Micah’s exhortation (6:8) to God’s people reminds us of what the Lord requires of us, and what is good, according to His eternal perspective. In light of the immense needs and injustices, as well as the absence of love in our own communities and in the world today, we need to continuously reflect on this penetrating truth, completely internalize it, and act consistently upon it.
On doing justice…
Righteousness and justice are the foundations of God’s throne (Psalm 89:14). God loves justice and abhors injustice. To know God, we must understand how much He delights in love, justice, and righteousness. But, even though we claim to know God, we forever turn a blind eye towards the countless injustices we see among us in the here and now. We accommodate ourselves to the systems of this world that favor a few and unjustly treat the rest. We seek our own well being above the well being of those around us. How is this so commonplace among us as followers of Jesus? Many would redefine the richness of biblical justice, which is referenced 134 times in the Bible, simply in terms of righteousness. And then we limit righteousness to personal rightness, upstanding character, or individual holiness.
Yet, the fundamental social implications of biblical justice go far beyond this kind of individualistic righteousness we substitute it with. We are required to right the wrongs, both big and small, in order to actively “do” justice. We are required to be aware of the distorted systems that frame our present world with injustice and to struggle against them as we follow Jesus.
By Roy Soto, Pastor of CSS Church in Fraijanes, Costa Rica
As a pastor, father, husband, and community member who was victim to the devastating earthquake that shook our region of Costa Rica just one year ago (Jan. 8th 2009), I know the feelings and emotions that come to my Haitian brothers and sisters now in the aftermath of the natural disaster of January 12th.
We suffer as we see our children and neighbors cry out in fear, pain, sadness, desperation, and impotency and weep from their wounds and losses. How do we respond to our wives as they ask “and now where will we live?”
In that desperation I found that I had one of two choices. Either I could give up and fall into hopelessness or see the crisis, with all its pain and suffering, as an opportunity to see God and experience His love and presence in the midst of the storm.
I chose to see Him in the suffering. By choosing that, God used me, broken and suffering as I was, to serve, cloth, feed and bring comfort and hope to my neighbors.
The circumstances of pain and suffering in our community didn’t disappear magically, but His presence and love broke through the darkness that surrounded us in beautiful and mysterious ways. His presence and love for us who suffered loss and destruction broke through in the lives of our RdC network family, churches that came and served us and brought us relief and aid, walked with us and cried with us and felt our pain; friends and servants from all over the world that prayed for us, sent offerings of love to help us rebuild and restore lives. Read the rest of this entry »
While working on DCC’s “to Be Told” video teaching series in Houston this month with DCC friend and colleague Travis Reed (www.theworkofthepeople.com), we shared a lot about the wonder of being made new, being born again, and the new eyes we are given when we embrace Jesus, the Way of the cross, and the new life in God’s Kingdom Community.
Travis created the following piece based on our conversations. We share it with you as a belated Christmas gift and prayer for the New Year!
The monthly and in some communities of faith, weekly, celebration of the Eucharist, or the Lord’s Supper, is an intrinsic element of the gathering of those who follow Jesus.It comes from Jesus’ radical revision of the Passover meal that he shared with His disciples the night before He was arrested and led to the culmination of His mission… the cross.
Jesus took the singular most significant and honored religious tradition among the Jewish people, the Passover celebration, which was very familiar to all Jews in his time with over 1,500 years of faithful practice, and He infused it with new meaning that has radical implications for His disciples.
His revised version came with a command that those of us who participate in the communion celebration must be aware of and mindful of its implications for our lives and His mission.As Jesus became the meal, offering His body broken and His blood poured out, He said to his disciples, “Do this in remembrance of me”.
Now whereas we so often hear this familiar verse recited during communion and take it to mean we should gratefully reflect on the unfathomable expression of love Jesus showed us by being broken and poured out on the cross, His command “do this” adds a level of complexity to the lesson He is conveying. His use of the verb remember is not merely asking us to recall and reflect in solemn gratefulness, but rather, He is saying DO THIS: “remember me by imitating me as the teacher become friend, be broken and poured out for others in my name”.
by Claudio Oliver of Curitiba, Brazil. Pastor and RdC Network Connector
Those who know me may find the above title curious, to say the least. Being with the poor is part of my history: My grandfather and grandmother were founders of the Salvation Army here in Brazil, and their ministry is a central reference point for my family. Their life was dedicated to the homeless, prostitutes, and in a special way to the orphans, the hurting and the renegades.
