Tag Archives: Called to Do Justice

Repairing the Breach

Living in the Spirit

August 16, 2022

Scripture Reading:

Isaiah 58:9b-14

If you remove the yoke from among you,
   the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil,
if you offer your food to the hungry
   and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
then your light shall rise in the darkness
   and your gloom be like the noonday.
The Lord will guide you continually,
   and satisfy your needs in parched places,
   and make your bones strong;
and you shall be like a watered garden,
   like a spring of water,
   whose waters never fail.
Your ancient ruins shall be rebuilt;
   you shall raise up the foundations of many generations;
you shall be called the repairer of the breach,
   the restorer of streets to live in. –Isaiah 58:9b-12

The word breach today is most often used to describe an infraction or violation of a law, obligation, tie, code, or standard unfulfillment or nonfeasance constituting infraction*. During Isaiah’s time, it most likely took on the connotation of something that was broken, ruptured, or torn condition, a place showing rupture, split, or fissure*. While the definitions are much the same the first describes a more sanitized meaning where we would go to court, whether civil or criminal, and handle the issue. Isaiah speaks more of something more visceral and observed as being irreparable but must be repaired for life to be meaningful. As impossible as life may seem at times, we serve a God who is a repairer of the breach and who has called us to be repairers of the breach.

We are at a crossroads in our nation, the whole world, where breaches surround us. Where discerning what is just and right has become so fractured, we cannot find the common ground needed to support the Common Good even to the extent that we are caught in a pulling contest with God being the rope. Rather than conducting a religious tug of war, we must let God be God as God strives to rebuild us and makes us repairers of the breach.

Prayer:
Dear Lord and Father of mankind,
forgive our foolish ways;
reclothe us in our rightful mind,
in purer lives thy service find,
in deeper reverence, praise**.  Amen.

*https://unabridged.merriam-webster.com/unabridged/Breach

**First verse of the Hymn Dear Lord and Father of Mankind by John Greenleaf Whittier. See at https://hymnary.org/text/dear_lord_and_father_of_mankind

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.

Ministry of Justice

Ordinary Time

January 23, 2022

Scripture Reading: Luke 4:14-21

When he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, he went to the synagogue on the sabbath day, as was his custom. He stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was given to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written:
‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
   because he has anointed me
     to bring good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives
   and recovery of sight to the blind,
     to let the oppressed go free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

And he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant, and sat down. The eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him. Then he began to say to them, ‘Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.’  –Luke 4:16-21

The text for Jesus’s first sermon was Isaiah 58:6, and 61:1-2 quoted above. They outline his ministry’s purpose—bringing justice to the poor, captives, blind, and to letting the oppressed go free. These remain our goals today. We have failed repeatedly to maintain justice.  We live in the richest nation in the world and yet $140 million people* live in poverty or are one crisis away from poverty. Former students remain in low-income situations because of interest rates making payback of loans a lifelong commitment. They are captives to a system designed to make the rich richer not to lift people out of poverty. It is interesting that Jesus chose the blind to highlight. Besides returning sight to the blind, It may mean he came to open all people’s eyes to disparities in our world and how we drift away from the core of God’s plan for all creation. Oppression continues in the USA, for example, Black male offenders continued to receive longer sentences than similarly situated White male offenders**.  According to Bureau of Labor Statistics data, in 2020, women’s annual earnings were 82.3% of men’s, and the gap is even wider for women of color.

I invite you to join me in a season of prayer for our nation and our world as we seek to discern what kind of world in which we want to live, during this election year.

Prayer: Lord, Open my eyes that I may see glimpses of truth thou hast for me, Spirit divine!*** Amen.

*For more information see https://wwSeew.poorpeoplescampaign.org/140-million-maps/

** see https://www.ussc.gov/research/research-reports/demographic-differences-sentencing

Derived from hymn Open My Eyes by Clara H. Scott see at https://hymnary.org/text/open_my_eyes_that_i_may_see

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.

What Is Justice

Lent

March 29, 2021

Scripture Reading:
Isaiah 42:1-9

Here is my servant, whom I uphold,
   my chosen, in whom my soul delights;
I have put my spirit upon him;
   he will bring forth justice to the nations.
He will not cry or lift up his voice,
   or make it heard in the street;
a bruised reed he will not break,
   and a dimly burning wick he will not quench;
   he will faithfully bring forth justice.
He will not grow faint or be crushed
   until he has established justice in the earth;
   and the coastlands wait for his teaching. –Isaiah 42:1-4

What is justice? Is it an individual reality only or is justice always interrelate? The Hebrew word translated above as justice is mishpat and means judgment* and is targeted at the nation. The pictures of scales evenly balanced is an apt illustration of this word. But how do we determine what is just–doing that which is right: acting rightly or justly: conforming to the standard of the divine or the moral law: free from guilt or sin**?

I read in the paper yesterday that a man was set free from a rape charge because the woman who was raped was drunk, and there was solid proof that she was drunk because she chose to drink. No one forced her to drink. That decision was following that state’s law.

The Oklahoma City jail has some significant infrastructure problems that have resulted in it not having running water for weeks. Yesterday, a guard was taken hostage, and the prisoners demanded better treatment. Many of the prisoners are there because they could not pay the required bail. One prisoner was killed as authorities regained control of the facility. Many people held in jail have not been found guilty of anything.

The state of Georgia just passed a law making it illegal to provide water to people standing in line waiting to vote. Christ-followers are commanded to provide water for the thirsty. (Matthew 25:35) Who determines what is just?

Prayer: Lord, as we observe today, Jesus driving the money changers out of the temple grounds, guide us to ponder on the things that are just or unjust in our individual lives and our land. Please help us to see ways we can foster justice across our world. Amen.

*https://biblehub.com/hebrew/4941.htm
**https://unabridged.merriam-webster.com/unabridged/righteous

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.