January 19 Krum Star Article
"Let the Oppressed Go Free"
Let’s free the oppressed.
That phrase serves as one of the major calls of what is
often referred to as the “social gospel,”
i.e., the Good News that opens not just one door—the
one that leads to full reconciliation with God, but two
doors—the other one leads to reconciliation with
the created world.
I often think about the term
“reconciliation.” It’s a powerful word
with many implications: peace, forgiveness, re-connection,
wholeness, healing, the move from death to life, from
darkness to light. For me, the word means an active movement
to offer that which I’ve received to others. The
act of reconciliation is one of becoming free from oppression
and freeing others as well. When one lives in a state
of holy reconciliation with another, then it is impossible
for one party to oppress or enslave or intentionally mistreat
the other.
I am quite convinced I can’t
be in a state of reconciliation with God unless I am also
in that state with the world in which I live. I just don’t
think it is possible to separate one’s spiritual
life from one’s social and economic and political
and personal and mental and emotional lives. I do know
there are people who seem to be able to fully segment
the difference areas of their lives—I am just not
one of them. I’ve often said, “my categories
all bleed into each other.”
I was thinking about this as
I read an email from a friend in another area who mentioned
the search for a different church because the one this
person had attended for a number of years was no longer
“meeting my needs in a church.” I know this
is a common phrase in a world where one shops for a church
in the same way one shops for a car or house or furniture
or clothing. We want the one that fits, that does indeed
“meet our needs.” But here’s where I
see the problem with this: a church that “meets
our needs” actually then becomes a place than encourages
more self-centeredness rather than less. And a place that
encourages self-centeredness can hardly be a place that
encourages the kind of reconciliatory activity that actively
works to free the oppressed. In many ways, the self-centered,
needs-meeting focus subtly works to oppress others—for
others simply become objects whose purpose is to meet
our needs—hardly a good basis for reconciliation
and freedom.
For me, the very essence of
the Good News of Jesus Christ is the call to freedom—and
part of that freedom is the move from self-centeredness
to other-centeredness. We are no longer enslaved by our
own desires, but become free to work for the wider battle
against oppression of all kinds.
We’ll talk about it more
on Sunday, 8:15 and 11:00 a.m. services.
