The hope in a level playing field eventually tipping toward the righteous is what many of the faithful yearn for in the divine.   We do not want to believe that we are part of meaningless chaos.  Our righteousness, it is thought, will please the divine.  Just as the evil one will eventually come to ruin.

A deeper existential and Biblical study gives us a far more complex view of the divine’s relationship to the righteous and the unrighteous.  for every victorious Gideon there is a solitary Job, for every Israel nation triumphantly crossing the Red Sea there is an undeserving Nineveh, for every Ananias and Sapphira there is a slippery Zacchaeus getting faith at a bargain price.  As the divine aptly points to Job, “You try making it rain only the just and not the unjust!”

In a psychologically soothing sense believing in the divine’s sovereignty is essential.  Mostly our imminent experience is that God is too much like father’s admonition to our protestations, “Sometimes life is just not fair!”

The inability to deal concisely with evil is a serious ontological deficiency with the divine’s being.  It is a valid reason for many people to walk away from faith in disappointment with the divine.  Isn’t there anything to balance the scales and tilt history toward the righteous?

Still, those of us who remain keep the Psalmist’s hope alive.  That the divine’s gaze is not glazed when it comes to evil and righteousness is still our yearning.  Even if there is no visible retribution for wrongdoing, we remain steadfast in our faith that righteousness matters.  Even in the midst of evil we believe, hope, praise and strive to see a world where righteousness prevails.  The glory of God is from everlasting to everlasting and we are in just a temporary moment of that divine history.