First Congregational Church of Braintree  
  United Church of Christ   

"It's not fair!" is commonly heard coming out of kids' mouths. But that sense of fairness does not end in childhood. We carry it forward as adults and often are found comparing what we got with what everyone else got. Social media hasn't helped this. We want our "fair share." We want what is ours "fair and square." 

Life isn't fair. But what we usually fail to see is the bigger problem. Life isn't just. While we worry about whether we got as much as the person sitting next to us, we forget about those who aren't even sitting at the table. The ones who aren't even in the building.

Jesus was not concerned with fairness. He was concerned with justice. He paid attention to the forgotten, differently abled and discarded. He didn't care who sat where at the table, he was too busy building a bigger table and busting down the walls to accommodate it. 

We receive a lot of blessings in life--community, abilities, family, church. We don't earn them. Most of us receive a lot more--medical care, inherited money or property, schooling, the privilege of setting money aside for retirement.  Again, we didn't earn being born in this country, in this setting, in our family, with the chance to get these opportunities. It isn't fair, and wow have we benefited. 

Jesus asks us mature enough to let go of "fair" and to turn toward justice, over and over again. It isn't easy. But aren't we lucky that we get to try.