The Just Man

Excerpt taken from Dialed In: Reaching Your Full Capacity as a Man of God by Jim Ramos

Chapter 18
The Just Man

Life isn’t fair. People win, and people lose. People live long and happy lives, and people live horribly and die too soon. Children are born in affluent nations, and children are born in underdeveloped countries. Some children are nurtured by loving families, and babies are butchered through abortion. I can go on and on.

Life isn’t just or fair.

But the dialed-in man is fair, just, and righteous. He does the right thing even when it’s not popular. Someone said, “Only dead things drift downstream.” But the dialed-in man is willing to put in the sweat equity. He doesn’t whine about what should be coming to him. He doesn’t demand reparations. He does what is right even if that means swimming upstream, cutting against the grain, or standing among the minority.

I once read a saying that was transformational for me: “Evil prevails when good men do nothing.” It takes a dialed-in man to stand up for justice, treat all people fairly, show no favoritism, and speak on behalf of God and the powerless and against the evils of society.

Do what is right, even if it isn’t popular.

In Titus 1:7–8 we come to our next quality of the dialed-in man, “For the overseer must be … just.” In Titus 1:8 the word Paul used for “just” was dikaios. Amazingly, dikaios appears over two hundred times in the New Testament, and the Hebrew for “just”—tzedek—appears over five hundred times in the Old Testament!

Wow! Do you think justice matters to God?

The man with this characteristic has found salvation through Jesus Christ and has given God his full capacity—he trusts God completely. Not only does he surrender everything to the Savior, but he also makes a public stand to bear witness to what he believes and why. To stay silent about our faith is not only cowardly but denies God what is due Him, as Paul said, “For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (Rom. 1:16).

James the Just (also known as James the brother of the Lord and James the Righteous) was the half brother of Jesus and an early leader in the Jerusalem church who died a martyr around AD 65. The author of the book of James, he spent more time on the sin of partiality in James 2:1–10 than any other New Testament writer:

My brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism. For if a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, and you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the fine clothes, and say, “You sit here in a good place,” and you say to the poor man, “You stand over there, or sit down by my footstool,” have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil motives? Listen, my beloved brethren: did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him? But you have dishonored the poor man. Is it not the rich who oppress you and personally drag you into court? Do they not blaspheme the fair name by which you have been called?

If, however, you are fulfilling the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well. But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.

Are you showing favoritism to a person or people group? What advantage does a person gain by receiving something they did not earn? What happens when they have to work at something, such as maintaining a healthy marriage, raising a family, or moving upward through their career?

Favoritism judges based on outward position, status, or appearance, but we should judge others based on the fruit they produce: “But the LORD said to Samuel, ‘Do not look at his appearance or at the height of his stature, because I have rejected him; for God sees not as man sees, for man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart’” (1 Sam. 16:7).

The fair, just, and righteous man deals with people the way he would like them to treat him—the Golden Rule (Matt. 7:12). Do not bring your prejudices, biases, or predispositions to any person or situation. Instead, let the actions and character of others speak for themselves. Do what is right, even if it isn’t popular.

Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego were willing to put their faith in the fire. They were willing to burn for their cause. Are you? Are you a just man? Or are you just a man? Here is a way to find out. In the chapter on “The Generous Man,” we learned that we are simply managers of God’s resources. Those resources include our time, talents, and treasures. How much of your God-entrusted resources go to kingdom causes that you care deeply about?

The just man is a wrecked man. He is passionate about specific injustices in the world, and he gives his time, talents, and treasures to eradicate them. It is one thing to get angry when we read about little children being trafficked as sex slaves. It is quite the other to act.

What wrecks you? What provokes you to take an active role in curing an injustice in the world—racism, abortion, sex trafficking, lost souls, pornography, drug or alcohol addiction, or domestic abuse? The list goes on. There are a myriad of noble kingdom causes out there. Which ones is God calling you to invest your resources to eradicate? Start there.

Do what is right, even if it costs you greatly. Do what is right even if it hurts. Get dialed in.

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Excerpted from Dialed In © 2024 Jim Ramos. Used by permission of David C Cook. May not be further reproduced. All rights reserved.

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