Living Justice

The study in Zechariah 3 addresses an old and senseless argument you get from atheists.
We discern from the narrative of the Fall a critical element in human nature is desiring to be, or create, one’s own god. Modern secular theology (assertions denying divinity are theology) proposes to raise an objective scientific/logical standard by which religions are judged. Zechariah turns that on its head: God defines justice; God is the standard.
Thus, we see God, speaking through His Angel, can overrule Satan’s prosecution. We are forced to deal with parables, of course, but the image is God as Creator, Judge and Ruler. He prefers to portray Himself in terms of an Eastern Potentate, one who made it all and owns it all. Justice is whatever He says and does. No one can hold Him accountable. While He has revealed a standard of justice by which we can approach some participation in His justice, wiser minds understand we can’t really understand it. He hints in the process of revelation there is no way anything within reach of human intelligence can really encompass what’s going on, so the element of mystery remains. There is a sense in which Satan (“the Accuser”) is an employee of God, and cannot point to anything outside God and His Office as a standard of fairness or regulation. If God “arbitrarily” overrules something the Accuser raises in the Court of Heaven, it’s because all of this is nothing more than an extension of His plans and desires in the first place.
It serves as a reminder human intelligence is also fallen, incapable of discerning the fullness of what God is and does, and what He expects from us. It’s not a simple matter of winding it up and letting it run. There is an undying accountability to God on a personal level. We are accountable to Him as Creator. If there is, or could be, anything to which God is held accountable, it would of necessity rest far beyond our ken. Thus, even when there was a priesthood vested with the knowledge of His Law, they still had to keep on hand the means to discern His will for something which apparently was not clearly covered in His revelation. Thus, in Israel, the priests had their Urim and Thummim.
With the coming of Christ as the final revelation and the release of His Spirit among humanity, those old means are no longer available. God doesn’t deal outside His Son. You might assay to reconstruct the Covenant of Moses in all purity and sincerity, and it may appear you have recovered the use of Urim and Thummim (we have no idea what they were, actually), but it won’t be the same. It’s now a matter of personal accountability through the Son.
And outside the Son, nobody on earth can make it matter to you. There is no logic able to breathe life into a dead spirit. If you aren’t moved beyond your own logic, don’t worry about it. There’s nothing anyone can do to clarify things for you. If your spirit is alive, you may have a whale of a lot of seeking and studying ahead of you, but the issue is fundamentally one of finding peace with Him and no one can explain it.
So, for example, I have enunciated certain principles of God’s Laws, allowing this and forbidding that — in theory. I can say something is okay under the Laws, and still not feel comfortable doing it myself. That’s not inconsistent if Zechariah 3 has any meaning at all. I may also say something is forbidden and then tell you God has forgiven you for doing it, for the same reason. It all rests on His purpose in you, something to which I am only marginally a party, if that. I can’t speak for Him in some cases, only decide I would be unable to work with you directly on something. I can also do whatever I find necessary to keep you from interfering in something I am certain He demands of me. All the while I am completely unable to explain reasonably to anyone.
Justice is alive in the Person of God. There is no such thing as objective truth beyond a certain level.