Developing a Simple Life-Style - No. 7 - Justice and Politics

Tribal women in Northern Thailand

JUSTICE AND POLITICS. We are also convinced that the present situation of social injustice is so abhorrent to God that a large measure of change is necessary. Not that we believe in an earthly utopia. But neither are we pessimists. Change can come, although not through commitment to simple lifestyle or human development projects alone.

Poverty and excessive wealth, militarism and arms industry, and the unjust distribution of capital, land and resources are issues of power and powerlessness. Without a shift of power through structural change, these problems cannot be solved. The Christian church, along with the rest of society, is inevitably involved in politics which is “the art of living and community”. Servants of Christ must express his Lordship and their political, social and economic commitments and their love for their neighbors by taking part in the political process.

How then can we contribute to change? First, we will pray for peace and justice, as God commands. Secondly, we will seek to educate Christian people in the moral and political issues involved, and so clarify their vision and raise their expectations. Thirdly, we will take action. Some Christians are called to special tasks and governments, economics or development. All Christians must participate in the active struggle to create a just and responsible society. In some situations, obedience to God demands resistance to an un-just established order. Fourthly, we must be ready to suffer.

As followers of Jesus, the suffering servant, we know that sacrifice service always involves suffering. While personal commitment to change our lifestyle without political action to change systems of injustice lacks effectiveness, political action without personal commitment lacks integrity.

(This is part 7 of a series of 10 blog posts. Developing a Simple Life-Style was a conference with 85 evangelical leaders from 27 countries at High Leigh Conference Center, London, England March 17-21, 1980)

Developing a Simple Life-Style - No. 6 - International Development

Development in a village in Sierra Leon, Africa

INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT. We echo the words of the Lausanne Covenant, “We are shocked by the poverty of millions, and disturbed by the injustices which cause it”. One quarter of the world’s population enjoys unparalleled prosperity, while another quarter endures grinding poverty. This gross disparity is an intolerable injustice – we refuse to acquiesce in it.

The call for a more just order expresses the justified frustration of the Third World. We have come to understand more clearly the connection between resources, income and consumption. People often starve because they cannot afford to buy food, because they have no income, because they have no opportunity to produce, and because they have no access to power.

We therefore applaud the growing emphasis of Christian agencies on development rather than aid. For the transfer of personal and appropriate technology can enable people to make good use of their own resources, while at the same time respecting their dignity. We resolve to contribute more generously to human development projects. Where people’s lives are at stake there should never be a shortage of funds, but the action of the governments is essential.

Those of us who live in the affluent nations are ashamed that our governments have mostly failed to meet their targets for official development assistance, to maintain emergency food stocks or to liberalize their trade policies. We have come to believe that in many cases multinational corporations reduced local initiative in the countries where they work, and tend to oppose any fundamental change in government. We are convinced that they should become more subject to controls and more accountable.

(This is part 6 of a series of 10 blog posts. Developing a Simple Life-Style was a conference with 85 evangelical leaders from 27 countries at High Leigh Conference Center, London, England March 17-21, 1980)

Developing a Simple Life-Style - No. 5 - Personal Life Style

Children in a North-West  Indian village, Near Delhi.

PERSONAL LIFE-STYLE. Jesus our Lord summons us to holiness, humility, simplicity and contentment. He also promises us his rest. We confess, however, that we have often allowed unholy desires to disturb our inner tranquility. So without the constant renewal of Christ’s peace in our hearts, our emphasis on simple living will be one sided. Our Christian obedience demands a simple lifestyle, irrespective of the needs of others.

Nevertheless, the facts that 800 million people are destitute and that 10,000 die of starvation every day make any other lifestyle indefensible. While some of us have been called to live among the poor, and others to open our homes to the needy, all of us are determined to develop a simpler lifestyle. We intend to re-examine our income and expenditure, in order to manage unless and give away more.

We lay down no rules or regulations, for either ourselves or others. Yet we resolve to renounce waste and oppose extravagance and personal living, clothing and housing, travel and church buildings. We also accept the distinction between necessities and luxuries, creative hobbies and empty status symbols, modesty and vanity, occasional celebrations and normal routine, and between the service of God and slavery to fashion.

Where to draw the line requires conscientious thought and decision by us, together with members of our family. Those of us who belong to the West need the help of our Third World brothers and sisters in evaluating our standards of spending. Those of us who live in the Third World acknowledge that we too are exposed to the temptation to covetousness. So we need each other’s understanding, encouragement and prayers.

(This is part 5 of a series of 10 blog posts. Developing a Simple Life-Style was a conference with 85 evangelical leaders from 27 countries at High Leigh Conference Center, London, England March 17-21, 1980)

Developing a Simple Life-Style - No 4 - The New Community

Ministry with children at risk in favelas in Brazil

NEW COMMUNITY. We rejoice as the church is the new community of the new age, whose members enjoy a new life in a new lifestyle. The earliest Christian Church, constituted in Jerusalem on the Day of Pentecost, was characterized by a quality of fellowship unknown before. Those Spirit-filled believers loved one another to such an extent that they sold and shared their possessions. Although their selling and giving were voluntary, and some private property was retained (Acts 5:4), it was made subservient to the needs of the community. None of them said that anything he had was his own (Acts 4:32) that is, they were free from the selfish assertion of property rights. And as a result of their transformed economic relationships, there was not a needy person among them (Acts 4:34).

