"No Justice. No Peace."
It's a rallying cry from thousands of years ago. God's word to God's people through the prophet Isaiah.
In chapter 58, the LORD tells Isaiah exactly how His people are missing the mark. He explains how their religion is insufficient because they've focused on the wrong requirements. His people have constructed a system that promotes and celebrates oppression. But, it's not too late! I heard a pastor friend share this week that "the flipside of sin is glory." That seemed out of place for me. I think of holiness as the opposite for sin. But look, it's here in the scroll, too.
"Then your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness (or righteous One) will go before you,
and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard." -Isaiah 58:8 NIV
Jesus Himself goes before us, God's glory behind us, enveloped entirely. God promises restoration follows repentance. His people can claim new names:
Repairer of Broken Walls
Restorer of Streets with Dwellings
(Isaiah 58:12, NIV)
But it gets even better. In chapter 59, the LORD explains through Isaiah that confession and repentance are tools and a Redeemer is coming.
This hits me very personally. Yesterday, I joined five teenagers and the 40+ others they recruited on Facebook to hold a rally to honor Black and Native women who have died because of violence in the United States of America. Paul encourages the Church to "mourn with those who mourn" (Romans 12:15), a command I am far too familiar with this year. Mourning these lost women, made in God's image, brought me to this passage in Isaiah:
"The way of peace they do not know; there is no justice in their paths. They have turned them into crooked roads; no one who walks in them will know peace." (Isaiah 59:8)
Protests can't save Americans; only Jesus can. Hundreds of years before Jesus' arrival, this section of Isaiah reinforces the Truth that only Jesus saves people. But the same scrolls call out sin within the Church. The same scrolls urge us to run from quarreling and strife, from ignoring the needy. The same scrolls demand the Church speak out for justice and act out for peace.
I know that attending a protest isn't everyone's way to loose the chains of justice. Some within the Church may be in a position of power to change laws or business practices, especially those actively benefiting from the oppression of others (Isaiah 58:3). Some may untie the cords of the yoke through debt forgiveness or "passing the mic" (Isaiah 58:6). Some within the Church can open their homes for a meal or a boarder, maybe even someone in your own family (Isaiah 58:7). But the Church cannot do nothing. The Church cannot say nothing.
The children in our community are literally taking to the streets with the words of the prophets. We must humble ourselves before God and listen.
Tuesday, July 21, 2020
Thursday, July 9, 2020
who we hear
I woke up to my son announcing he had a poopy diaper. It's a rainy quarantine morning, and I'm still tired from camping at a state park the night before. In the early waking moments, I don't want to be an American toddler mom this morning.
Freshly changed, I tag my husband for the next few minutes of parenting. Doesn't work. My son only wants Mama to sit with him. He hits his Dad. He hits the dog. He cries for Mama attention. I don't want to be an American toddler mom this morning.
It takes three tries to get my Keurig to brew a cup of coffee. I swallow my morning meds to have a chance at managing anxiety through whatever 2020 imagines for today. My husband continues to read whatever shows up on his phone.
"Can we read the morning Psalm together?" I ask, as we converge on the playroom couch.
Psalm 116:
https://netbible.org/bible/Psalms+116
Promises of rescue. Freedom from oppression. Celebrating God's faithfulness in the Land of the Living.
So distant from my social media window into the world.
I look at friends complaining or campaigning: "Wear your mask!" "Protect your rights!" "Speak up for the unborn!" "Black lives matter!" "Vote for God's man!"
This is not the struggle described by the Psalmist.
The world continues to deal in death. Americans continue to pay for COVID with their lives. But larger genocide continues undiscussed in my American toddler mom circles. I think about the asylum-seeking mother, separated from her babies within the borders of my own nation. I think about the Uighur creating the clothes my son wears. I think about the Rohingya, still running away from burned livelihoods. I think about the Syrian teacher, persevering to care for children as years of war have threatened every semblance of humanity. I think about the families in Yemen, a nation in crisis my entire adulthood.
But to think is only the start. I pray, like my soul is in the dirt there. Because, that's the transcendence of the Church: my soul is united with these grieving sisters and brothers.
"Anyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." It's the promise Paul and Silas shared with their jailer, an invitation into God's peace and family. Each oppressed Muslim mama is made in God's image. Each trembling Yazidi reflects the LORD who will return. Salvation is accessible for the silenced and solitary in prison camps, work camps, and detention center alike. My spirit groans with the Spirit for restoration in this life.
Right now, my toddler is hosting a car show for his grandma over the Internet. He has no idea that 1,000 prisoners were reclaimed from Boko Haram the month he was born. He doesn't consider the Uighur when a well-meaning friend or family member gifts him another cheap, plastic toy. He cannot imagine a day without food, because no one in our family has ventured to Yemen. He's unfamiliar with the phrase "Anti-Balaka" because Christians are the good side in our cultural narrative.
As an American toddler mom, I want my son to know God loves him and anyone else. We actively preach that God's love is for "those like us, not like us, and who don't like us." We pray for the healing of individuals and nations, for the reclamation of systems in our nation and beyond. We pray for a renewal within the Church of the sanctity of life, of a recognition that each person is made in God's image. We want our little toddler to grow in the knowledge of God's redemptive love.
