What Justice Means

Pastor Luke Heumann gave his very first sermon to our community this past weekend. He presented us with the passage of Amos 5:18-24 to help us to fully understand what justice means for us practically.

The Lord was despised by their meaningless worship. What made their worship less disgusting is shown in verse 24.

“But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.”

He isn’t pleased in these meaningless offerings. God desires so much more. God deserves so much more.

So, what does this mean for us today? What does this passage teach us as the modern-day church? The Church has become an industrial complex. The Church has found itself acting like businesses. It has become more about entertaining than about loving our neighbors as ourselves. What if the Church acted differently?

What if our worship was rooted in celebrating our risen Savior? What fruit would we see? What if Christ transformed culture? What if we were less like competitive businesses? Pastor Luke directed us to begin to think about these questions. Pastor Luke led us to think about the purpose of the Church. He led us to explore where justice needs to start. Real transformation needs to begin in our church. It needs to begin with Christ transforming our community and our culture.

God is lamenting over us today just like this passage. We also need to lament over ourselves. We need to lament over our Church as well. Let us be a church that follows Jesus into all the different trenches of our world today. Jesus went to Nazareth declaring the kind of Church He wants to see in us.

Luke 4:18-19| The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me. He has sent me to preach good news to the poor; to proclaim release to the prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind, to liberate the oppressed, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

This is our calling as the Church today. This is what justice means for us today. We have been anointed as His People.

We are called to preach good news to the poor.

We are called to proclaim release to the prisoners

We are called to proclaim recovery of sight to the blind

We are called to liberate the oppressed and to seek the disenfranchised

Proclaiming justice and freedom begins in us. Let us be the church known for praising and celebrating our Risen Savior.