This principle of generous and sacrificial sharing, expressed in holding ourselves and our goods available for people in need, is an Indispensable characteristic of every Spirit-filled church. So those of us who are affluent in any part of the world, are determined to do more to relieve the needs of less privileged believers. Otherwise we shall be like those rich Christians in Corinth who ate and drank too much while their poor brothers and sisters were left hungry, and we shall deserve the stinging rebuke Paul gave them for despising God’s church and desecrating Christ’s body (1 Corinthians 11:20-24).

Instead, we are determined to resemble them at a later stage when Paul urged them out of their abundance to give to the impoverished Christians of Judea “that there may be equality.” (2 Corinthians 8:10- 15). It was a beautiful demonstration of caring love and of Gentile-Jewish solidarity in Christ. In the same spirit, we must seek ways to transact the church’s corporate business together with minimum expenditure on travel, food and accommodation. We call on churches and para-church agencies in their planning to be acutely aware of the need for integrity in corporate lifestyle and witness.

Christ calls us to be the world’s salt and light, in order to hinder its social decay and illumine its darkness. But our light must shine and our salt must retain its taste. It is when the new community is most obviously distinct from the world – in his values, standards and lifestyle – that it presents the world with a radically attractive alternative and so exercises its greatest influence for Christ. We commit ourselves to pray and work for the renewal of our churches.

(This is part 4 of a series of 10 blog posts. Developing a Simple Life-Style was a conference with 85 evangelical leaders from 27 countries at High Leigh Conference Center, London, England March 17-21, 1980)

Developing a Simple Life-Style No. 3 - Poverty and Wealth

Humble families live on the outskirts of La Paz, Bolivia

POVERTY AND WEALTH. We affirm that involuntary poverty is an offense against the goodness of God. It is related in the Bible to powerlessness, for the poor cannot protect themselves. God’s call to rulers is to use their power to defend the poor, not to exploit them.

The church must stand with God and the poor against injustice, suffering with them and call on rulers to fulfil their God appointed role. We have struggled to open our minds and hearts to the uncomfortable words of Jesus about wealth. “Beware of covetousness”, he said “and a life’s a person’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions. (Luke 12:15) We have listened to his warnings about the danger of riches. For wealth brings worry, vanity and false security, the oppression of the weak and indifference to the sufferings of the needy. It is so hard for a rich person to enter the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 19:23) and the greedy will be excluded from it. 

The kingdom is a free gift offer to all, but it is especially good news for the poor because they benefit most from the changes it brings. We believe that Jesus still calla some people (perhaps even us) to follow him in a lifestyle of total, voluntary poverty. He calls all his followers to an inner freedom from the seduction of riches for it is impossible to serve God and money and to sacrificial generosity to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share. (I Timothy 6:18).

Indeed, the motivation and model for Christian generosity are nothing less than the example of Jesus Christ himself, who, though rich, became poor that through his poverty we might become rich. (2 Corinthians 8:9) It was a costly, purposeful self-sacrifice. We mean to seek his grace to follow him. We resolve to get to know poor and oppressed people, to learn about issues of injustice from them, to seek to relieve their suffering, and to include them regularly in our prayers.

(This is part 3 of a series of 10 blog posts. Developing a Simple Life-Style was a conference with 85 evangelical leaders from 27 countries at High Leigh Conference Center, London, England March 17-21, 1980)
  

Developing a Simple Life-Style - No. 2 - Stewardship

A Bolivian Sunday School with many children

STEWARDSHIP. When God made man, male and female, in his own image, he gave him dominion over the earth (Genesis 1:26 – 28). He made them stewards of its resources, and they became responsible to him as Creator, to the earth which they were to develop, and to their fellow human beings with whom they were to share its riches.
 

So fundamental are these truths that authentic human fulfilment depends on a right relationship to God, neighbor and the earth with all its resources. People’s humanity is diminished if they have no just share those resources. By unfaithful stewardship, in which we fail to conserve the earth’s finite resources, we develop them fully or to distribute them justly, we both disobey God and alienate people from his purpose for them.
 

We are determined, therefore, to honor God as the owner of all things, to remember that we are stewards and not proprietors of any land or property that we may have, to use them in the service of others, and to seek justice with the poor who are exploited and powerless to defend themselves. We look forward to the restoration of all things at Christ’s return (Acts 3:21). At that time our full humaneness will be restored so we must promote human dignity today.

