Isaiah 11 - A Righteous Shoot from the Rod of Jesse
 1 A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse;
      from his roots a Branch will bear fruit. 2 The Spirit of the LORD will rest on him—
      the Spirit of wisdom and of understanding,
      the Spirit of counsel and of power,
      the Spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD - 3 and he will delight in the fear of the LORD.
      He will not judge by what he sees with his eyes,
      or decide by what he hears with his ears; 4 but with righteousness he will judge the needy,
      with justice he will give decisions for the poor of the earth.
      He will strike the earth with the rod of his mouth;
      with the breath of his lips he will slay the wicked. 5 Righteousness will be his belt
      and faithfulness the sash around his waist.
I find it interesting that righteousness is so bound up in Isaiah’s prophecies for Israel. The message up to this point is that Israel was righteous in the past (Is. 1:21). When God looked for it however, their righteousness was gone (Is. 5:7). However, Israel will be righteous again (Is. 1:26-27) when God sends the Messiah (Is. 5:16), who will rule in righteousness (Is. 11:4-5) forever (Is. 9:7).
I also find it interesting how Jesus will rule versus how we rule today. Jesus is going to judge the needy of the earth, but He will be just. He will feed the hungry by growing food, but he will slay the wicked. One reason I think is because this is not what we do today. Instead of feeding from the earth, our rulers feed by striking the pockets of the innocent, and with the stroke of a pen, we feed the wicked and provide them free health care and legal resources. WWJD? The opposite of what we do. That’s for sure. But at the same time, I am not called to mete out the punishment that our government does not… for this is a governmental responsibility, and not a personal one. My personal responsibility is to not judge the wicked (except for when I serve as a juror or some other appropriate authority), but to protect my children from them.
You know, one can argue whether President Bush ruled as Jesus would have him, or whether President Obama is doing so now, but it seems pretty clear that whatever Jesus would have our rulers do, they are not ruling in righteousness. Good intentions and idealism (assuming a good heart on Obama’s part) does not always equate to justice, and neither does it equate to righteousness.