Speaking as a Christian ethicist, I can say with certainty that in flippantly attacking the concept of social justice, Glenn Beck inadvertently poked a finger in the eye of every person who takes the Bible as God's revealed Word and (according to Scripture) poured contempt on a central concern of God Himself:
"For I the Lord love justice." (Isaiah 61:8)
"You must not distort justice; you must not show partiality; and you must not accept bribes, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and subverts the cause of those who are in the right. Justice, and only justice, you shall pursue." (Deuteronomy 16:19-20)
"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)
"Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream." (Amos 5:24)
"Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness [Greek dikaiosune, also translated as justice], for they will be filled." (Matthew 5:6)
"And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them." (Luke 18:7-8)
"Woe to you ... for you have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith." (Matthew 23:23)
This is a target-rich environment. I could have picked hundreds of other verses. By our count in Kingdom Ethics: Following Jesus in Contemporary Context (Intervarsity Press, 2003), fellow ethicist Glen Stassen and I find in the Bible 1,060 uses of the two Hebrew and two Greek words for justice. In contrast, the main words for sexual sin appear 90 times. There really is no theme more central to biblical faith than the matter of justice. This is very widely recognized to be true for what Christians call the Old Testament, but in our book we show that it is just as true for the New Testament. We offer an entire chapter detailing the forty occasions in which Jesus confronted the powers and authorities of his time over their injustice. We show that justice is one of the core themes of the kingdom of God that Jesus preached about and died to bring into existence.
In that chapter, we break down Jesus' confrontation with injustice into four primary categories:
1. Jesus confronted the injustice of greed and gross economic exploitation and unfairness. He demanded/invited justice for the poor and hungry.
On this theme, a key passage is the parable of Lazarus and the rich man dining in luxury inside his gated home (Luke 16:19-31). The rich man is scored for his indifference to his poor neighbor and his ability to live in complacent opulence while a man slowly dies outside his door.
2. Jesus confronted the injustice of domination and bullying and demanded/invited his followers to exercise power in the form of mutual servanthood.
Here a memorable passage is the one in which Jesus contrasts the power-over-lordliness of the pagans with the true greatness of servant-leadership (Mt. 20:25-26). He embodied that servant-leadership throughout his ministry.
3. Jesus confronted the injustice of violent killing and demanded/invited peacemaking.
His earliest followers often remembered how Jesus grieved outside Jerusalem over the coming destruction of the city in a rebellion against Rome that would be ruthlessly crushed by the Roman legions, at the cost of 1.2 million Jewish lives (Mt. 23:37-39). No early Christian participated in that revolt.
4. Jesus confronted the injustice of exclusion from community and demanded/invited into existence a new kind of community in which everyone has a place at the table.
Jesus was constantly criticized for the way he and the God he served were about welcoming the despised, the rejected, the sick, the marginalized, and even sinners, offering mercy rather than judgment (Luke 5:27-32).
To summarize: for Jesus, as for the Jewish prophets in whose line he came, social injustice consists of misuses of power to create distortions of human community in which greed, domination, violence, and exclusion come to dominate human life. Social justice consists of human acts to resist social injustice by repairing such distortions of human community. We work today for social justice when we seek to create religious and political communities characterized by more economic justice, less domination, less violence, and more inclusive community. When we do so, we can have every assurance that we are attempting to put into practice God's will and indeed God's passion for a world that he made for precisely such justice.
I have never before written about Glenn Beck, and this is not really a post about him. I think of Mr. Beck as a hugely skilled political entertainer whose meteoric rise reflects his own considerable skills and the equally considerable political polarization of a nation that I love.
He has made his rise on skillfully inflammatory rhetoric that has hooked the emotions of millions. But this time he hooked the Bible and the God of the Bible. He managed to do something few have been able to do -- speaking only of my own religious community, he has united Catholics and Protestants, evangelicals and mainliners, Christian progressives and moderates and conservatives. He has offended all Christians who know that our God is a God of justice, and that advancing justice is central to our mission as a people and to the kingdom of God for which we work and wait.
Follow Dr. David P. Gushee on Twitter: www.twitter.com/dpgushee
duh!
what ever is in your heart, you will find it in the Book.
So what are you going to DO about it David P Gushee???
But the reality is that the right is stupid. Look at the crazy hats that the tea baggers have. We need to do what is right as we clearly are smarter than the right.
Let Go, Let Nancy Pelosi!
Hence, why he is so good at dispensing ti...
The LORD is slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, forgiving iniquity and transgression; but He will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generations.'
Justice must be balanced with mercy. Every parent knows this. If he came down and punished the wicked for their wrong doing you would suggest he is a tyrant; that he is not merciful. If he leaves man alone long enough stumbling in the dark things will get bad enough that we will question whether he is just. The trick is that we need both. People must be allowed to make mistakes. They can not be allowed to continue to bring suffering to others however.
-Jesus
Beck is claiming the Bible says things it doesn't, and doesn't say things it does... which is pretty amusing, considering he's a Mormon, which isn't even Christian.
The is no righteousness or justice by godless men in power. God said: I am coming to judge the leaders (godless men who are in power) of All Nations, on the day of my wrath, the terrible day of the Lord.. Does not say the sinners, the oppressed. /woe to you who build your houses through the grievous toil others ( those they oppress middle class, no health care, cheap labor, the poor, hungry that they clearly see, no excuse etc) And all their building materials are the bricks and stones of sin. I tell you ye shall have no peace. Woe to you who spread evil to your neighbors (liars) For you shall be slain in Sheol.
Jesus was asked about divorce in Moses time. Jesus said with God it is not so, but because of mans heartened hearts at that time, it was given.
Jesus came to bring us on a deeper understanding spiritually of who God is and his will and desire for all his children. God is our King, our creator, our ruler, and all things belong to God for he created all. Yet God has told us, all that is mine I share with you, for all have received. God provides all our needs the earth that is filled with everything we need to exist on this journey, we are not in need of anything. God does not call us his slaves, but his children and he is our father. Man is the creator of sin not God. They are called Godless men of power.
James 5:8
I liked that part also.