“For many years
now, people who seek justice and healing have engaged in a debate about whether
a relational approach or a power-based approach is most effective in addressing
class and ethnic disparities. The relational camp reminds us that we are called
to be the family of Christ. Various reconciliation passages in Scripture focus
on broken trust between individuals and the need for forgiveness. Relational
advocates, then, claim that the gospel calls us to relate to one another in
regular, authentic ways. These high-trust, redeemed, integral relationships
will provide a solution-from-within for injustices within society. The idea is
that better relationships will result in greater compassion, truth, equity,
justice, and ultimately, peace in our society. Sometimes the approach of this
relational group is very emotional or very conciliatory.
The power-based
group seeks up-front commitments for power sharing between dominant and
underrepresented or oppressed groups. Sometimes this conversation leans toward
reparations and the need for immediate decisive action. It is on the basis of
such actions that relationship can begin or be restored. Sometimes this
approach is advocated graciously, other times with a rather aggressive and
confrontational style. A popular slogan is “No justice, no peace.”
There are
gradations within each approach, but many people or groups fall solidly on one
side of the fence or the other. But the fence seems to me a useless divide,
like so many other divisions among believers today. The church should be about
being family across ethnic and class lines. All should be welcome, and as
believers we should be marked by forgiveness and authentic love for one
another. The church should be about resolving substantive power issues in
economic terms, in decision making, and in civic inequities within the
believing community and in the world. We should have a corrective prophetic
voice and presence in our society where that is necessary. The Scripture offers
all of this. There is no separation in
the Bible, and there should be no separation among us. All of this is part
of our birthright and our marching orders as believers.
Warm, fuzzy
feelings between people are of such fleeting presence that after they have
passed one might wonder if they were ever genuine. They are only ghostly
shadows of real love. They evaporate when the light of real life hits and are
worth little in the real world. Heightened emotions and verbal promises left in
limbo serve only to deepen animosity between people. Love must be proved in substantive action, as Scripture shows us in
2 Corinthians 8–9. Jesus’ love – by which the world is to know we are believers
– was costly and sacrificial. It meant a relinquishing of power; it meant
humility; it meant a coming and dwelling among people. It was relational. But warm
feelings alone are the sentiment of love without the courage or thoughtfulness
to give it substance – a cowardly lion or thoughtless scarecrow in the light of
the kingdom.
If
the civil rights movement, Reconstruction and the Civil War should teach us
anything, they should teach us that you
cannot make someone love you by waging war or passing legislation. Such
efforts may help to restrain evil, but they do not engender love between
people. Truth be told, they either expose and exacerbate open animosity or
force it underground. They may be right and necessary; they may be needed to
improve the life of some. However, they
are but hollow shells of real love. They are the form of love without its
lifeblood – a tin man with no substance, no heart.
In
pursuit of justice, we must have both a relational and a power-based approach.
We need to have actual love for both oppressor and oppressed, and we need to
not be satisfied with hugs and handshakes. Since
we live in a fallen, sinful world, we will need law and such, but they cannot
substitute for kingdom love. In truth, if we all loved with God’s love,
there would be no need for the huge legal system we have today.”
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