Controversy. It leaps at us from our social media screens, weaves its way through academia, murmurs a loud undercurrent in polite circles whenever a daring topic is broached. Matters of justice are as much a cause of controversy as anything.
Let’s take a current issue as an example. Continue reading Christians and Social Justice Part 3: They said, We said
Isaiah 58:9b-11a
“If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
with the pointing finger and malicious talk,
and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry,
and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
and your night will become like the noonday.
The LORD will guide you always.”
These verses from Isaiah 58 are quoted often in conversations about justice in church settings. Even more commonly quoted are verses six to nine. A yoke is a wooden frame fastened to the necks of two animals and connected to a cart which they must pull. Here God tells us to get rid of the ‘yoke of oppression’ – human beings are not meant to be enslaved and subject to cruelty by one another and treated as less than human. People should not gain good things by trampling on other people; the many should not be exploited for the benefit of a few. Continue reading Christians and Social Justice Part 2: When Mercy Gets Messy and Justice Gets Personal
Today I am beginning a three part series on what justice looks like in the church. Often justice is made out to be a political issue, when really it is just as much a spiritual one.
“He has shown you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.” – Micah 6:8 NIV
Social Justice means many different things to many different people. For now I’m broadly defining it as undoing the work of oppression, working to make a world of equality, and respecting and advocating for all those made in God’s image – every man, woman, and child on Earth. Continue reading Christians and Social Justice Part One: What the Church Does