Someone once asked me what I meant about mercy and justice coexisting. Doesn’t the presence of one mean forgoing the other? It was an important question. And it reminded me of a metaphor that has shaped what I hope to be true of my presence in the world: the existence of home and helping others find it.
The world can be a wonderful place. But the world can also be a scary place, a dark place. It is scarier for some than others, but I believe we all feel it—that longing to be home. Not home in the sense of the place we were stuck in for months during quarantine. Home is not just a bed, four walls, a door that locks, and a pile of laundry in the hamper. If it was, countless people in the world would have no hope of “home” in their lifetimes. And others who do have access to these things would reassure you that having a place to sleep does not make a home.
No—home is belonging. It’s safety, and it’s love. Home is the place where you’re greeted with the warmest hug, where you know you have a place there because you sense that you’ve been missed. Home is the place where you can take off your shoes and your facades, where you feel safe enough to let the tears you’ve carried within you cascade down your face or to let milk erupt out of your nose and dribble onto your shirt in delighted laughter.
Home is the place that gives you a clear sense of who you are, that fiercely believes in you even when you feel you do not deserve it, that forms you into the person you knew you could be by holding you to that standard, that emboldens you to take risks and grow into that person because you are anchored in something that will be there even when–not if–you fail.
As someone who has spent her whole life trying to figure out where home is, I realize it’s an elusive idea. Maybe, like me, the home you grew up in had pieces of that definition but fell short much of the time. But home is not where you came from. Home is where you belong.
So what does this have to do with justice & mercy?
A Home for All
True justice creates a foundation for safety and growth. Justice makes a home we can all live in together. One brother cannot hit another without being held accountable. And accountability is being held to the standard that we say we’d like to live by, held up to the plumb-line of who we would like to be. When our actions are seen plainly without self-flattering filters or distracting excuses, we begin to see how far we’ve strayed. How far we have come from home.
But mercy provides a way back home. Mercy approaches the brother out in the cold and says, there is still a home for you. Not a home that will ruin you with flattery or excuse your shortcomings, but one that is committed to teaching you and loving you. Mercy does not make belonging contingent upon perfection. Mercy leaves room for a redemptive ending. And mercy makes it possible for all of us—lonely, lost, fearful, messy as we are—to find our way home too.
We need both to have a home. Right now, many people in the world are without shelter and without food. They are house-less. But many more, even with shelter, who are home-less. And many who fear there is no way back.
Let Me Walk You Home
When I think about one of the most tangible acts of love you can offer someone, what comes to mind is this: walking them home. Walking someone home is usually inconvenient and inefficient. It exposes us to risk, as we leave our safe spaces to go out into the cold. And it tests us deeply, especially when it’s for someone we believe deserves to be left out there.
In the same way, a commitment to justice and mercy is a commitment to walking someone home. It means we have to stay the course, to offer both accountability and the hope of belonging when it is much easier to choose just one.
To walk someone home is one of the bravest things we can do. It means leaving room to be surprised and holding out hope for a redemptive ending. We choose to leave behind the story where dragons must be slain to see if dragons may be befriended and transformed into protectors of the weak. We may be disappointed, and we may get burned.
But when we choose to walk the long, treacherous road with someone, we ourselves become a temporary place of shelter and belonging. We become a home. We get to carry the safety of home within us, wherever we may choose to venture, a reminder that we can find our way back no matter how far we may stray.
So let’s walk each other home, shall we? I’m rubbish at directions, but one step at a time, we’ll find it together.