Dr. David D. Young
February 18, 2007
Jeremiah 5: 1-9
Amos 5: 14-15 & 24, Micah 6: 8
"What About Justice?"

Today marks the last in our Winter Sermon Series, "Struggling with Tough Questions" as we embrace the question, "What About Justice?"

Last Sunday we explored same-sex orientation and in retrospect the preaching style of coming out, sitting on a stool, and sharing from the heart seems to have been, from my viewpoint, an appropriate way to communicate. After all, the Bible doesn’t say that much about it – and what it does say is about as relevant as selling our daughters into slavery – which it says elsewhere in the Bible. Jesus himself never spoke on the subject of same-sex orientation – and we can only guess at what he might have said.

Today’s theme, however, is not so vague, ambiguous or time bound. The Bible is replete with the imperative and injunction to both seek and do justice. And so, the style will be yet again different this morning.

Charlie Brown and Lucy are leaning against their philosophical wall and Charlie Brown says, "You know what I wonder? Sometimes I wonder if God is pleased with me. Do you ever wonder if God is pleased with you?" To which Lucy replies, "He just has to be!"

Well, that’s precisely the question Jeremiah struggled with for himself and for his people. A sobering question is taken seriously. In preparing for this morning – and after the past several weeks of dealing with some pretty tough issues – as I read our text from Jeremiah I was wishing I could deal with something else, for its message is hard.

"Search all of the streets of Jerusalem and see if there be just one person who does what is right and tries to be faithful to God” – and if you do, I will forgive the entire city – says God. And the unbelievable thing is – there is no one, not a single soul who fits the bill.

People were not paying attention to God. Many, not all, but many were committing adultery. Jeremiah uses the image of men being like stallions neighing and lusting for somebody else’s wife. Therefore, should the Lord not punish them? – he asks. How many stations do you have to surf on the television to find a similar theme – where someone is lusting after someone else’s spouse or partner? Not very many. It’s so common place in the media and perhaps even around us that at times we barely seem fazed by it all.

Jeremiah has a hard message. He told the people they were messing up big time – and that they’d better change their ways. God said to him, “Search the city streets – see if there be one just person and if so, I will forgive them all." Things had gotten so bad that God had purged the people in an attempt to restore them – but they would not change their ways. In verse 3 we read,

"O Lord, do your eyes not look for truth? You have struck them, but they felt no anguish; you have consumed them, but they refused to take correction. They have made their faces harder then rock; they have refused to turn back."

So…What About Justice?

When a people become pretty much self-seeking for pleasure and entertainment – it’s time for the prophets to stand up and proclaim the word of the Lord. And that is exactly what Jeremiah was doing.

The great author of the south, Flannery O’Conner, put it this way in The Habit of Being,

"You say one becomes evil when one leaves the herd. I say that depends entirely on what the herd is doing."

Well, the herd wasn’t doing so great in Jeremiah’s time. The people were being lulled into apathy and a sense of false security by unrealistic optimists who were saying, "It can’t happen here – God won’t punish us."

In verse 12, after our passage ends, the people say,

"God won’t really do anything. We won’t have hard times. We won’t have war or famine."

The false security combined with their prosperity – instead of making the people grateful – led to conceit, haughtiness, self-sufficient thinking and depravity. Jeremiah found that the apathy of the poor and especially the price of power for the wealthy was that having a conscience must be discarded.

Jeremiah loved his people and his God. And he struggled with whether or not his people were too far gone in the eyes of God. In the last verse of our text we read,

"Shall I not punish them for these things? says the Lord; and shall I not bring retribution on a nation such as this?"

"What About Justice?"

Let me ask you a question, what do you see when you search the city streets

- in Greenwich
- in Stamford
- in New York City?

I think you know what you see most of the time…self-centeredness and people looking out for Number One.

So…What About Justice anyway…in our time?

In western culture, justice is often thought of as an external, legal idea. In the Bible, the concepts of "mishpat" and "tsedaqa," namely justice and righteousness – go hand in hand. Justice is fairness and equality – doing what is right. Righteousness is a way of being – gentleness, compassion and kindness – having a right sense of being with others. These two words – especially as the Old Testament prophets understood life – and what they really stand for – are the basis of all relationships.

Justice (Mishpat) is relieving oppression and working against injustice. Righteousness (Tsedaqa) is the quality of a person that makes a relationship right.

"Love without justice is a Christian impossibility," writes Alan Paton in The Dorothy Day Book, "and can only be practiced by those who have divorced religion from life, who dismiss a concern for justice as ‘politics’ and who fear social change much more than they fear God."

God is just and sides on the side of justice. God expects the same from his people. Hear our other texts from the prophets Amos and Micah,

"Seek good and not evil, that you may live; and so the Lord, the God of hosts, will be with you, just as you have said. Hate evil and love good, and establish justice in the gate; it may be that the Lord, the God of hosts, will be gracious to the remnant of Joseph." (Amos 5: 14-15)

"Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever flowing stream.” (Amos 5: 24)

"He has told 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?" (Micah 6: 8)

God’s justice is to be our justice – Jeremiah, Amos and Micah would say – and scripture tells us that God is love and truth – so justice is truth and love in action.