My teenage passion was consumed by the idea of fighting against poverty, hunger and injustice. Since I got married, 25 years ago, I have been involved in serving in slums, serving poor students, coming alongside needy populations, in peripheral neighborhoods, the beggars, the unemployed and other moneyless people.
I could report facts to support my pretensions over the years such as having helped “the poor” generate income, facilitated the restoration and organization of broken families, made bridges between rich and poor, fed the hungry, and facilitated the opportunity for some friends to discover professions, find their vocation and transform their own future. To “empower” people was once a key point in my practice in order to avoid creating dependency.
After all of this, or even because of all this, today I am called to question my whole life of “service” and to give up on serving the poor.
Asking “Why?”
Throughout my life I have kept the habit of always asking myself whether what I am doing makes sense, whether my heart is aligned with God’s will, and whether or not I am missing the point. This discipline, is essentially the Three “Whys?” Rule. It forces me to question each given answer with the kind of question that only children ask, and which helps me to generate a permanent transformation vector of self-criticism and of personal adjustments. Thus, in each step I take, for every thing I do, I ask: “why?” Whatever the answer might be, again I ask, “why?”. I feel I am in the right path when what I am doing surpasses the third “why”, and then and only then, will I move on.
For some time now I have reflected on Jesus’ life, on the principle of kenosis (emptying) based on the text of Philippians 2:1-11. I’ve thought about Jesus’ incarnation into our reality and into the numerous contacts and conversations he had with miserable people such as the lepers, and rich people such as the publicans, the synagogue chiefs and princes of his people; how he spent time with middle-class families, with proprietors and with servants and beggars.
I have reflected on what Jesus saw and how he acted.
As Terri and Elen were practically falling out of their chairs in a belly laugh, I could not help but to think how much I value the RDC/DCC.
Without the RDC/DCC, there is not a chance in this world that this Dominican pastor’s wife, who knows little English, would be sitting on my porch swapping stories with my wife, who knows little Spanish, to what is now a long series of inside jokes between the two of them.
Without the RDC/DCC, Esdras and I would not be swapping tearful pastor stories and learning from each other about how to become more Kingdom minded. If it had not been for the RDC/DCC my church and I would not have been able to go to Esdras community, to listen and learn and find ways to help him serve his piece of the Kingdom.
If it had not been for the RDC/DCC, Esdras and Elen would not have been able to help me “fund raise” for my family to come to the DR, by cooking a Dominican meal for my neighbors. Or at least that is what it was fronted as.
Esdras and Elen were well aware that they were doing for us what we get to do for them in their neighborhood, helping my wife and I serve our community, who are scared to death of the idea of darkening the doors of any church, but are fascinated/curious about the Kingdom work we are doing and are hungry to check it out. Esdras and Elen were helping us to reach our unchurched friends, in the same way we get to help them.
After all, isn’t that what partnership is all about?
One last story. I took Esdras to a block in the streets of Baltimore that is filled with drug use, prostitution and crime. I showed him where we do block parties to help a local mission to practice holism, finding ways to help them to serve their local community. Yet that is not the best part of this story.
After pointing out all that we get to do downtown, I was able to point out that the only reason our church is able to do what we do, is because of what we learned from him and the RDC/DCC!
Our partnership so transformed and revolutionized our church, that we came back to our piece of the Kingdom work in Maryland and began doing church in a new kind of way.
Tom and Dee, I am so thankful for the RDC/DCC – thank you for doing what you do.
Reflections on my Africa experience
By Tom Yaccino
Over the last couple of weeks we experienced some intense Kingdom connections during a gathering of the Amahoro Africa network, a sister network to the Red del Camino in Latin America. Both networks share a common passion that we believe is God’s dream for all of creation, which is to bring about the total redemption and restoration of all things.
We also had a powerful experience in Burundi, where we connected with Dallas church, Community of Faith and local Christ-followers from the Batwa tribe. Our time in Burundi reminded us again about the power and possibility of God’s vision for a restored creation.
Kingdom Reconciliation in South Africa
RdC Network leaders have been invited to be a part of the African network gathering since it started three years ago. This year, Robert Guerrero and I traveled to South Africa to participate in the network’s annual gathering, “The African Reformation”.
The beauty of these moments of connection within the global Kingdom community is that as we share stories of how God makes himself known and felt in the midst of the suffering that is so prevalent in the world, we experience reconciliation and hope.
