Short answer: change your zip code.
Yep. Move into the neighbor-’hood (to loosely quote Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase of John 1:14). Radical? Yes. Feasible in this moment for everyone reading this post? No. But imagine what kind of incarnational transformation might take place if every American Christian—including the youth we work with—had the goal of downward mobility.
Change your zip code, and suddenly injustice is the pothole you hit on the way to work each morning. Would such a pothole have lasted very long in the typical middle-class suburb? Not likely. Will the city respond if you call about this particular pot hole? Don’t count on it—at least not the first time. But keep calling.
Change your zip code, and you now have a personal interest in news about the grease recycling plant possibly moving into the empty lot across the street. If you don’t show up at the city council meeting to object—(you have learned that your neighborhood will smell like dead chickens for the next century)—no one will. Not because your neighbors don’t care but because they gave up trying to claim some dignity a long time ago. But you try anyway.
Change your zip code, and the 911 dispatchers will get to know you personally. Gunshots around the corner? On Christmas Eve? While there are small children in the house? You will pick up the phone. And you will pick it up again tomorrow and again in the oppressive heat of summer (when gang violence increases) and again when the air conditioning unit at a nearby church is destroyed by someone seeking the valuable copper inside. You will become a pro at telling the dispatchers up front exactly what they need to know. Because someone has to remind the city that this neighborhood is not off the grid. People live here. Children live here.
Change your zip code, and you are now more aware of the injustices in the world. Because they mess up your day.
It’s sad but true. When these issues are out of sight, they are out of mind, no matter how passionately we might claim to want to serve “the least of these.” But put them front and center—make them the first things you see when you step out of your front door every day—and they aren’t so easily forgotten.
Or at least, that’s what happened to me.
Several years ago, my husband and I moved into an intentional Christian community. It was a household created in the spirit of the Catholic Worker and New Monastic movements—and thus intentionally situated in what is often considered the ghetto of northeast-central Durham, North Carolina. It is a community of poverty and crime, gangs and violence. It is also a community of corner churches and little grandmas who have been praying longer than most of us have been alive.
My husband and I had been living elsewhere but attending a church in that neighborhood when we met our future housemates one Sunday morning. One thing led to another, and soon we found ourselves backing a moving truck up the driveway. We moved into the neighborhood.
And they were some of the most transformative three years of my life.
We slowly got to know our neighbors, most of whom experience more injustice in one week than many of us do in a lifetime. We made those calls about the potholes and the disintegrating railroad tracks. My housemates and neighbors went to the city council meeting about the grease recycling plant. I called 911 on Christmas Eve and said that gunshots were unacceptable, there were small children in the house, and could a patrol car at least come by and give the impression that the city cared.
Injustice was in my face, and I couldn’t ignore it. Changing my zip code, an act of incarnation, meant that the suffering of the world became my suffering.
My husband and I now live in a parsonage in the suburbs—not by choice but in submission to the pastoral appointment system of the United Methodist Church. We have made a different kind of incarnational move. And trust me, there is plenty of brokenness behind the perfectly painted doors on my street. But now, every time I see a pothole (look fast: they don’t last long around here), I am very, very aware that not all communities are created equal.
“The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood” (John 1:14, The Message). Where will the moving truck take you next? Where will it take your youth?
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I have to admit that when I saw this topic, I immediately thought, What do I have to say to this? This isn’t really my area of expertise.
But after I got over the initial shock and actually gave some thoughtful reflection to the question, I realized that I just might have a few things to offer based on my own experiences and what I’ve read in Scripture.
Perhaps the most important thing we can do is first to recognize our own self-centeredness. I find it fascinating that almost all of the world’s major religions emphasize the need to look beyond ourselves in order to help others. Christianity makes it clear that the only way this happens is through a complete reorientation of our heart and mind as we allow God to radically transform us.
Christians are called to “be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you” (Ephesians 4:32). We’re also called to “look not only to our own interests, but to the interests of others” (Philippians 2:4). We do this because Jesus himself first loved us (John 13:34-35). And if becoming like Jesus is not enough of a goal, Jesus reminds us that “not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 7:21). Scripture is clear that “the Lord loves righteousness and justice” (Psalm 33:5), and therefore Christians are called to be engage in activities that promote justice: “Hate evil, love good; maintain justice” (Amos 5:15). When we do this, we are blessed (Psalm 106:3). Given our sinful nature, this will never happen in our own strength but only as God begins to change our hearts and minds.
I’ve come to realize that one of the primary ways we become more aware is simply by asking God to give us his heart for the other. As this happens over time, our eyes and ears slowly become attuned to the needs of those around us. I remember watching the evening news once when the focus was on a country that had been been ravaged by a tsunami. As I watched the images, my heart literally broke for those affected by this disaster. I had never been to that country. I didn’t personally know a single person who lived there. Yet I found myself openly crying as I watched this tragedy unfold.