One of the great preachers of the last century, George Buttrick, put it this way,

"Our righteousness is justice. God’s righteousness is love. It becometh us to fulfill all righteousness."

What the prophets teach us to believe and what the world rewards as belief are not the same.

So, what do you see when you search the city streets? I think you know what you see most of the time…gentleness takes more courage than violence – especially in the face of violence. And human compassion is more valuable than any ideology.

I believe that the best and truest loves in life are often the costliest – over the long haul – things such as marriage, family, friendship and church involvement. So too, with justice – an investment of time and self are required – but it is well worth it.

If justice then, is what God really wants – how do we go about it? Rather than laying a guilt trip on you – I want to suggest some opportunities. Besides, motivation by guilt is seldom helpful. And, we know that ultimately our future lies in the grace of God as a gift and nothing we can earn.

The first thing we can do – is something we do together. I’m going to tell you about it in just a minute – but first, this story.

Over 200 years ago John Newton, a drunken sailor, got off a ship on the docks of London. He was a slave trader and an alcoholic, a street fighter, a man who had morally hit bottom.

As he was weaving his way through the streets of London, Newton passed a little Methodist mission hall where he heard singing. He felt compelled in his heart to go in. Inside, the people were singing about the grace of God, and the preacher spoke of God’s holy love for everybody. Then he gave the invitation to come to Christ, John Newton made his way to the front and surrendered his life to Jesus Christ.

Later, as he was contemplating what he had done and was meditating on his newfound experience with God, Newton wrote the great hymn, "Amazing Grace." Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me. I once was lost, but now I’m found, was blind, but now I see.

Did you know that there are still twenty seven million people around the world today who are living in slavery? Two hundred years ago the British Empire abolished slavery – thanks to the original great emancipator William Wilburforce. John Newton had greatly influenced Wilburforce and Wilburforce was one of Abraham Lincoln’s models.

Today, February 18, 2007, is being recognized as Amazing Grace Sunday all around the world as a call to both sing that wonderful song and bring an end to slavery everywhere. And so, let us join with our brothers and sisters around the globe in singing "Amazing Grace" and committing ourselves to join in a new abolitionism. (At this point the congregation sang "Amazing Grace."

So…What About Justice?

I shudder when I think of how our country has tortured prisoners during these past few years. And I shudder when I learned just this past week in the Times that a final executive order authorizing military commissions to begin trying suspected terrorists has been issued. Under rules drafted by the Pentagon last month, the commissions would be permitted to sentence defendants to imprisonment or even death on the basis of hearsay or coerced testimony.

Friends, what is happening to us? And I cry, What About Justice? There is so much to be done – at times it seems overwhelming.

"I am only one," says Edward Everett Hale, "but still I am one. I cannot do everything. But still I can do something; and because I cannot do everything I will not refuse to do the something that I can."

Of course, we can’t do everything – but we can do something. We can engage our political process and speak out for justice, write letters, send e-mails and call our elected officials. Every voice can make a difference whether it’s for life, the environment, peace, poverty, women and minorities, same-sex rights and prisoner’s right. Every voice makes a difference.

In the coming year we hope to launch a new initiative here at the church offering to every member of the church an opportunity to be involved in a mission team. You will be hearing more about this in the coming months but it will be a tangible hands on way to get involved.

There are so many ways to help now through Neighbor to Neighbor, preparing food for the soup kitchens, we have twenty-three of our young people and advisors down in Honduras right now, making a small but an important difference down there, our trip to H.O.M.E. every year. There are so many things to do right here on the home front, things to get involved with and globally all the work that needs to be done for AIDS, combating hunger and providing shelter.

If you go to the United Church of Christ website – it’s at UCC.org – you’ll find lots of other opportunities. And I was just there yesterday and learned about a very recent activity taking place on our behalf by the President of the denomination, John Thomas, who by the way is from Stamford, he grew up in First Congregational Church of Stamford. He’s been representing us in a group forming called "Christian Churches Together." The country’s broadest ever ecumenical coalition of Christian leaders have issued a statement condemning the "scandal of widespread poverty" and calling for action as leaders and Christian Churches Together,

"We believe that a renewed commitment to overcome poverty is central to the mission of the church and essential to our unity in Christ."

And that comes from a statement they made on February 9th.

"All of us are but God’s instruments who do our little bit and pass by." so spoke Mother Theresa out of her humble commitment to the poor in Calcutta.

In closing, I have one simple request. I am going to ask each and everyone listening who has the physical and mental capacity to do one more thing than you are already doing for justice. Just one more thing!

Take a look around – and ponder the cumulative effect if each of us just did one more thing. Now, I am not going to prescribe what that should be for you – but please, make a determination right now that you will do that one more thing with your life energy – for God’s justice. And then as we’re "searching the city streets" – perhaps we might just see one another!.

Amen!