poverty tour

... a powerful video on the reality of poverty in America. 37 million Americans are living at or below this level.

God's heart is for the poor, needy and oppressed. Consider these Scriptures:

Lev 23:22
"When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Leave them for the poor and the alien. I am the LORD your God."

Ps 82:3-4
Defend the cause of the weak and fatherless;
maintain the rights of the poor and oppressed.
Rescue the weak and needy;
deliver them from the hand of the wicked.

Isaiah 10:1-4
Woe to those who make unjust laws,
to those who issue oppressive decrees,
to deprive the poor of their rights
and withhold justice from the oppressed of my people,
making widows their prey
and robbing the fatherless.

What will you do on the day of reckoning,
when disaster comes from afar?
To whom will you run for help?
Where will you leave your riches?

Nothing will remain but to cringe among the captives
or fall among the slain.
Yet for all this, his anger is not turned away,
his hand is still upraised.

Amos 2:6-7
This is what the LORD says:
"For three sins of Israel,
even for four, I will not turn back {my wrath}.
They sell the righteous for silver,
and the needy for a pair of sandals.
They trample on the heads of the poor
as upon the dust of the ground
and deny justice to the oppressed."

Luke 4:18-19 (Jesus quoting Isaiah 61)
"The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to preach good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to release the oppressed,
to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor."

James 2:1-6a, 8-9
My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don't show favoritism. Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, "Here's a good seat for you," but say to the poor man, "You stand there" or "Sit on the floor by my feet," have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?

Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him? But you have insulted the poor. ... If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, "Love your neighbor as yourself," you are doing right. But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers.

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I've been struck over and over again in the last year how God's heart is for those who are downtrodden and marginalized. It's all over the Bible. In fact, James says that religion that God finds "pure and faultless" is twofold: looking after orphans and widows in their distress, and keeping ourselves from being polluted by the world. Though as followers of Christ we honestly don't do very well at either of these (on the latter, we're either completely emersed in, and hense polluted by the world, or we're totally removed from culture and unengaged), we tend to ignore the former. But I believe this is changing. I'm seeing churches—yes, evangelical ones—turning their hearts toward God's. I know God is slowly changing my heart about it.

James 2 is a lot about favoritism and discrimination. Who do you show favoritism to? Who, deep in your heart, do you discriminate against? What "kinds" of people do you find yourself avoiding, maybe even literally walking around or past them when you see them—like the story of the religious leaders in the Good Samaritan? This, my friends, is discrimination. And we're not limited to the poor of James 2 or what in our culture gets the most press—racism. You may not like the smelly person or high maintainence person. Or the prisoner. Or—dare I say it—the homosexual. I'm not talking about condoning sin here, I'm talking about loving people Jesus loves, like Jesus' response to I guess what you could call the Not-So-Good Samaritan, the woman at the well.

I've gotten off the topic that jumpstarted this—poverty, so I'll come back to it. I'm in a place where I know God is moving me towards doing something, but I'm not sure what.

How has God been speaking to you about this issue? What are some practical things that we can do to help the needy in our society? Leave your comments here—it might help stir some of us to action and give us ideas. I know I would like some.

done

I finally finished the critical schools reading report! Yea!

what i did today

This morning, I went for a run outside—I think it's the coldest weather I've ever run in (about 35 degrees). I know, I know, you real runners—I'm a woos. But it was a good run!

Then I went Christmas shopping with my friends Erica, Jen & Elissa. Got a little Christmas shopping done, plus some other stuff. I was really looking forward to this, because I haven't been really shopping with friends for a long time.

Tonight, I'm going to work on a project for Hermeneutics class. We have to do a reading report, and yesterday I thought, "I'll just work on it this afternoon and evening and be done." Ha! I have to read a 73 page handout with about 20 critical schools of biblical thought (post-exilic to the present) and write 10 lines on the biblical interpretation model of each critical school, plus 2 lines on how I think they would interpret the 70 weeks of Daniel. Ugh! After about 4 hours last night, I only got through 25 pages.

So back to the grind ...