Just Do it! Do justice! Its just this! Its about doing!

This past weekend I found a new appreciation for Paul’s words in Galatians 5:16,

“But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not carry out the desire of the flesh.” (NASB).

How does one refrain from doing evil? By thinking real hard and long? By

meditation and contemplation? By one’s doctrinal beliefs? Not at all!

Its by walking by the Spirit or to put it another way, by living obediently to God’s calling of abundant wholeness. This past weekend I attended Pentecost 2008, Training for Change, a one and a half day conference on organizing teams to help make poverty a central issue in your Churches and in the White House. Part of the experience of being there was participating in groups where you was challenged to share relevant autobiographical information to people, in just 2 minutes, that served as a frame of reference as to why one is called to peace and justice. By the time the training was over, participants were already mobilizing a team and carrying out a plan of overcoming poverty.

I learned the value of simply doing something as oppose to processing it and trying to understand it before doing it. Don’t get me wrong, God gave us minds to process things but when it comes to the issue of poverty, and other social oppressions, it is as serious as somebody about to be hit by a car and the would be hero not thinking but simply acts to save the individual from harms way.

Many times in our culture of intellectualism, we attempt to understand things before an action is involved. In this sense, thinking is security, its about being in control. Not so bad right? Security and having a handle on things are good but at times it can be a hindrance especially when there is a matter of life and death.

I am one of those people who like to be in control of things by processing almost everything that is put in front of me to make decisions about. I am indecisive because my decisions about things have to be measured by how much I have ran it through the scanning devise–my less than certain brain. This way of deciding is helpful if you are deciding on what is the best deal on a home or trying to figure out a math problem. But when it comes to the Christian call to peace and justice, its not a matter of the mind but a matter of the heart ( both should be one in the same but our culture has created a thick wedge between them).

Many of Jesus’ liberating actions towards the poor and the mistreated started with having compassion for them ( Matthew 14:14, 15:32, 18:27,20:34; Mark 1:41, etc).

My prayer is that God’s faithful community would have compassion and be moved to action that will begin to liberate people from individual and systemic injustice. It has to start with compassion, not doctrine, not denomination, but with compassion. Lets ‘just’ do it, lets do justice!