I remember several years ago when I bought my first car. I had never bought something so expensive before and so I was a bit nervous. In my cautiousness, I took the car for lots of test drives. In fact, I asked the car salesman if I could borrow the car for a day. Surprisingly, he agreed! I wanted to make sure that this Pontiac G6 was everything it was advertised to be.
A similar scenario plays itself out for people who don't hold to a Christian worldview but are intrigued by JESUS. They want to know if Jesus is everything He is advertised to be before they sign-up for the Christian life. And so they look to Jesus' followers to gain their impressions of Jesus. Are His followers like (or at least trying to be like) the Jesus portrayed in the Bible? Are the people defined by their love for the 'least of these', do they promote justice in their church community (and the world!), are the people humble and willing to give up their rights for the sake of others? This is the litmus test that many people use to determine if Christianity is for REAL and if Jesus is worth following.
And this was the same litmus test used by the non-Israelites in the Old Testament. They wanted to know if the God of the Hebrews was everything He was advertised to be. This is why in Deuteronomy 4:5-8 God instructs His people to put His teaching into action so that the nations will say, "Surely this is a wise and understanding people." But Israel failed. Specifically, they failed to uphold justice and to care for the orphan and the widow. Israel looked no different than the other nations!
This is why the concepts of JUSTICE and RIGHTEOUSNESS are emphasized so much in the prophetic books. The word for JUSTICE in Hebrew is shapot which means 'to put things right' or 'to fix a wrong or broken situation' (it's a REACTIVE word). The word for RIGHTEOUSNESS in Hebrew is sedeqa and is a standard against which something else is measured or 'that which is as it ought to be' (it's a PROACTIVE word). God wants His people to be PROACTIVE in promoting RIGHTEOUSNESS by living out God's teachings and be REACTIVE by standing for JUSTICE when God's teachings are being neglected (in a way that shows and promotes love, of course!).
But RIGHTEOUSNESS and JUSTICE were being neglecting by God's people! Amos 2:7 says, "They [Israel] trample on the heads of the poor as on the dust of the ground and deny justice to the oppressed. Father and son use the same girl and so profane my holy name." Israel was failing to accurately represent God's holy name that according to Psalm 33:5 "loves righteousness and justice." And according to Amos 5:7, God was going to judge His people because they were "turning JUSTICE into bitterness and casting RIGHTEOUSNESS to the ground." Clearly justice (including social justice!) and righteousness are near and dear to God's heart.
And since God is concerned about justice and righteousness being manifested in His world so then should we! This means we should be concerned about the poor, the fatherless and the widow. But many Christians don't believe the church should emphasize these issues. Why? For many, social justice represents a liberal agenda. But if this is true then I guess God is a liberal (at least on this issue) because His Scripture seems to indicate that justice is a cause worth emphasizing in the community-life of His people!
But many people will still object for the following reasons:
OBJECTION ONE: The church needs to focus on people's SPIRITUAL needs because those are ETERNAL whereas PHYSICAL needs are only TEMPORARY.
OBJECTION TWO: POVERTY is not a MORAL issue like abortion or homosexuality and so the church does not have a MORAL obligation to address it.
OBJECTION THREE: The church is not a NATION in the same way Israel was and therefore does not have a SOCIETAL responsibility to address SOCIAL concerns (except regarding members of the church).
But are these objections really based on truth? Doesn't the physical, emotional, and psychological aspects of a person's life impact their SPIRITUAL life? Doesn't social injustice have a MORAL component in that it is caused by sins such as greed, hatred, pride, addiction, and violence? Did God want Israel to stand for justice just because they were a NATION or (more so) because injustice moves God's heart to action (and so it should move our hearts to action)?
THE BOTTOM LINE
We can not escape the reality that social justice is important to God (unless we use hermeneutical gymnastics to explain it away!). And so what Christ-followers need to embrace is the fact that we reveal God's heart to fix a broken world when we help others in their time of need...and this makes a spiritual impact and brings glory to God! In fact, the power in Jesus' ministry was that His message was always reinforced by His spirit-empowered actions of love and justice. And so may we become Christ-followers who not only TELL people about Jesus but also SHOW people Jesus!
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