Micah 6:8 says,
“God has showed you O mortal, what is Good; and what does the Lord
require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly with
your God?”
One of the
struggles of people of the Old Testament was to determine and discern the will
of God for them. In this chapter, we
read tension and inquiry to bring the best to the house of God. Micah lists from offering thousands of ram to
an offering of the first born as an atonement of sin and a way to please
God. But God revealed to him that the
favour in God’s house is earned through the willingness to do justice and love
kindness.
Emil Brunner, in his book, Justice
and Social order suggests that God is the only just entity and that
whenever anyone appeals to social justice, or political or economic justice
etc., the person in essence has invoked God’s justice. And that justice is based on love and the
kingdom of God willing to embrace and make everyone a child of God.
Justice in
the scriptures, particularly the New Testament, reveals itself to incorporate,
invite, include and accept those who were left out of the family of God. Exodus 3:8 tells us that God informed Moses
that he will lead his people to the promised land which was the land of the
Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites and the
Jebusites. And certainly, the land of
these foreign nations became the promised land of the Jewish people and several
wars were fought over the control of the land.
This division
was steeped in the intention and attitude of God towards other nations. Genesis 11: 1-9, tells us of the desire of
the inhabitants of the earth to have one language and harmony among
themselves. It also informs us of the
desire of God to scattered human beings to all corners of the earth and to
create division among them. So the Lord
confused their language and human beings because of confusion dispersed to
various parts of the world. In other
words, God divided the inhabitants of the earth on that day at the foot of the
tower of Babel.
On the day of
the Pentecost, Acts 2:1-12, God who dispersed the nations of the earth,
gathered them together through the gift of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit enabled the disciples to proclaim
the message in the various languages of the visitors to the holy city. Everyone heard the message in their own language,
we have been told. Those who were caste
outside of the family of God were now members of it and recipient of God’s
message in their own language. The
universality of the message was a clear symbol of inclusion of everyone in the
family of God. This is the example of
God’s justice as he received the dispersed and outcastes in God’s family. The division and enmity had come to an end as
everyone was part of God’s kingdom and his greater plan for human kind.
The church
has struggled with the concept of inclusion since its inception. Saint Peter, in spite of all the revelations
to him, struggled to accept gentiles and people of other traditions in the
family of God. We have, as a church,
supported and advocated several oppressive and exclusionary practices. Some of those are: slavery, exclusion of
women in ordained ministry, burial of still born or unbaptized children outside
of the cemetery, denying marriage to a divorced person. Fortunately, the spirit of God led the church
to include and revise the policies because of the just and equitable nature of
God. The church even rationalized the teachings
of Jesus pertaining to divorce. The changes were in obedience to the will of God to do justice and love
kindness. However much has to be done as the spirit is calling us to work towards the full inclusion of LGBTQ in our church. Spirit is also confronting us to support self-determination (fifth non-geographical province or non geogrphical diocese) of indigenous members of our church. The same spirit is imploring us to combat racism, sexism and discrimination of visible minorities in our society and culture. The commandment to be just and kind is to be on a road less travelled and the determination to go miles before we stop or sleep. . .