Dig in, a little deeper. The voices of the oppressed are all around us. It's easy to just listen to what happens in our homes, but Jesus died for more than those with my last name or DNA.
Credit:
https://www.genocidewatch.com/countries-at-risk
Freshly changed, I tag my husband for the next few minutes of parenting. Doesn't work. My son only wants Mama to sit with him. He hits his Dad. He hits the dog. He cries for Mama attention. I don't want to be an American toddler mom this morning.
It takes three tries to get my Keurig to brew a cup of coffee. I swallow my morning meds to have a chance at managing anxiety through whatever 2020 imagines for today. My husband continues to read whatever shows up on his phone.
"Can we read the morning Psalm together?" I ask, as we converge on the playroom couch.
Psalm 116:
https://netbible.org/bible/Psalms+116
Promises of rescue. Freedom from oppression. Celebrating God's faithfulness in the Land of the Living.
So distant from my social media window into the world.
I look at friends complaining or campaigning: "Wear your mask!" "Protect your rights!" "Speak up for the unborn!" "Black lives matter!" "Vote for God's man!"
This is not the struggle described by the Psalmist.
The world continues to deal in death. Americans continue to pay for COVID with their lives. But larger genocide continues undiscussed in my American toddler mom circles. I think about the asylum-seeking mother, separated from her babies within the borders of my own nation. I think about the Uighur creating the clothes my son wears. I think about the Rohingya, still running away from burned livelihoods. I think about the Syrian teacher, persevering to care for children as years of war have threatened every semblance of humanity. I think about the families in Yemen, a nation in crisis my entire adulthood.
But to think is only the start. I pray, like my soul is in the dirt there. Because, that's the transcendence of the Church: my soul is united with these grieving sisters and brothers.
"Anyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." It's the promise Paul and Silas shared with their jailer, an invitation into God's peace and family. Each oppressed Muslim mama is made in God's image. Each trembling Yazidi reflects the LORD who will return. Salvation is accessible for the silenced and solitary in prison camps, work camps, and detention center alike. My spirit groans with the Spirit for restoration in this life.
Right now, my toddler is hosting a car show for his grandma over the Internet. He has no idea that 1,000 prisoners were reclaimed from Boko Haram the month he was born. He doesn't consider the Uighur when a well-meaning friend or family member gifts him another cheap, plastic toy. He cannot imagine a day without food, because no one in our family has ventured to Yemen. He's unfamiliar with the phrase "Anti-Balaka" because Christians are the good side in our cultural narrative.
As an American toddler mom, I want my son to know God loves him and anyone else. We actively preach that God's love is for "those like us, not like us, and who don't like us." We pray for the healing of individuals and nations, for the reclamation of systems in our nation and beyond. We pray for a renewal within the Church of the sanctity of life, of a recognition that each person is made in God's image. We want our little toddler to grow in the knowledge of God's redemptive love.
Dig in, a little deeper. The voices of the oppressed are all around us. It's easy to just listen to what happens in our homes, but Jesus died for more than those with my last name or DNA.
Credit:
https://www.genocidewatch.com/countries-at-risk
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Ephesians 5
Therefore, be imitators of God as dearly loved children and live in love, just as Christ also loved us and gave himself for us, a sacrificial and fragrant offering to God. But among you there must not be either sexual immorality, impurity of any kind, or greed, as these are not fitting for the saints. Neither should there be vulgar speech, foolish talk, or coarse jesting – all of which are out of character – but rather thanksgiving. For you can be confident of this one thing: that no person who is immoral, impure, or greedy (such a person is an idolater) has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and God.
Let nobody deceive you with empty words, for because of these things God’s wrath comes on the sons of disobedience. Therefore do not be partakers with them, for you were at one time darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of the light – for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness, and truth – and find out what pleases the Lord. Do not participate in the unfruitful deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. For the things they do in secret are shameful even to mention. But all things being exposed by the light are made evident. For everything made evident is light, and for this reason it says:
“Awake, O sleeper!
Rise from the dead,
and Christ will shine on you!”
Therefore be very careful how you live – not as unwise but as wise, taking advantage of every opportunity, because the days are evil. For this reason do not be foolish, but be wise by understanding what the Lord’s will is. And do not get drunk with wine, which is debauchery, but be filled by the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, singing and making music in your hearts to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for each other in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, and submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.
Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord, because the husband is the head of the wife as also Christ is the head of the church – he himself being the savior of the body. But as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything. Husbands, love your wives just as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her to sanctify her by cleansing her with the washing of the water by the word, so that he may present the church to himself as glorious – not having a stain or wrinkle, or any such blemish, but holy and blameless. In the same way husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one has ever hated his own body but he feeds it and takes care of it, just as Christ also does the church, for we are members of his body. For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and will be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. This mystery is great – but I am actually speaking with reference to Christ and the church. Nevertheless, each one of you must also love his own wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.