Let me share with you something I ran across recently. The book is Deep Justice in a Broken World: Helping Your Kids Serve Others & Right the Wrongs Around Them by Chap Clark & Kara Powell (Zondervan 2007). The authors juxtapose (compare & contrast) service and justice with intent of pointing Christians to pursue "deep justice." (pp. 15-16)
Service makes us feel like a "great white savior" (or black or brown or other skin color) who rescues the broken. Justice means God does the rescuing, but often he works through the united power of his great and diverse community to do it.
Service often dehumanizes (even if only subtly) those who are labeled the "receivers." Justice restores human dignity by creating an environment in which all involved "give" & "receive" in a spirit of reciprocal learning & mutual ministry.
Service is something we do for others. Justice is something we do with others.
Service is an event. Justice is a lifestyle.
Service expects results immediately. Justice hopes for results some time soon but recognizes that systemic change takes time.
The goal of service is to help others.The goal of justice is is to remove obstacles so others can help themselves.
Service focuses on what our own ministry can accomplish. Justice focuses on how we can work with other ministries to accomplish even more.
Service is serving food at the local homeless shelter. Justice means asking why people are hungry and homeless in the first place - and then doing something about it.
Showing posts with label Deep Justice. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Deep Justice. Show all posts
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Kingdom Justice
Jesus came to bring good news...to the poor. He called that good news the kingdom of God & said it was at hand. He invited everyone to enter it & experience life to the fullest! He lived complete love, perfect holiness, and radical justice. He demands the same of his followers. So, as his apprentices, we seek kingdom life & kingdom justice...now!!
What an awesome story and an awesome calling!!
"We are not to simply bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice, but we are to drive a spoke into the wheel itself." ~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer
"We can do no great things. We can only do small things with great love." ~ Momma T
"We are called to play the Good Samaritan on life's roadside...but one day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It comes to see that a system that produces beggars needs to be repaved. We are called to be the Good Samaritan, but after you lift so many people out of the ditch you start to ask, maybe the whole road to Jericho needs to be repaved." ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
When Gandhi was asked whether or not he was a Christian, he would often reply, "Ask the poor. They will tell you who the Christians are."
What an awesome story and an awesome calling!!
"We are not to simply bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice, but we are to drive a spoke into the wheel itself." ~ Dietrich Bonhoeffer
"We can do no great things. We can only do small things with great love." ~ Momma T
"We are called to play the Good Samaritan on life's roadside...but one day we must come to see that the whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be constantly beaten and robbed. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It comes to see that a system that produces beggars needs to be repaved. We are called to be the Good Samaritan, but after you lift so many people out of the ditch you start to ask, maybe the whole road to Jericho needs to be repaved." ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
When Gandhi was asked whether or not he was a Christian, he would often reply, "Ask the poor. They will tell you who the Christians are."
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