Matt's Muzings
Angry at Injustice?
60 minutes
I was watching 60 minutes recently and they did an interview with Michael Moore. He is the top-selling author of "Stupid White Men" and the filmmaker whose documentary, "Bowling for Columbine," was just nominated for an Oscar. He has a prophetic voice about issues here in the USA . He exposes corporate America and in the recent documentary he looks at the gun issue. He takes a stand at injustice and abuse. * note that you are not necessarily endorsing all of his stuff....
The interviewer asked Michael a question that stood out to me, "You seem to have had a good childhood, why are you so mad?"
I pondered that question for a while and it revealed an aspect of where I see my weakness in leadership and where we are as a nation and our view of leadership.
That question raises the assumption that a leader only gets mad because they have had a painful or troubled childhood. If you have had a good childhood then you won't be mad. It implies that anger is a sign of weakness and immaturity. Is there no place for anger at things that are wrong? Is there wrong?
Injustice
It seems once again modern leaders are not modeling the heart of God in our leadership. The Bible is clear that God gets angry at injustice. In fact, Psalm 7:11 says, "God is a righteous judge, And a God who has indignation every day." When you look up indignation, the dictionary says, ‘anger aroused by injustice.' So we can say it this way, there is not a day that goes by that God is not angry at injustice.'
As a practical example, we had a speaker who spoke on behalf of children.
He gave us some painful statistics to provoke us:
1 in 4 children are raised in debilitating hunger
11-13 million children are AIDS orphans in South Africa
12 million children raised as refugees.
If we spent one second naming all the street children in the world it would take 3 years to name them all.
500,000 children are illegally imported into western Europe for the purpose of prostitution.
How do we respond to this? What is my reaction? I realize we have lost the concept of a leader who is mad at injustice. I have to wonder, where is the righteous indignation, the growing anger at people or systems that hurts others?
Now I know that our anger is so easily bent by our own versions of things that affect us personally. I feel my own pain and react to others issues because I am hurt. I am not talking about that.
I am talking about understanding the heart of God and his pain over those who suffer. The poor, the afflicted, the widows and orphans. Taking care of them is a clear part of our job description.
I have to ponder, and in a moment of honesty I see an aspect of my flesh that whispers to me that as long as my needs are met then I need not be bothered by these things. I have to take that to the cross and give it no space in my life.
I would say that leaders who are healthiest and most alive will be the maddest at injustice and suffering. They will hear the cry of the afflicted and find a way to express the heart of God through working on creating just laws, giving and caring for those in need.
Do you or I get mad at injustice? I must confess I rarely do. I must also confess that my leadership is lacking and I need to be more like God so as to express Him better to a suffering world.
Where are those in the Church who will rise up against the rampant legalism in some denominations? What about the financial abuse by large corporations? Where are those that will take on a healthcare system that is not taking care of our health? What about abuse in the family? What about Governments that only help the rich? Who will hear God's heart for terrorism? We know about terrorism because it affects us personally? Yet other nations have struggled with it for years.
Injustice is injustice in God's book. Abuse is always abuse. Evil can never be whitewashed in the Kingdom of God . Join with me in saying to the Lord this simple prayer, "Here am I Lord, send me to deal with injustice. Let my leadership be more like yours. Help me to be angry at the things that anger you, and then help me to do something about it as an expression of who you are. "