Would Jesus Occupy?

Last week I saw them at the Capitol building. They were shaking their signs at some unknown person. Or persons. The signs condemned greed, and capitalism and corporations. Big banks. Big business. Big government. Some made a lot of sense. Some were just crazy.

And then there was one. “Jesus would have been here.”

I don’t know what to think.

I know our country is full of problems, and there are no clear answers. A Washington Post poll today shows that 78 percent of Americans are dissatisfied. With unemployment dogging any meaningful discussions, we are given to extremes – on both sides. When a man is hungry, he’ll do anything. And right now, there’s plenty of blame to go around.

I just wonder what my place is, where would my Lord would be in this discussion?

My friend Glynn Young has a great post on the Occupy movement that is now sweeping across the world.

“This raging against the rich is a nasty impuse,” he writes. And I would add, it’s a dangerous thing to do. Just look at history. I’m thinking about the Russian Revolution, Pol Pot and kinds of similar movements launched against the powerful and the rich. In the end, who really wins?

Glynn sees an affinity between Jesus and the poor, the underpriviledged. “But I can’t see Jesus advocating a violent overthrow or whipping people into a frenzy,” he writes. “But I can see Jesus walking with and ministering to the unemployed, and the people whose lives have been wrecked.”

The bottom line? Government will not save us. Class warfare will not fix our woes. Raging against power will not patch the holes in our hearts, or our society.

But this I know. Jesus saves. Always did. Always will

Please, share with a friend if you feel moved.
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