Wed
Jul 1
2009
Bishop Dave deFreese
Nebraska Synod, ELCA
“If we are rich and see others in need, yet close our hearts against them, how can we claim that we love God? My children, our love should not be just words and talk: it must be true love, which shows itself in action.” I John 3:17-18
In a society in which atheism seems to be growing, the following story is most appropriate. Two fellows are talking with each other, and one says he has a question for God. He wants to ask why God allows all this poverty and suffering to exist in the world. His friend says, “Well, why don’t you ask?” The first shakes his head and says he is scared. When his friend asks why, he mutters, “I am afraid God will ask me the same question.”
Do we hear God’s Holy Spirit questioning us: “Tell me why we allow this to happen? You are my body, my hands, my feet.”
Our God has never been positioned distant from human suffering. In fact, permeating the Holy Scriptures is God’s great compassion for the poor. One cannot read the Bible, without being struck by the reality of God’s invitation to all who would respond to God’s gift of love and life to care for the last, least, lost and the lonely.
I recently heard of a church in North Philadelphia that hung a banner out front that read: “How can we worship a homeless man on Sunday and ignore him on Monday?” What does it mean to be the church? How do we respond to a gracious God who calls us into partnership to care for a world in need?
I love the brilliance of a statement that Groucho Marx once made: “It’s not the parts of the Bible that I don’t understand that bother me…it’s the parts of the Bible I do understand.” God’s clear mandate for disciples is to be with the poor and to express compassion.
“There is no one like the Lord our God…He raises the poor from the dust; he lifts the needy from their misery.” Psalm 113
At the Synod Assembly, I gave those attending a simple homework assignment: “Please send me a single paragraph describing your mission center/congregational effort in ministry with and among the poor.”
I want to thank the more than 40 ministry settings and mission centers who have forwarded me their articulation of that request. It has been marvelously gratifying to see the efforts that are being made with those whom God calls us to stand with.
Many leaders have told me that they want to talk over this request at their congregational council meetings. I am grateful for the sincerity and depth of taking that question seriously. I genuinely believe that it lies at the heart of our truly being the Body of Christ.
Will those who I have not heard from, please follow through on this invitation.
When I was ordained, an elderly woman came through the line and articulated an insightful Christian discipleship model: “Now, comfort the afflicted, and afflict the comfortable.” Her words have haunted me over the years. God’s grace so lavishly poured out upon us is meant to spill over into every relationship, especially our efforts to respond to those in need. We live as fellow beggars who have received bread and the Bread of Life to be shared.
Please be encouraged as we live out our calling with gratitude and joy.
“The spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me; He has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners.” Isaiah 61:1a
Blessings!
Bishop David deFreese
I want to thank Bp. DeFreese for passing on the illustration of the succinct expression of how confession of sins operates. God does ask us what have we done in our own richness to alleviate the needs of the poor. I suspect “the poor” means econominically so inclined and certainly that is one factor. But I also would like to point out that “the poor” may also be a target phrase for those who have indeed, in their atheism, ignored the present and immediate impact through judgment that the hidden God beyond Christ has on us. This happens directly within all the series of relationships in which I find myself where I don’t use Christ’s forgiveness as mediation point. In my own mission approach, I have tried to illustrate how desperately poor we have become because we would rather ignore those who live closer to the survival mode because we do not like a witness to our true nature as people born in Adam and Eve. By ignoring that witness we fall into atheism. Economic poverty may be symptomatic of a much deeper chasm which honestly reveals and witnesses to us our basic dependencies. Additionally I also try to express that it is because we in our richness as well as in our thanklessness have ignored the God who judges us in each moment of our existence. We would rather use alien means of justifying our behavior (God-has-blessed-me because-I- work-harder-than-you-do attitude is one example) rather than the means God has provided in Jesus’ death and resurrection for us to pass along to others. God’s judgment on us is illustrative of the connection to our old person who through that judgment is being put to death. Atheism, or perhaps it is really agnosticism, is the true way that we have forgotten that it was in Jesus’ death that we ourselves have been forgiven and now we are admonished to forgive others, which includes feeding the hungry, etc.
Thanks for the comments this month.
Pr. George T. Rahn, interim
Tri-County Lutheran Parish,
Chappell, NE