As I reflected on why I was crying, God gently reminded me that my prayer in recent days had been that I develop his heart for others, that I begin to see people the way he did. “You see,” he seemed to say, “how painful it is?”
Another way I’ve become more aware is by listening to those around me. That sounds simple, but in reality, really listening is difficult. Most of us listen just long enough to figure out the thrust of what the conversation is about then immediately begin to formulate our responses. True listening involves listening with our heads and our hearts, taking time to consider what the person is sharing and why. When we begin to listen like this, we become safe places where people can share things they might not share otherwise.
One such conversation with the Hispanic pastor at our church really helped me come to better understand the real needs of and the injustices often perpetrated on migrant workers. Whatever your take on the illegal immigrant issue (which itself is a major theological issue the church needs to respond to), the reality is that there are tens of thousands of migrant workers, both legal and illegal, who are regularly taken advantage of, often working horrendous hours for incredibly little pay. And there is often no recourse they have for fear of being deported (for the illegals) or fear of being blacklisted by the farms for causing trouble (for the legals). This conversation helped me understand the incredibly wide systemic nature that contributes to and perpetuates the injustices imposed on this group of people.
The third way I’ve become aware is by simply exposing myself to issues I generally ignored previously. For instance, I had always considered slavery to be an issue “over there.” It didn’t really impact me, so I didn’t really think too much about it. I recognize now that I was intellectually aware of the injustice of slavery. But that was the extent of it.
Then I read a story about a young girl from Cameroon who was brought to the U.S. with the promise of living with a couple from Cameroon who would send her to school. This would be a major life improvement, so her parents readily agreed. However, once the girl arrived, she was turned into a slave, working 18 hours a day and unable to have any contact with others outside the household. Slavery isn’t an “over there” issue, for the place where this story happened was just 60 miles from where I used to live! This moved me from intellectual awareness to emotional awareness.
But the reality is that the awareness wasn’t enough. Don’t get me wrong. Being aware is important. It’s the first step. But my great concern is that far too many of us simply stop there and don’t do anything more than just be aware.
This bothered me considerably, so I started reading other articles and books on this topic, having conversations with those in the know, and generally trying to educate myself about the extent of the problem. And the more I learned, the more I felt the need to act. I think this is the biggest issue we have to address here: being intellectually or emotionally aware of injustice and fighting injustice are two very different things. Unless we then choose to be engaged in finding ways to fight the injustices and help people find justice, we are withholding justice, and the Bible makes it clear that when we do this, we are cursed (Deuteronomy 27:19).
So in the end, I want to rephrase the question to ask, “How do we become more aware of the injustices around us and the world and then act on them?” For it is only when we act, Jesus seems to say in Matthew 25, that we actually are doing the work of the kingdom.
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When I see a question like this, I’m tempted to say: “Open your eyes. Injustice is all around.” But it is never that simple, is it? Yes, injustice is all around us, but unless we have the right filters, it goes clean over our heads. This is especially true of systemic injustice.
The texts we read are important in recognizing injustice. There is the Text. The Bible talks a lot about justice and injustice—a lot. Deuteronomy 16:19-20, as well as other passages, is clearly against bribes: “You must not distort justice; you must not show partiality; and you must not accept bribes, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and subverts the cause of those who are in the right. Justice, and only justice, you shall pursue, so that you may live and occupy the land that the Lord your God is giving you.”
Questions to consider with our youth around this text could be: What is a bribe? How do people give and receive bribes in our society today? How are those who cannot afford to give bribes affected as well as those who receive bribes? What makes the practice unjust? How do we see institutional bribery in our time?
Jeremiah 22:13-14 addresses the issues of just and unjust wages and living well at the expense of others. What is a just wage? What should a just wage be able to do for a person, a family? How does that compare to what many people receive in our society? How are people who receive unjust wages viewed when they seek better conditions? Who is living well at the expense of others?
I’ll take a final sample from Isaiah 58, a passage we often turn to when we think about and discuss fasting. The chapter addresses unjust wages and feeding the hungry, providing shelter for the homeless, and clothing those in need of clothes—not just in a distant, sanitary way but in a fashion that impacts our space.
So how do we become more aware of the injustices around us in the world? We can start by taking the Bible seriously and checking our lives and what happens around us in its light.
There is also the text of society. We are inundated with lots of news. Unfortunately, many of us only seek one source for our news. We need to seek several sources so we can get a more well-rounded picture of what is going on. Seek views that do not coincide with ours and that are not comfortable for us. Always ask why. Why have they said this? Why did they give the story that particular slant? Ask who as well. Who benefits? Who loses? Who is not even mentioned, and why are they left out?
Finally, we can check out texts that help us gain a better understanding of the ways in which privilege and power create injustice and systematically exclude significant numbers both in the United States and in the world at large from ever participating equally in society.
Justice is about everyone having fair access and therefore a share in society. It is about equality and value of those God has created. It is something God demands. Let’s open our eyes, read the texts, ask the questions, and—as we become more aware—make the change.
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