Building on a Foundation of Justice

Our reading this first weekend after Pentecost is from the gospel of John:

“I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come. He will glorify me because it is from me that he will receive what he will make known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will receive from me what he will make known to you.” (John 16:12-15)

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This is Part 1 of I Have Much More to Say to You.

One of the things I believe the gospel of John gets right is its repeated call to take Jesus’ liberation work further than Jesus could in his own lifetime. This challenge doesn’t need to fill us with anxiety, and perfection isn’t the goal. Our justice work today can follow the same trajectory as Jesus’ work, and be in harmony with the values we perceive in Jesus’ gospel. As long as we are endeavoring to do this, sometimes we will get it wrong and sometimes we will get it right. And when we do get it right, healing justice will be the result. 

You find this idea echoed in other parts of the gospel of John as well:

Very truly I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these . . .” (John 14:12)

More revelations, greater deeds, continuation of the Spirit: all of these narrative elements hint that the Johannine community believed they were to build on Jesus’ initial work. We can do that in for our context, time, and spaces, too!

Jesus built on the justice tradition of the Hebrew Scriptures:

Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves,

for the rights of all who are destitute.

Speak up and judge fairly;

defend the rights of the poor and needy. (Proverbs 31:8-9)

Learn to do right; seek justice.

Defend the oppressed. 

Take up the cause of the fatherless;

plead the case of the widow. (Isaiah 1:17)

Today, we can build on Jesus’ work, with these themes as our foundation too.  Literalists among us have often cited passages like this and only been concerned with those who are literally widowed or fatherless. But the principle here is to prioritize and center whomever our society makes vulnerable to harm. In patriarchal societies like the ones both Proverbs and Isaiah were written for, community members not connected to a man (widows were without a husband, while the fatherless were without a present father) were vulnerable to social, political, and economic harm. Today we can mark other differences that make certain people in our communities vulnerable to harm. Today we don’t only use patriarchal biases We also use differences like race, gender, sexuality, education, culture, legal status or citizenship, and more to make community members vulnerable. 

Today, we still have poor people, as well as the elderly and children. We must also be cognizant of how differences of race, gender, sexuality, citizenship, and other factors are used to justify cruelty and harm. And how we do this, matters. We’ll pick up here in Part 2.

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