(This is part 2 of a series of 10 blog posts. Developing a Simple Life-Style was a conference with 85 evangelical leaders from 27 countries at High Leigh Conference Center, London, England March 17-21, 1980)

Developing a Simple Life-Style - No 1 - Creation

Developing a Simple Life Style - Number 1 - Creation

A  new church in Cochabamba, Bolivia - many children present.

“Life” and “lifestyle” obviously belong together and cannot be separated. All Christians claim to have received a new life from Jesus Christ. What lifestyle, then, is appropriate for them? If the life’s new lifestyle should also be new but what are to be its characteristics exclamation?

In particular, how is it to be distinguished from the lifestyle of those who make no Christian profession?

And how should it reflect the challenges of the contemporary world – it’s alienation both from God and from the earth’s resources which he created for the enjoyment of all?

CREATION. We worship God as the Creator of all things, and we celebrate the goodness of his creation. In his generosity he has given us everything to enjoy, and we receive it from his hands with humble Thanksgiving (I Timothy 4:4, 6:17)

God’s creation is marked by rich abundance and diversity and he intends its resources to be husbanded and shared for the benefit of all. We therefore denounce environmental destruction, wastefulness and hoarding, we deplore the misery of the poor who suffer as a result of these evils we also disagree with the drabness of the ascetic for all these deny the creator’s goodness and reflect the tragedy of the fall we recognize our own involvement in them and we repent.
 

(This quote, the first of 10 posts, is from Developing a Simple Life-Style, a conference with 85 evangelical leaders from 27 countries at High Leigh Conference Center, London, England March 17-21, 1980)

Canada - "Guilty of 'Cultural Genocide' to First Nations says the Truth and Reconciliation Committee"

On Winnipeg's Main Street: Painting of idyllic Indian life.

Surprise, surprise! Canada is guilty of 'Cultural Genocide' in its dealings with our First Nations. (Actually, we are not surprised to hear this. Sadly, we expected this declaration.)

Several years ago, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was formed with a mandate to investigate issues of abuse, and the resulting effects on Canadian society.

Yesterday, the report of the Truth and Reconciliation Committee was published after thousands of interviews, meetings held across our country, and an investigation into residential schools, among other institutions.

The Toronto Star says, "The report also describes how the legacy of residential schools — described as a central component to a government-led policy of cultural genocide — continues, not only through the direct effect that generations of institutionalization and abuse have had on survivors and their families, but how it is manifested in racism, systemic discrimination, poverty and dying indigenous languages." Read more from Toronto Star.

Painting on Selkirk Avenue: Generations of First Nations

The National Post says, “Cultural genocide is the destruction of those structures and practices that allow the group to continue as a group,” the report reads. “States that engage in cultural genocide set out to destroy the political and social institutions of the targeted group. Land is seized, and populations are forcibly transferred and their movement is restricted. Languages are banned. Spiritual leaders are persecuted, spiritual practices are forbidden, and objects of spiritual value are confiscated and destroyed. And, most significantly to the issue at hand, families are disrupted to prevent the transmission of cultural values and identity from one generation to the next. In its dealing with Aboriginal people,” the report states, “Canada did all these things.” Read more from the National Post.

The Globe and Mail says, "After six years of combing through church records and crossing the country to talk to survivors, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission has concluded that Canada’s treatment of aboriginals at residential schools amounted to ‘cultural genocide.’ The commission released 94 recommendations Tuesday as part of a summary of its landmark final report. The report includes a common theme of concern that its work should not be forgotten, but rather should lead to concrete steps to improve the lives of aboriginal people in Canada." Read more from the Globe and Mail.

I will be commenting on this national disgrace and its implications in further posts.



 

"How Some Armenians are reclaiming their Christian Faith" Al Monitor

Some Armenians are publicly speaking out - and acting out - about their "hidden" heritage.

A very interesting trend and its well worth reading more.

"Keeping the Faith in Canada" - Which churches are growing? Which declining? - Angus Poll

Religion in Canada - dramatic changes: music, worship, society 

The Angus Reid poll on 'faith in Canada' shows interesting trends.

The Anglican Church relied  on immigration from England and the Presbyterian Church was boosted by new comers from Scotland. The same for the Lutheran Church as German speaking folk swelled the membership rolls.

No more. "(Their growth was) being fed with these wonderful immigration pipelines for an awfully long time with people coming from Europe." This seems to be the trend with groups known for their "organized religion".

The largest growth, over the last 40 years, has been the number of people who claim no religion. This group now numbers about 25%.

Evangelical churches, according to Sociologist Reginald Bibby are holding their own at about 12% of the population.

Read more from the CBC.

The United Church is closing down church buildings more quickly than ever. Funerals now outnumber both baptisms and births combined.

The Roman Catholic Church is bucking the trend with immigration from Central and South America and from the Philippines. Many RC Churches are once again full, or overflowing.

Immigration is bringing growth to Buddhists, Sikhs, Hindus and Muslims, whose growth seems dramatic in percentage, but who are still a small portion of the total Canadian population.