On expectations; or, why injustice destroys the world

I began to learn Spanish when I was 12 years old, and loved it so much that I went on to study it as a minor in college at Baldwin-Wallace. And imagine my joy when I discovered that following college, my work as a US-2 Young Adult Missionary would include community organizing and ESOL work with local Spanish-speaking communities! I’ve had the great privilege to travel to many places and work with people from many cultures, but I’ve never set foot in a Spanish-speaking country. It’s something that surprises many people; “How can you speak the language if you’ve never visited a place where they speak it?!” Ignoring the obvious answer – that I live in the US, where Spanish is spoken regularly – it’s a valid expectation of someone who speaks Spanish, I suppose. When I set foot in Mexico tomorrow, I’ll finally live up to this particular expectation, and, it must be said, dream of mine.

I’ve seen pictures. I’ve read books. I’ve watched documentaries. I’ve heard stories, so I have expectations of my own as to what I will encounter when our Volunteer in Mission (VIM) team sets foot in the colonias of Nuevo Progreso, Mexico, tomorrow. Our team from Trinity (Tasha, Liz, John, and Katy) will join with 29 other folks from Glenwood and Scioto Ridge UMCs, as together we construct two casitas (small homes) and serve folks in the Manos Juntas Medical Clinic. I’m curious, excited, and anxious to begin. I’m ready to see how my expectations stack up to reality.

Upon a first reading, Psalm 82 is a curious text. “God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment”, verse one reads. And we think: what? It certainly doesn’t meet our expectations of how our God rules. But if we take a step back to consider the teaching this psalm offers, rather than the face-value message it presents, we discover this: this psalm is about God’s expectation for how the world is ordered. God rules the world, and in this scripture God our heavenly Parent is putting on trial all the competing claims in our lives. God rules the world, and thus the things that concern God most must be human concerns. God is declaring that our time, our resources, our actions, our knowledge and understandings, must be used in ways that honor God’s gracious rule, and used in ways that live into God’s vision for our lives, and for our world.

It’s very clear what God expects of us:

“Give justice to the weak and the orphan;” the psalmist cries in verses 3-4. “Maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.’” Injustice – which we see so often when our brothers and sisters go hungry, when folks lack adequate shelter, when they go years without adequate medical care, when they don’t have shoes or a coat – is a violation of God’s desire and will for our world. And justice and righteousness aren’t abstract understandings. They’re not principles God cares about in theory. And I know this because we see Justice and Righteousness incarnate in the person of Jesus Christ, the Son of God whose anointed ministry on this earth was categorized by bringing “good news to the poor,” proclaiming “release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind.” (Luke 4:18) Jesus came so that all the oppressed might go free. So should we too, who love and follow Jesus. Doing justice means building relationships with the widow. It means taking the orphan into our homes. It means providing palliative care for the sick (and preventative care for the healthy).  It means building homes for those who have no homes. The expectation of justice which God lays out for us begins with work like that we’ll be doing this week in Nuevo Progreso. These are the foundations upon which God's Kingdom is built. It’s clear that in God’s eyes, anything less than this sort of justice destroys the world.

More tomorrow!

Pastor Katy