solutions driven by love

well i have heard a lot in the past week or so to keep my thinking for awhile....which is good. but often times hard to process the thoughts. on sunday i was at a neighborhood gathering, called Catalyst, where a woman who is the President of the Peace Foundation here on the northside was speaking. She really gave me a lot to think about. We were talking about Pres. Obama and what that means for us, for our communities, for the nation, and also talking about issues of race and faith. She really got into the education system, how it the system was set so long ago-when we were still an agricultural society farming in the summers. (therefore we have three months off of school) She was saying in essence that the root of most of the issues we face today, especially with violence, crime, and poverty, are caused by the education system. I was aware of some of it, but I have not thought that deeply about it. There are pretty alarming statistics when it comes to education and inner cities and race-and that translates to the alarming statistic of poverty, crime, and imprisonment in inner cities and among race. She was pointing out how we won't make stereotypes that are negative based on ethnicity, but we can easily say that black people are good at basketball, asian people are smarter, kenyans are faster, etc. But really, give a black kid who lives in a concrete jungle a ball and a hoop and nothing to do all day and of course he'll get good at basketball. Kenyans live in a higher elevation, walk to school their whole lives, and run for fun as they grow. Barefoot. We could also take a look at the education system in a number of asian countries and begin to see why they have better test scores and excel in areas america is weak in. She had a lot to say about education, not all i can remember, but one place in particular she mentioned was new york city. There was a school there with low graduation rates and test scores, and instead of not giving it funding anymore, giving up, not hiring as many teachers, and sending kids to detention-someone created a solution. they got the local university to bring in student teachers for free so the students could be in school until 7pm and also go on saturdays. this transformed the schools performance. why did this happen? because the person loved-and the love found a solution. love finds solutions. Just as God sent Jesus-radical, not ordinary, a little crazy even-as a solution. Driven by love.
I have also been listening to number of sermons and articles regarding God's economy, in the face of the failing economy around us. THere are some disgusting facts out there-like the average CEO make 500 times the amount of money that their workers. America makes up 6% of the population-while using 50% of the world's resources. Americans on average are more in debt now than in the depression. We are nation of consumers. During Christmas, I heard we spend about 400 billion on Christmas every year. It would take just 10 billion to solve the world's water problems. America is the wealthiest country-but also the most depressed, lonely, and medication country. What is wrong with this picture? As Shane Claiborne said, "What does God's dream look like in light of what we're seeing?" God's dream looks like solutions driven by love. But we can't begin to find solutions if we keep pretending that these problems don't exist-and don't treat them like our problems. Greg Boyd preached on this recently. I spoke about Luke 16 and the parable of Lazarus and the rich man, and also referred to the scripture in Isaiah 58. To make it short-God is pointing out that this rich man living a wealthy life in his own gated community, while walking past extreme poverty everyday. We as Christians often read, study, church, discuss, etc. about theology and scripture, etc. and then debate about things-rather than actually addressing the blantant issue in front of us. There is obviously homelessness, poverty, hunger, racism, messed up systems, poor education, to name a few-right in front of us. We don't want to acknowledge that we understand what we read in the Bible because it is uncomfortable and causes us to act and make sacrifices.
I heard another serom before Christmas by a woman named Sandra Unger that preaches at Woodland Hills. She said that if our money and possessions are for us to hoard, than anyone who is in need is a threat to us. Someone who needs some food, or a neighbor who loses their home, or the homeless person on the corner of 94, are threats to us. To acknowledge that we can be the solutions-driven by Christ's love, takes a big sacrifice. Not just a sacrifice of prayer, not one of extra money in the offering plate, not a short term missions trip-but true sacrifice of self, of your own resources, of your time, of genuine relationships. It gets messy, uncomfortable, it doesn't make sense, and it especially doesn't make sense in light of "the american dream." But what's God's dream? We are called to be radical-not just be distinguished by our beleifs. But by our crazy actions towards solutions motivated by love.
Love costs something. But if i have learned anything in this last year and a half, the love the Christ freely offers is so worth it. If i am to fully to take it, then i must give it back out sacrificially. i don't always like it, but my true JOY is in Christ Jesus-and that drives my to keep pushing forward..... I have hope in my Creater, He is bigger than all of this. But I know He is calling to me to free the chains of injustice, break the yokes of oppression, share food with the hungry, provide shelter to the wanderer, clothe the naked, and not to turn away from the world around me. Then His light will break forth, healing can come, God will go before me, with His glory to follow.