From Charity to Justice
St. Francis once said, “There is no exercise better for the heart than reaching down and lifting people up. For it is in giving that we receive.”
Being involved in charity, which is not a bad thing, means to give to a person or an organization who will be doing the reaching down and the lifting up of people.
They are what you would call a middleman, buffering you from the actual experience of reaching and lifting.
Charity allows you to help someone or a group of people without having to experience the pain or discomfort or inconvenience of what they are going through. Charity protects you.
But charity also robs you. It robs you of depth, purpose and the joy that can only come from reaching down and lifting up the people that your charity has actually protected you from. Charity can actually distance you from God.
Did I say that charity is not bad? I think I did. And it’s true. We need charity. We need generosity. We need to give to causes that we cannot personally be involved with.
Organizations on the front lines of war, disease, hunger and extreme poverty need our charity.
Yet…ultimately, God is not a God of charity but a God of justice. And because God is a God of justice, then so must we.
Justice is about a young girl in Africa having the same rights and opportunities as a young girl in the United States.
Justice is about a mother in Guatemala having the same access to medical care as a mother in the U.K.
Justice is about an inner city student being given the same quality education as an upper class suburban student.
Bill Gates has said “Until we’re educating every kid in a fantastic way, there is no shortage of things to do.”
Justice is about a foster child in America receiving a family support system that will propel them towards a sustainable future.
Justice is about a hungry belly at the bottom of the caste system in India having the same access to food as the bulging bellies of the upper caste system.
Justice is harder than charity.
Justice demands results.
Justice requires skin in the game.
Justice means sometimes eliminating the middleman.
Justice means we have to get our hands dirty, our knees skinned, our ego’s humbled and our comfort shaken.
Justice means we must learn to get along with each other so we can accomplish a greater good.
Justice is harder than charity, but it is exactly in these hard places that we see and experience the heart of God.
Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable… Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.”
He also said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
I am not sure if you will meet God in a worship service and I am not sure you will meet God in a sermon(there are some bad ones out there), but I am sure that you will meet God when you get involved in justice.
Shane Claiborne says “Charity can function to keep the wealthy sane. Tithes, tax-exempt donations, and short-term mission trips, while they accomplish some good, also function as outlets that allow Christians to pay off their consciences while avoiding a revolution of lifestyle. People do their time in a social program or distribute food and clothes through organizations which take their excess. That way, they never actually have to face the poor and give their clothes, their food, their beds. Wealthy Christians never actually have to be with poor people, with Christ in disguise.”
This is counterintuitive to our segregated, protected, “stand at a distance” kind of church life, but we must not just care about the poor, or give to the poor but we must meet, hang out, know, befriend and touch the poor.
Shane Claiborne goes on to say, “But when we get to heaven and are separated into sheep and goats (Matt. 25), I don’t believe Jesus is going to say, “When I was hungry, you gave a check to the United Way and they fed me” or “When I was naked, you donated to the Salvation Army and they clothed me.” Jesus is not seeking distant acts of charity. He is seeking concrete actions: “You fed me, … you visited me, … you welcomed me in, … you clothed me.…” If we are to truly be the church, poverty must become a face we recognize as our own kin.”
When Jesus says feed, shelter, comfort, visit, clothe, you are doing justice and it can be difficult but that is where you will meet him and you will experience a joy that cannot be taken away.
When the prophet Isaiah says to defend the defenseless and to fight corruption and abuse, you are doing justice. It can be painful, but it is where you meet the God of Justice and your legacy will be as a rebuilder of walls and a restorer of cities, and you’ll experience a sense of fulfillment that you have been searching for.
When the writer of Proverbs says when you give to the poor, you are lending to God and he will repay you well and you are doing justice. It may cause you to have to change your lifestyle, but you will learn to trust the God who will provide for your every need and you’ll experience a spirit of generosity that will set you free.
God simply asks us to show up, for a grieving mother, a lonely elder, a sick child, a hungry family, a struggling addict, a lost soul, and as we show up, though we can’t solve everyone’s problems, somehow God uses us as agents of healing and miracles happen.
I challenge the church to show up.
Show up in your own backyard where orphans are called foster children, to the jungles of Peru where mosquito’s kill children, to the slums of India where young girls are violated, to the famine deserts of Africa where bloated bellies scream for nourishment, to the inner cities of America where young men are growing up fatherless and drug dealing is the career of choice, I challenge you to show up.
For big causes of justice and small causes of justice, show up!
Albert Einstein said, “In matters of justice, there is no difference between large and small problems, for issues concerning the treatment of people are all the same.”