Courageously Preach Against Injustice

Courageously Preach Against Injustice

Proverbs 22:22-23
“Do not rob the poor because he is poor,
Or crush the afflicted at the gate;
For the Lord will plead their case
And take the life of those who rob them.”
(NASB)


Introduction:

In the Spring of 1963 a Baptist minister sat in a jail because he courageously preached against the injustice of his day. He received a lot of criticism from many different people. He learned that he didn’t have to answer all the criticism, because most was unfounded and it wouldn’t do any good to respond. He learned to simply stay the course in his efforts. As he sat in jail this day he was moved to respond to a loud criticism leveled at him. The man was Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the criticism was from eight ministers who called him out for coming to Birmingham to march against segregation. Eight ministers criticized Dr. King’s courageous efforts to preach against injustice!

We still have injustices today. Every generation has injustices that are common to all generations and then some that are unique to them. Are you going to be like Dr. King and courageously preach against injustice? Or are you going to be like the eight critical ministers?

Proverbs 23:22-23 gives us an important teaching on justice. This proverb deals with the problem of injustice, then gives us God’s solution for injustice, and I will then apply this teaching to a specific unique injustice that we face today.

Body

I. Through the Israelite Sage, God Preached Against Injustice

A. God gave us a command concerning injustice (22:22)

These verses show us that “Through the Israelite Sage, God Preached Against Injustice”. In this first verse we see a command concerning injustice. God spoke through the writer of this proverb about his view of injustice. This passage sits within a group of scriptures that some commentaries call the “Thirty Sayings” which are thirty sayings concerning different moral issues. This saying deals with how to treat the poor or oppressed in society.

1. Justice was denied by the powerful, simply because they can (22:22a)

The first of four statements in this proverb deals with the powerful who oppress or rob the weak or poor simply because they can. They have no compassion for the less fortunate, but simply seek their own greedy and sinful desires.

After pondering on why he got into a sexual relationship with Monica Lewinsky, President Clinton said that he did simply because he could. For some reason I really liked his authenticity about his sin. He didn’t lie and say that he was in love with her or something like that, but simply took advantage of the situation because he could.

The first line of this verse is a command to not take advantage of the weak simply because you can. There will always be poor and we are not take advantage of them simply because they are poor.

2. Justice was denied by a wicked godless government (22:22b)

The first part of the verse told us to not take advantage of the poor, weak, or afflicted in a general sense. This part of verse gets more specific. It tells us not to take advantage of the poor, weak, or afflicted through the legal system. It commands the reader to not crush or bruise, or apply pressure that kills those who are less fortunate that you. In ancient Israel, the city elders sitting at the city gates heard trials. This was the common means of justice and is seen in numerous passages like Proverbs 31 and the story of Ruth and Boaz.

I want to address an important point at this stage. We live in a democratic country. If you live in a democratic republic then you are a ruler. You and your morality establish the foundations for your legal system. You have a responsibility to make decisions for your country. You are responsible for who is the President and the Senators from your states. They reflect you and your morality. If there is a corrupt law in your country then you are responsible for it. Because we live under the blessing of democracy we all, in a sense, sit as rulers at the city gate of our society.

With that said, those in your government should affirm justice as found in your ultimate authority, the Bible. This means that your government should affirm a Christian God. This does not mean we have to be a theocracy, which will come in the end times, but it does mean that you cannot separate your faith in Jesus from your politics. Your God dictates your morality, and your morality dictates your politics.

In the legal system, we should have laws that do not crush, kill, or take advantage of the poor, weak, or afflicted. Your Christianity is connected to your morality, your morality to your politics, and we all establish the laws of the land through our politics. Vote your values and don’t let justice be denied at the city gate.

B. God gave us a threat concerning injustice (22:23)

The Sage has given us a command concerning justice, now he tags unto this command a threat to those who don’t heed his warning.

1. God promised to plead the case of the innocent (22:23a)

Sticking with this theme of justice we see that God promises to serve as a defense attorney for the innocent who were oppressed by you.

Picture this scene. You are charged with a crime that you know that you are guilty of and you look over to see who the prosecutor is going to be, knowing that he will shred you on the stand. You look over and it is God Himself! This is the same God that says that he knows every hair on your head. Then you look over and see who the judge is going to be, the judge who will hand down your sentence and it is also God, the perfectly righteous judge! If you think Johnny Cochran was tough, try to go up against God in the courtroom.

Those who are denied justice because they are weak, poor, or afflicted will have their case plead by God himself. That brings me great hope.

2. God promised justice for the innocent (22:23b)

We next see a little poetic justice in that those who took the lives of the weak will have their lives taken by God Himself. You rob their lives; He will rob your life. This verse sends chills up my spine, but it also gives me a great feeling of hope. God will and has thrown into hell those Nazi and Communist leaders and murders who slaughtered millions in the last century. Hitler, Pol Pot, and Stalin have faced justice in the form of God Himself. Those who enabled the wicked Jim Crow laws of the American South will answer to the Judge.

Like Bob Dylan sang:

You may be an ambassador to England or France,
You may like to gamble, you might like to dance,
You may be the heavyweight champion of the world,
You may be a socialite with a long string of pearls,

But you’re gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed
You’re gonna have to serve somebody,
Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you’re gonna have to serve somebody.

The Israelite Sage was saying that ultimately God will judge those who abuse the weak.


