photo credit: OWN
It’s difficult for me to watch the interview Lance Armstrong held with Oprah Winfrey. Here is a man who cheated by using performance-enhancing drugs. And finally, he admits the truth.
Apparently he never learned the mantra, “Cheaters never prosper.”
Perhaps cheating could be forgiven, but this is not an ordinary cheater. This is a man who, in order to protect his own lies, destroyed the livelihoods of those who spoke the truth. That demands justice.
But what is justice, really?
Today as I type this, my kids are home to celebrate Martin Luther King Day.
Here we celebrate a man, who had his own demons, but who died defending his truth, his dream. We celebrate a man who stirred a movement.
MLK had a belief about justice. In his words, “Justice at its best is love correcting everything that stands against love.”
If justice is love, than I see my own heart does not always stand for justice.
Instead I see my own flesh, aching for vengeance.
But when we ache for vengeance we destroy ourselves with bitterness. Vengeance is not our job – not when the perpetrator is a stranger on a platform nor when he is a relative under our own roof.
God says, “Vengeance is mine. I will repay.”
So instead of vengeance this week, I’ll look for justice – a Martin Luther King, Jr. kind of justice. Imagine that – Love at work, correcting all that stands against love. What a revolution.
I don’t really know what justice means for Lance Armstrong, or for anyone else who cheats to win his game.
All I know is I’m called to run my own race, and to run in such a way as to win the prize.
Ultimately Love is the truest performance enhancer.
What do you think? What is justice in this case?
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