. Even our ideas of justice, God, help us to do justice, that which is right and good according to your word, for people around us and for people around the world. God, help us to do justice for the orphan, and the widow.
Help us to do justice for the impoverished and the oppressed. God, we pray to help us to do justice for those unjustly treated all around us and all around the world. Open our eyes to injustice and oppression, and help us to act, God, in ways that exalt your name. God, as we pray for Afghanistan this month, we pray for an end to the evil and injustice of the Taliban. God, we pray for that. We interceded right now together for that.
Please, God, we pray for justice to reign in Afghanistan. We pray that you would raise up just leaders, who work for the good of all the people. For the good of our brothers and sisters in Christ there. For the good of many people who are not our brothers and sisters in Christ, God, we pray for all of their good. We pray for justice to reign in Afghanistan.
This Verse Asks God to Help Justice Reign in Our Country
Even as we pray for justice reign in our communities and our countries where we live. And God, we pray that you’d help us to be instruments in your hands for doing justice in ways that exalt you. And all of this to proclaim you, Jesus, as the just judge, as the one who will rule the nations in righteousness, and we long for that day. Come, Lord Jesus, come quickly. Bring about full and final justice on this earth. Come quickly, we pray, and help us to faithfully do justice, and love kindness, and walk humbly with you in ways that exalt you. By our justice, by others’ justice here and around the world. Specifically, we pray in Afghanistan. In Jesus’ name. Amen.
David Platt serves as a pastor in metro Washington, D.C. He is the founder of Radical.
David received his Ph.D. from New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary and is the author of Don’t Hold Back, Radical, Follow Me, Counter Culture, Something Needs to Change, Before You Vote, as well as the multiple volumes of the Christ-Centered Exposition Commentary series.
Along with his wife and children, he lives in the Washington, D.C. metro area.