II. Through His People, God has Always Preached Against Injustice

Biblical religion has always had a great tradition of preaching against injustice. “Through His People, God has Always Preached Against Injustice”. The Israelite sage did it in his day. The Minor Prophets like Amos and Micah cried for justice in their day. History has forgotten that Roman baby girls were saved from death by the early Christians who established the first orphanages, the opium trade was combated by the Christians, drunkenness was battled by the Christians, slavery was abolished in the British Empire by the Christians, and the American abolitionist movement was a distinctively Christian movement.

The Bible is filled with verses like Micah 6:8:
“He has told you, O man, what is good:
And what does the Lord require of you
But to do justice, to love kindness,
And to walk humbly with your God?”

“Through His People, God has Always Preached Against Injustice”.


III. Today, Will YOU Courageously Preach Against Injustice

As I have studied, prayed, and thought through these verses I have tried to narrow down the most important thing that we need to apply from this. Concerning application we are to Courageously Preach for Justice.

But the question I had through this whole study is what injustice does our generation face? In the 1940’s it was clearly Nazi Fascism and Japanese Imperialism that cruelly murdered millions. In the 1950’s it was clearly Soviet Communism, which before it was done had killed over 100 million in the previous century. In the 1960’s I think America was rightly dealing with racial injustice and the Civil Right’s Movement. But sadly I think that many don’t realize that we are now in the first decade of the 21st century. Many are still focused upon battles of the past. There are skirmishes to be fought on these issues but the war is won on all of these injustices.

We are in the 21st Century, but we either live in the past or have not learned from the past. We refuse to preach justice on an issue that is staring us in the face. An issue of injustice by the powerful over the weak. An issue of the wicked laws established by the people that you and I elect. An injustice that is killing people by the millions like the Nazis and Communists did. An injustice that is killing more and is enacted upon a more innocent and weaker victim than the African-Americans in the Civil Rights movement.

The injustice that I am talking about is the injustice of abortion upon the unborn. Since the 1973 verdict by OUR United States Supreme Court in the Roe v.s. Wade case more than 40 million abortions have been performed. Our elders at the gate have established a legal law that is both unjust and forced upon us without a vote of the people. Our courts decided this in one instance without my vote or your vote. They said that the right of a pregnant woman to murder her child was in the constitution and since then we have seen a case of genocide in this country that is worse than the Jewish Holocaust. The victims of this genocide are truly innocent and cannot fight back.

I was born in 1978 and a quarter of my generation was has been murdered due to abortion and many of us arrogantly sit in our ivory tower and place racism and feminist issues on the same plane as abortion!

Even at Dallas Theological Seminary I have heard two Systematic Theology professors raise racism and feminist issues to the same level of imporatance as abortion! I have also heard one of them act like it was not wrong to support an American political party that is mainly responsible for this injustice! DTS needs to do more about this injustice and needs a better message to their students.

Many in our own generation have not done enough because we down play the reality of this injustice or buy the lie that Francis Schaeffer destroyed which said that “Jesus would not part of the political process.”

I recently heard the lawyer who is now representing “Roe” in her fight to over turn the law. She is an evangelical Christian now and understands that abortion is murder. He said that the Roe v.s. Wade is built upon two false pillars. One, that the unborn child is not alive and second, that abortion does not harm the mother. I could hear my son’s heart beat around 22 days after conception, before most even know that they are pregnant. We also saw him moving around throughout the pregnancy. Even before Mason was born, he was clearly alive. Second, the psychological trauma is so severe upon women how have abortions that they have their own syndrome, Post-Abortion Syndrome (PAS) which is marked by “drug and alcohol abuse, personal relationship disorders, sexual dysfunction, repeated abortions, communications difficulties, damaged self-esteem, and even attempt suicide” (National Right to Life website). Abortion is clearly the greatest injustice of our day performed against the most innocent, the poorest, the weakest, and the most defenseless victims.

The second half of the last century found some new voices that helped frame the evangelical movement. Carl F. Henry and Francis Schaffer both were strong on this issue because they understood it in a larger theological context. The Henry Institute at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary is headed by Russell Moore. Moore has written a book dealing with the new evangelical perspective of the Kingdom of God. I attend DTS so I understand the issues of Dispensationalism versus Covenant Theology. Moore basically affirms a sort of Progressive Dispensationalism that does not see our immediate future in completely negative terms. The traditional Dispensational movement typically gives up and quits trying to change our society for the good. The traditional Covenant camp sees the future in probably a too positive light. Look, the end times will be horrible but that does not mean that we are to not continue being salt and light, changing our culture for the glory of God.

Sadly the most dangerous place for a child in America is in his or her mother’s womb and we can help change that injustice. If we see injustice we must Courageously Preach against it. Courageously Preach for Justice

Conclusion

In conclusion I want to share an excerpt of a letter written to eight Alabama ministers (Bishop C. C. J. Carpenter, Bishop Joseph A. Durick, Rabbi Hilton L. Grafman, Bishop Paul Hardin, Bishop Holan B. Harmon, the Reverend George M. Murray, the Reverend Edward V. Ramage, and the Reverend Earl Stallings) on April 16, 1963.

Here is an excerpt from Dr. Martin Luther King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”:

“Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging dart of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking: "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-county drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you no forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness" then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience.”

The unborn can’t write letters, they can’t march in protests, they can’t vote, they can’t Courageously Preach for Justice. The unborn are more poor and weak than the African-Americans in the South. The most dangerous place for an American child to be is in the womb.

Are you too cool or too spiritual to get involved with this injustice? What are you going to do with your voice as a Christian and a Christian leader? Are you going to tickle ears or are you going to change society?

Give to the Pro-Life movement, vote for people who will help change the injustice of abortion in America, and lend your voice and support to this injustice. Courageously Preach for Justice.