We all long for better times.  We live for the day when justice and equality will be the norm for every living person — when (in effect) the kingdom of God comes on earth as it is in heaven and justice — God’s justice — rules the day.  And because living and wanting better times is such a personal thing, we all have our own ideas about how we should go about achieving it.  But we forget one important factor.  God also has an idea about how we should go about achieving it.  And God’s plan is to first address the injustice present in our personal lives.  If injustice is the cause of our misery — personally or communally — then the remedy is to get rid of injustice.  The problem is that injustice doesn’t just go away.  It has to become as intolerable as a poisonous  infection would be to our bodies.  It doesn’t seem like that’s the place where injustice begins.  But God is on point with this.  So, we are advised to put iniquity out of our hands and to deny injustice an active place in our lives.  God understands — even if we haven’t figured it out yet — that if sin and injustice are active in our hands, then they are active in our homes.  If there is injustice in our homes, then there is injustice in our communities.  If there is injustice in our communities, then there is injustice in our county.  And the cycle of injustice just grows like a malignant cancer until the entire world is infected with the life-threatening presence of injustice.  So, it is only by ridding injustice from the places we live that misery gets evicted from us and life begins to take on a new and revived existence.  It’s then that we can experience the bright and radiant sunshine of life and living in the presence of God.  We begin living and thriving instead of just existing and surviving.  That has always been God’s desire for us.

• In what ways are you able and willing to take an active role in making your home and community a more just place?
• How can you work to involve your friends and/or your church in your efforts?

Todays Prayer

Today’s Prayer
Loving God, guide me into a greater awareness of where injustice is present in me. Help me to get rid of it so that I may become a more just person, helping your Kingdom come on earth.

         Perhaps things were much different when these words in Holy Scripture were written.  Today the idea of showing hospitality to strangers (inviting people you don’t know into your home if only momentarily) is met with a healthy dose of cynicism and caution.  Today, the idea of allowing some stranger into our homes also invites us to consider “squatter rights and laws”, wrongful evictions, and other laws that protect those who may be homeless over those who have homes and may choose to show hospitality to others.  We are challenged, then, to find other ways to “keep loving one another as brothers and sisters” while at the same time finding workable housing solutions for those who may be strangers among us or are simply unable to find affordable housing solutions.

         And yet, the reality is, while times have changed, justice for the poor and empathy for those separated from family and friends has not changed.  We — as God’s people — still have an obligation to honor God by showing compassion and empathy for those who are considered “have-nots”.  The key is not how we practice justice, but that we practice justice.  And we must do it in ways that both honors God and those who find themselves in the unfortunate circumstance of being without an adequate living space — if only for one night.

         Our and other communities have chosen to criminalize homelessness by establishing laws allowing the arrest of individuals found sleeping in their vehicles and in public spaces without a place to stay.  Our community — as well as many others — have failed to address homelessness in a way that gives dignity to the homeless community regardless of how they now find themselves to be without shelter.  The question becomes, “How do we both honor God and give dignity to those who are homeless without criminalizing their poverty?”  And the answer is to do the just and empathetic thing according to God’s word by showing compassion, mercy, and understanding to those who may now find themselves holding the short end of life’s stick.

• How can we effectively “keep loving one another as brothers and sisters” without providing adequate solutions to remedy homelessness?
• What would you be willing to do to support your church in helping to find a solution to “show hospitality to strangers … “by finding a solution to the homeless situation in our community?

Todays Prayer

Today’s Prayer
Loving God, give me both the wisdom and strength to work in finding a long-term solution to address the homelessness that surrounds me.

         There is a powerful connection between doing justice and living.  And I don’t mean living as in waking up, breathing, and walking around kind of living.  And I don’t believe that is what God means.  I believe that God attaches living to the justice we impart to others.  Living, then, becomes more than just occupying a warm body and moving around.  Living becomes an action targeted toward the empathetic actions of care toward those who are less fortunate.  And it involves actively pursuing matters of justice as related to those from whom the basic necessities of life are frequently withheld.  For God, that involves eliminating oppressive policies against the poor.  It involves issues of integrity in which people don’t take that which doesn’t belong to them, but feeds the hungry in their midst, providing clothing to the naked, creating economic equality among the poor and not profiting off of their poverty.  These are the issues of justice things Jesus came to live when he said,

     18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me,

         because he has anointed me

     to proclaim good news to the poor.

         He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners

     and recovery of sight for the blind,

         to set the oppressed free,

     19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.” (Luke 4:18-19, Isaiah 61:1-2)

And it’s nothing more than the message God gives to each of us — to provide justice for those to whom justice is often denied, giving them an opportunity to experience living as God intended all human creation to experience.  It’s not a single season of a specified period.  It is a season of life that is a daily expression of living offering others the justice that God requires for and from us all.  So, it’s not just that we live, but how we live that opens the door of God’s justice for all people.

• In what ways does your living actively display God’s justice among those you know?
• How can you become more assertive in living in a way that God’s justice becomes a more central part of your life?

Todays Prayer

Today’s Prayer
God of Life and living, grant that I may live my life in such a way that I honor others according to Your understanding of justice and truly live.