Our South African brothers and sisters opened our eyes and hearts to a country whose history is marked by divisions and has suffered decades of hatred, systemic discrimination, violence, and oppression. Even in the darkest times of South Africa’s Apartheid, hope broke through the darkness through faithful followers of Christ who refused to conform to the “anti-kingdom” present in the form of governmental institutionalization of racism. Leaders like Nelson Mandela continue to inspire the world with their perseverance and commitment to justice. As a nation that still struggles with the scars caused by that horrible system, to this day it continues to move forward seeking reconciliation and equality.
During the Amahoro gathering we witnessed the mystery and power of God’s grace and love. A white senior official of the South African national police force, who became a follower of Christ several years ago, shared his story together with his former black maid, two black clergy, and a former white anti-terrorist task force member who later became a pastor and now serves as an international consultant for development and reconciliation initiatives.
After hearing the police supervisor’s testimony, a new friend of ours, Sean, who still struggles with guilt and shame for the dark actions he committed under order from the Police authorities during the apartheid years, confessed to the ex-official that he still harbors resentment and hatred toward him. He publicly asked for forgiveness. In turn, the ex-official pleaded for forgiveness from him. Both, now under the Divine directive that promotes life and wholeness, symbolized their act of reconciliation by washing one another’s feet. It was a Holy Moment–a sign of hope rising up from the ruins left by systemic injustice.
Signs of Hope in Burundi
After we shared a week with our family members from all over Africa who participated in the Amahoro gathering, we then traveled to Burundi where we experienced another powerful Kingdom connection between God’s people from the Batwa tribe and fellow Kingdom citizens from Community of Faith, a local church from Houston, Texas.
During our time with the Batwa, we were once again exposed to a people group who have been experiencing the by-products of marginalization and discrimination since before the time of Colonization. The systemic oppression that this ethnic group has suffered at the hands of the dominant tribes (and afterward, the colonizers) has left them landless and left out of the potential benefits of the educational, health, and economic systems of the nation. Their struggles only intensified during the 15-year period of civil war and political unrest.
As we heard their stories and were confronted by the conditions they live with, what surprised us most were the signs of hope. These humble and marginalized people, many of whom have put their trust in Christ, shared their dreams for their communities that are in alignment with God’s powerful dream of restoration.
Against all odds, Batwa young and old, are sharing their story and participating in God’s plans to make all things new.
The Transformative Power of Suffering
These experiences reminded us once again that even in dire circumstances there is hope because of the One who lived among us as a suffering servant - Jesus, who gives life through his suffering, death and resurrection.
Note: Roger wrote this reflection after a trip to the Dominican Republic where he served with ICC, a Network church in the capital city of Santo Domingo.
Micah 6:8 says: Do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with your God.
My definition of justice had always been some sort of “righteousness or consequence” idea. In leadership my definition was a sense of keeping things going in the right direction, “the rules of community”, or something like that. I think my evangelical background tied justice to God’s perfect justice which was overcome by Christ’s sacrifice of perfect love for us.
But the linkage between justice and mercy in this verse never made sense to me.
But here, at ICC in the Dominican Republic , I saw clearly for the first time that justice was about each of us having the same rights, the same reception, the same love, the same presence with Father God.
We all are sons and daughters of the same King. And if my brother or sister is in trouble, I am to love them with Mercy. I saw it with you, my new Dominican brothers and sisters. I saw you live it in your ministry to the homeless, I sense it in your love for each other. I feel it in your love and acceptance of us, of me, into your community.
When I see your justice practiced with such love and mercy, it is a true gift to me. It humbled me to be with you. I walk humbly with my God, home to Chicago , more rightly motivated to live DOING justice.
Those of us awakened to the reality of the plight of millions of people suffering from injustice often get plagued by one question, “What difference can I really make in this broken and hurting world?” We may say it out loud or in our minds, but the truth is we feel guilty when we sigh at disturbing news reports, ignore heart-wrenching images of crying babies, or hurry by the beggar on the street. And maybe when we look at the world with our eyes riveted on the problems, it is a rational and logical thing to ask.
But, everything changes when we begin to see through Kingdom lenses—even our complacency and doubt.
In a message entitled “The Power of Ten”, RdC DR network leader and pastor, Robert Guerrero, challenged listeners to consider what God meant when He said He would spare an entire city from catastrophic consequences for the sake of ten “just” people.
The teaching has special significance for the small, often marginalized communities of faith represented in the RdC networks that struggle against the tide to make a transformative difference in their neighborhoods, but it has powerful implications for all of us who are stumbling towards Jesus along His Way.
The Biblical text for the message comes from Genesis 18:23-32 where Abraham barters with God over the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.
