What Bible verses or passages spring to mind when you hear the word “justice”? Like many Christians, I usually associate the Old Testament prophets with the concept of biblical justice, since much of their collective ministry was dedicated to restoring social justice in a society that failed to treat the poor and disenfranchised with God-mandated grace and respect. It was the prophet Micah who penned one of the most famous quotes about justice in the Bible:

He has shown you, O mortal, what is good.
    And what does the Lord require of you?
To act justly and to love mercy
    and to walk humbly with your God. — Micah 6:8 (NIV)

If the prophets don’t come to mind first, perhaps it’s Jesus himself, who spoke at great length about the centality of justice in a life of genuine faith:

Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! […] You have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former. — Matthew 23:23 (NIV)

Or perhaps you’ve thought of a different part of the Bible—the outlining of the Ten Commandments, or of Nathan’s brutal critique of David’s act of injustice.

There are many examples of justice-related stories, commands, and rebukes in the Bible. But there are also many parts of the Bible that we don’t associate with justice. Which is why my attention was caught by a new Bible that hits bookstore shelves this week: the NIV God’s Justice Bible (website). Alongside the regular text of Scripture, it has hundreds of notes from an international group of Bible scholars, all of which aim to explore the concept of justice in every book of the Bible. You can download the complete book of Ruth, with commentary by Kenyan scholar Emily J. Choge-Kerama, to get a sense of its approach.

Tim Stafford, general editor of the NIV God’s Justice Bible says this Bible “brings together God’s people from the whole world in a crucial joint project. God’s Justice unites 55 writers from five continents. To understand fully God’s plan for his creation, we need the insights of the whole church, in a mosaic of cultures. This is, I believe, the first time writers from the whole world have joined in such a foundational project. It is, in a sense, a fulfillment of prophecy, for the Bible often predicts that people will come from east and west, north and south to jointly serve the living God.” He goes on to say God’s Justice

is the story of a God who sees disease and wants it healed; who hears the cry of the oppressed and is determined to make things right. The Bible is not a book about religion, as most people think of religion. It is a book about justice. It tells the story of God’s peculiar kind of justice, with love and mercy inextricably intertwined.

Restoring justice is God’s work and mission all through history; it is the heart of his loving, calling and redeeming his people. This story will lead, surely, to “justice roll[ing] on like a river, and righteousness like a never-failing stream!” (Amos 5:24).

You might find the NIV God’s Justice Bible an interesting way to study the topic of biblical justice, and we encourage you to check it out. However, there’s nothing stopping you from exploring this topic with the Bible you have now. For starters (and at the risk of perpetuating the myth that only the Old Testament prophets spoke about justice), you might take a look at our short summaries of the minor prophets, all of whom had very direct and still-relevant things to say about practicing justice. Mel Lawrenz recently talked about how to go about studying a particular topic (say… “justice”) in Scripture, and how to use Bible commentaries. Using Bible studies and commentaries was once a strictly offline activity, but no longer: there are a lot of excellent (and free) commentaries available on Bible Gateway for you to access alongside your Bible reading.

[Browse the Bible Section in the Bible Gateway Store]

“Justice” is a word we’ve been hearing a lot lately, and a look at the headlines suggests that as a global church, we are only just starting to confront the challenge of refugees, war, and our responsibility to “do justice”—so consider setting some time aside this week to explore what the Bible has to say about it.