Holiness and justice...

I've been reading Strickland and Robert's 'Just Imagine' it's a challenging read and one I would heartily recommend. Those of us who are Salvationists in the overweight West need to read a book like this at least once a month. The last time I felt a book shake me up like this was when I read 'Be a hero' by Court and Campbell.

The biggest risk we run in the west is that Satan will lull us into becoming complacent, apathetic and lazy - people who have become deliberately blind and deaf to the truth. Although somewhere in the back of our minds and at the bottom of our hearts we will be aware that things like hunger, poverty and injustice run rife they'll be buried between so much obsolete evangelical ephemera we won't hear the cries or see the tears of those we're called to redeem.

The thing that hit me today as I was reading was the link between justice and holiness. Sometimes God gives me an order and I see it as a call to righteousness. For example 'don't drink coffee' - because the command is seen as a holiness issue my conscience spends years debating the reasonableness of the request as I question whether it actually came from God in the first place or from that streak of ascetic self harm which runs through many primitive Salvationists!

Today the penny dropped as I realised that sometimes the command to alter our lifestyle is actually a call not to righteousness but to justice – the command isn't 'don't drink coffee because drinking coffee is a waste of money and worldly' the command is actually 'don't drink coffee because most coffee is harvested by slaves!' Strickland and Robert's make the point that in scripture the word justice and righteousness are often synonymous.

So I think I'll have to revisit that list of outstanding commands I have in my internal spiritual pending tray and instead of assessing them on the basis of their 'reasonableness' look to see if there is actually a link to justice.

As I type another example immediately springs to mind – is it unreasonable to give up watching football? Probably, at the end of the day we have to be 'in the world but not of it' and the last thing God wants us to become is miserable, self-righteous, kill-joys.

But then looking at the matter from a social justice perspective – how many teams are sponsored by breweries or casinos? How much money is gambled on football every week? How many wives and children are at this very moment suffering because the man of the house has gambled this week's house-keeping on the outcome of some fierce relegation battle? During the last World Cup Germany actually erected hundreds of 'legal' brothels close to football grounds in order to service the demands of men attending games. How many of the prostituted people who 'worked' in these brothels were trafficked or forced into such service against their will?

Holiness is much more than just an issue of self denial, indeed it is more than just a commitment to a simple lifestyle it is about living a life where my impact on the misery of others is minimised to the greatest extent possible. It's a life where the clothes I wear, the food I eat, the way (and distance) I travel, the place I bank, the shoes I wear, the hot drinks I consume are only enjoyed where that enjoyment is not funded by someone else's misery.

Righteousness and justice are the hallmarks of genuine holiness and without genuine holiness 'none shall see the Lord!'

The Saviour of men came to seek and to save
The souls who were lost to the good;
His Spirit was moved for the world which he loved
With the boundless compassion of God.
And still there are fields where the labourers are few,
And still there are souls without bread,
And still eyes that weep where the darkness is deep,
And still straying sheep to be led.

Except I am moved with compassion,
How dwelleth thy Spirit in me?
In word and in deed burning love is my need,
I know I can find this in thee.

Orsborn (SASB527)

Grace and peace, A