Then he said, “May the Lord not be angry, but let me speak just once more. What if only ten can be found there?” He answered, “For the sake of ten, I will not destroy it.”
Abraham was most likely looking out for his own interests (his nephew Lot and his family) and not necessarily the well being of a corrupt and unjust city. But what may have been a selfish inquiry by a concerned uncle is a useful object lesson for us all. The presence of only ten just Kingdom citizens in a city can make all the difference in the world.
Kingdom math takes a linear equation into the realm of infinite possibilities. For God,2+ 1 ”the One” = ∞ “infinity”.
While we often get caught up in quantities, (how many volunteers are there, how much money have we raised, or how many people were baptized this month?) God seems more concerned that those of us who follow Him make His presence known by being truly “present” in alternative Kingdom ways in our towns, cities, and neighborhoods.
God continually reminds us that the mission is His. Our “Kingdom business” is to be about renewing and redeeming everything we can possibly influence.
Our constant struggle as a community of faith is that God’s measurements for triumph, success, power, and influence are usually co-opted by the world’s measurements so that, most of the time, we are scrambling in vain to accomplish plans and purposes that are not part of His mission to restore and transform.
“Hey Wendy, how are you?” I ask when I see her in the lobby after the church service.
“Fine.” She tells me, but I know better.
She looks surprisingly well and typically beautiful. No one would ever know that a few days earlier she had been forced out of her “home” 7 months pregnant. She watched from a distance as her makeshift closet with everything she owned was burned down by police. And later, she found out that their dogs were killed by bullets that were meant for her and her little community — a community that had struggled to help one another survive.
But what some meant for evil, God has used for good.
Let me tell you Wendy’s story.
She and a little band of about 14 others live in caves located on a rocky beach strewn with garbage a couple of blocks from the colonial city of Santo Domingo. She is there because, like many young people, she was having some serious problems with her parents (especially her dad) for unruly behavior and thought it might be better for everyone if she left.
She doesn’t give much detail about her home life but tells of how she is not welcome anymore (admittedly because of her own bad behavior). She had heard of the caves and went down one day to see if it could be a place for her to live, since she knew she could not go home. The group there received her with open arms, fed her what they could, gave her a place to sleep, and above all this showed her acceptance.
Her parents do not know she is pregnant. They have her other three children.
She tries to get money day by day doing odd jobs, cleaning hamburger stands, and asking people for money. Sometimes she is even lucky enough to sell jars of freshly collected sea glass that she scavenges every day from the beach dump.
The man who is the father of her baby (Chino) does the same. When they have enough, they can sleep in a one-room pension for a time. But when the money runs out, they go to the caves. When the baby comes, they are not sure what they are going to do.
“I want to serve God because I like what I have seen in this church.”
Wendy and Chino came to know of ICC (where I was first introduced to her) through the soup kitchen.
The church is located only a few blocks from the caves and when the couple heard that there was a place to get a meal for the day, they started going. Now they both regularly serve there as well. She often says, “I want to serve God because I like what I have seen in this church.”
As a pastor, father, husband, and community member who was victim to the devastating earthquake that shook our region of Costa Rica just one year ago (Jan. 8th 2009), I know the feelings and emotions that come to my Haitian brothers and sisters now in the aftermath of the natural disaster of January 12th.
For some time now I have reflected on Jesus’ life, on the principle of kenosis (emptying) based on the text of Philippians 2:1-11. I’ve thought about Jesus’ incarnation into our reality and into the numerous contacts and conversations he had with miserable people such as the lepers, and rich people such as the publicans, the synagogue chiefs and princes of his people; how he spent time with middle-class families, with proprietors and with servants and beggars.
As Terri and Elen were practically falling out of their chairs in a belly laugh, I could not help but to think how much I value the RDC/DCC.
a former white anti-terrorist task force member who later became a pastor and now serves as an international consultant for development and reconciliation initiatives.
During our time with the Batwa, we were once again exposed to a people group who have been experiencing the by-products of marginalization and discrimination since before the time of Colonization. The systemic oppression that this ethnic group has suffered at the hands of the dominant tribes (and afterward, the colonizers) has left them landless and left out of the potential benefits of the educational, health, and economic systems of the nation. Their struggles only intensified during the 15-year period of civil war and political unrest.
While we often get caught up in quantities, (how many volunteers are there, how much money have we raised, or how many people were baptized this month?) God seems more concerned that those of us who follow Him make His presence known by being truly “present” in alternative Kingdom ways in our towns, cities, and neighborhoods.
ky enough to sell jars of freshly collected sea glass that she scavenges every day from the beach dump.