How Shall We Christians Address Social Issues?

Today we continue a discussion of discipleship, based upon John 6.

Jesus said, "Have the people sit down." Now there was much grass in the place. So the men sat down, about five thousand in number. Jesus then took the loaves, and when he had given thanks, he distributed them to those who were seated. So also the fish, as much as they wanted. And when they had eaten their fill, he told his disciples, "Gather up the leftover fragments, that nothing may be lost." So they gathered them up and filled twelve baskets with fragments from the five barley loaves left by those who had eaten. When the people saw the sign that he had done, they said, "This is indeed the Prophet who is to come into the world!" Perceiving then that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, Jesus withdrew again to the mountain by himself. - Jhn 6:10-15 ESV

What prophet were the people talking about? As the people of Israel were about to enter the promised land Moses told them he knew they would always want to know what the future held for them. Because of this curiosity they would be tempted to go to fortune tellers, people who inquire of the dead and even go so far as to offer their children as sacrifices to the strange gods of the land they were about to occupy. All this was forbidden . . .

for whoever does these things is an abomination to the LORD. And because of these abominations the LORD your God is driving them out before you. You shall be blameless before the LORD your God, for these nations, which you are about to dispossess, listen to fortune-tellers and to diviners. But as for you, the LORD your God has not allowed you to do this. 

"The LORD your God will raise up for you a prophet like me from among you, from your brothers--it is to him you shall listen-- just as you desired of the LORD your God at Horeb on the day of the assembly, when you said, 'Let me not hear again the voice of the LORD my God or see this great fire any more, lest I die.' And the LORD said to me, 'They are right in what they have spoken. I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brothers. And I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him. And whoever will not listen to my words that he shall speak in my name, I myself will require it of him. - Deu 18:12-19 ESV

The fact that Jesus was able to feed the thousands in the wild places even as the Israelites of old had been, convinced many in the crowd that Jesus was that prophet that Moses spoke about. Who wouldn't want such a man for king?  But Jesus would have none of it. He fled the scene. The kind of king they talked about was certainly not the king He had been sent to be. Yet he was a king. Later in John's Gospel as Jesus stood condemned by the Jews before Pontius Pilate, the Roman governor, we hear Pilate ask, "So you are a king?"

Jesus answered, "You say that I am a king. For this purpose I was born and for this purpose I have come into the world--to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice." - Jhn 18:37 ESV

Ah, the truth, but what is truth?

As the 20th century began in the United States the industrial revolution was in full swing. The war to end all wars devastated Europe and bankrupted entire nations. But the United States prospered—at least for a time. Walter Rauschenbusch (1861-1918), a Baptist minister among the poor and the industrial workers of New York city, lived in what was called Hell's Kitchen. He wrote about the fantastic increase of wealth among a few in the upper class.

The bulk of the increase in wealth has gone to a limited class who in various ways have been strong enough to take it. Wages have advanced on foot; profits have taken the Limited Express. For instance, the report of the Interstate Commerce Commission of June, 1902, stated that from 1896-1902 the average wages and salaries of the railway employees of our country, 1,200,000 men, had increased from $550 to $580, or five per cent. During the same period the net earnings of the owners had increased from $377,000,000 to $610,000,000, or sixty-two per cent.

Rauschenbusch pointed out how this inequity was ignored by the wealthy capitalist owners and managers and how poverty, sickness, drunkenness, despair and death ravished the workers and their families. He writes,

Wealth--to use a homely illustration--is to a nation what manure is to a farm. If the farmer spreads it evenly over the soil, it will enrich the whole. If he should leave it in heaps, the land would be impoverished and under the rich heaps the vegetation would be killed. 

The new wealth created in the Roman Empire was not justly distributed, but fell a prey to a minority who were in a position to seize it. A new money aristocracy arose which financed the commercial undertakings and shouldered the old aristocratic families aside, just as the feudal aristocracies were superseded in consequence of the modern industrial revolution. A few gained immense wealth, while below them was a mass of slaves and free proletarians.

So it was in the United States, to say nothing about other nations around the world. Rauschenbusch's writings were part of the "social gospel" movement, particularly in the United States among liberal Protestant leaders. These leaders insisted that churches must address the sins of the nation and lead the way to correct the huge inequities between rich and poor. Following World War I the movement began to decline, but the same ideas reappeared in the civil rights movement of the 1960s. In many ways, these issues remain in the current campaigns to elect or re-elect the president of the United States.

What part must the church as the church, the living body of Christ, play in addressing the issues outlined above? How can we be the followers of Jesus who fed thousands in the wilderness and not be concerned about poverty, sickness, drug addiction, the break up of families, the death of children and the despair and hopelessness that follows? The answer to these questions seems obvious. We cannot ignore the issues. We must not—in the name of Christ.

But note this. When the crowd wanted to elect Jesus as their king, he "withdrew again to the mountain by himself." Yet he was their king. How shall the church remain the church and Jesus remain king? How do we who are disciples of Jesus deal with the questions of Bread in the 21st century? I suggest that Lutheran teachings about vocation and the two kingdoms have vital answers to these questions. I will take them up in my next postings.