The Write Place

The painting displayed as the featured image is found in the Old Supreme court of Lausanne. It stands to remind that God’s word provides not just morality, but the basis for law. Justice is not blindfolded but stands on the law of God.

In his divine law we are told what justice is. In his word, God demands we examine a case based on evidence, demanding guilt be proven and not go with the crowd in the moment lest we do evil. Each individual, equal before God as an image bearer is to be judged based on the evidence of each case and nothing else.

I have found sadly, most have little to no knowledge or concern for God’s law, and following the crowd with little or no evidence is something even Christians are very pleased to do.

Exodus 22

1“You shall not spread a false report. Do not join the wicked by being a malicious witness. 2You shall not follow the crowd in wrongdoing. When you testify in a lawsuit, do not pervert justice by siding with the crowd. 


If you don’t seek the truth and examine evidence, you will often end up enabling those taking advantage of your disgust for things like sexual misconduct. That should anger you that people do. Worse yet, you will end up transgressing the law of God as if yours is better. I received pushback on this, sharing an article stating that we should ask for evidence in the Ahmad Arbury case. The young man was obviously murdered by the film (filmed by his murderers, released by them, telling you they thought they were in the right). I never said race couldn’t be an issue, I didn’t even say it wasn’t likely or possible, neither did I comment one way or another on it in this case. All I said was we need to examine the evidence rather than rush to conclusions.

Apparently, that was wrong of me to ask for case specific proof of this. Apparently, nothing like this could happen to me.

But there’s a historic analog in how I was asked to do rush to conclusions.

It’s the lynch mob.

And it leads to things like this.

The case of the Georgia DA Paul Howard proves in the shooting of Rayshard Brooks proves my point. A friend called tazers a non-deadly weapon citing the DA, who (to the ignorance of my self-congratulating friend) had two weeks before called the weapon deadly. 20,000 volts to the head or the right place on the chest can kill a man. With the police disabled, who knows what the man could do to take the officers guns, or who he could hurt. But my friend heard one side of the matter and it seemed right to him, and he did not wait for another to come and examine the case. He delighted in going with the crowd, not asking if there was something he didn’t know or if it was evil to do so.

The Dunning-Krueger effect is alive and well. For those unfamiliar the Dunning-Krueger effect, it is the phenomena of knowing very little information and feeling overconfident in your understanding of a matter. People hear one side, think they know everything, and are led around by the nose on their own sense of self-righteousness. The bible actually talks about this phenomenon.

Proverbs 18:13

He who answers a matter before he hears it–this is folly and disgrace to him.

Proverbs 18:17 (ESV) The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him.

This is not without biblical precedent as well. Joseph was wrongly accused by Potiphar’s wife of rape (Genesis 39). My friends previously mentioned would have jumped on killing Joseph, after all what else do you need to know (believeall women, as if they don’t sin too)?

Wouldn’t you rather punish an innocent man just to be safe rather than let a guilty man go?

A friend of mine said exactly that, much to the praise of his congregation.

That’s disgusting, and it demands you think yourself more righteous than God.

Both men have much to repent of.

Thomas Sowell also notes the moral aspect that gets tangled within it.

“It is usually futile to try to talk facts and analysis to people who are enjoying a sense of moral superiority in their ignorance.” ― Thomas Sowell

God’s law places a higher, more grounded foundation than the emotion of the moment. One that both of my friends would find more suitable to live under if they were accused. It is also one I hope they are simply not thinking about.

Deuteronomy 17:6

“On the testimony of two or three witnesses a man shall be put to death, but he shall not be executed on the testimony of a lone witness.”

Deuteronomy 19:15

“A lone witness is not sufficient to establish any wrongdoing or sin against a man, regardless of what offense he may have committed. A matter must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.”

My friend who said explicitly he would rather punish (that could include kill) an innocent man, would have killed Jesus, just to be safe.

Jesus was wrongly accused by the Sanhedrin (Matthew 26:57-67, Luke 22:66-23:25, Mark 14:53-65), in a trial that did not have sufficient but rather contradictory evidence as well.

If you would rather damn an innocent man than risk not punishing an evil one, you are guilty of joining a lynch mob. If all you need to know is what group he belongs to in order to know his guilt or motives, you are joining a lynch mob. If you don’t need to examine the case on it’s merits and by God’s standard of justice, you are joining the lynch mob.

The Devil comes as an angel of light, that you would expect fallen creatures to never sin by twisting the truth to make their own cause appear righteous is simply absurdity. Of course, people will lie about the most horrid of crimes, and use it to violent ends, dragging you into their lynch mob to do evil. If you go along with this, you are guilty of the same crime that lynched blacks in the south, Jews throughout history, and you would have crucified Christ. You are guilty of going with the crowd.

Matthew 6:2

“Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward.”

People want to be liked, they want to be part of the in crowd, and many like my friends, and like any of us want to be seen as the righteous man at the front of the crowd. Take heed lest you do this, and I fear and can say I have seen many of my friends do for themselves. Do not follow, or worse lead the crowd in doing evil. It is wrong to do so, no matter who does it. Instead seek out the matter, according to the standards God has set up in his word and in so doing do justice.