St Theodore's Sermon

	St Theodore's Wattle Park

Sermon of the Week

21/3/99

Justice & Christian Community
Barbara Deutschmann, Tear Australia Ex 23: 1-13
2 Cor 8:1-15

An interesting discussion took place last week around the morning tea table at TEAR when TEAR staff and some volunteers were asked by Steve Bradbury, the Director, to consider what policy we should adopt when people came to the office door asking for money. The discussion went like this: 'I usually tell them we don't give money and I offer them a cup of tea and a sandwich.' ' Look, we should not give them anything at all. Once you help one, there will be a queue.' 'I am not comfortable with turning people away: some seem to be in genuine need.' 'Nonsense. They are all heroin addicts after money for their next fix. You can't do anything for them.' 'They are not all heroin-addicts and even if they were, better to give them some money than have them go and rob the 7-Eleven'. 'I know that some of them are from the special accommodation place and they really have very little pocket money. I think we should definitely help them out.' 'But if they are heroin-addicts, you haven't helped them and you have just wasted money!' 'Look, it is worth taking the risk. You may get taken for a ride by some people, because if you don't, you are missing people with genuine need.' After strenuous discussion, we decided to keep a jar , filled by voluntary donations from staff and give out $5 gifts when asked. This discussion covered all the dilemmas of welfare that concerned people face: Concern for good stewardship of hard-earned money, questions of what really helps poor people, the concern not to group all the poor into one undeserving group and blurring the differences between them. These are hard questions which are at the heart of all welfare debate whether within Australia or outside of it. Grapple we must with it, because Australia and the world, are both becoming increasingly divided into haves and have nots. The annual UN Human Development report shows that the gap between rich and poor is growing larger and larger as each year passes. At the turn of the millennium, this is surely the most serious moral dilemma we face.

At the heart of the questions is the issue of the kind of society we want to be. Will Australia be marked in the next fifty years as a society of compassion, generosity and forgiveness or as one which is grasping and mean? We are not doing too well. A study last year showed that Australians give considerably less to charity within Australia than people in the UK and USA. For overseas aid, Australia gives 0.3% of the GDP compared the recommended 0.7%. I want to put before you a vision of something better, something that we as a Christian community can model for the rest of Australia.

   The Exodus reading today is a small segment of the law codes given to Israel by Moses after his meeting with God on Mt Sinai. Open it up and let's look at it and try and feel the heartbeat of the material: what kind of society did God expect Israel to be?



   The first few verses concern the justice system. The process of law in Israel was to be as fair as the laws themselves. There is instruction for the witness: 'Don't spread false reports, side with the crowd or give favoritism to the poor' There is instruction for the complainant: make sure that you don't let what is happening in the court-case influence just treatment of your neighbour outside court. There is instruction for the judge and jury about impartiality. There is also concern for employment conditions for all people including aliens and slaves (v12). There is also deep concern for the poor. Land owners were to refrain from cultivation and harvesting every seventh year to enable the poor to glean (v10). This instruction is mirrored in other places in the OT with laws exhorting farmers not to harvest to the edge of the field and not to go back over and fallen grain, thus allowing the landless to gather and eat. God was concerned that poverty not become an entrenched feature of life in the new society. To sum up, there is concern for persons and property but special care for the landless; the poor and the alien.



   One thing that is very clear in OT law is that justice was to flow from knowledge of God , not just knowledge of the law. This is the reason that the law is given to the people after the Exodus, after they had experienced God's compassion and power in the rescue from Egypt. The laws match the God: justice and compassion such as they had experienced in Egypt were the hallmark of the laws.



   Not only were the laws marked by the character of their rescuing God, they were also to be marked by the experiences of the people of Israel. They had moved from being a rabble to a people, aliens to loved citizens, an oppressed refugee-group to a redeemed and renewed society. Their law would always carry that recognition: 'Don't oppress an alien; you yourselves know how it feels to be aliens, because you were aliens in Egypt.'(23:9) The way they were to function together would always carry a quality of compassion along with the justice, a quality of grace along with fairness because they knew what it felt like to be oppressed then rescued. When we reflect on Australia's history we see how little these qualities have marked our society and its legal system. Despite our origins as colonies of convicts and adventurers, aliens if you like, we paid scant regard to the rights of the native population. The new start that many found in Australia did not produce justice and compassion for the indigenous inhabitants and we are all diminished by that now and wrestling with the consequences.



   The Exodus law-codes were written a long time ago and they were written for a society very different from our own. It was an agricultural society which knew nothing of the Industrial Revolution or the complex global economic situation which we face today. Can we seriously consider that it may have something to say to us? Don't some of the laws show more than a little naivety? There is no evidence that the Jubilee principles were enforced or enforceable! What does this all mean to us? Does it make any difference that Christ has come, that he has died his death, and risen again? Can we find in the NT any similar concerns to those we have noticed in Exodus 23?



   Yes , it does make a difference. When Luke wrote his gospel, and wrote of Jesus' approaching death, he recorded that Jesus spoke of it as his 'exodus'. The Exodus and the giving of the law in the OT is mirrored and enlarged in the New by the work of Christ in rescuing and in reshaping us into the new people of God. The new law he brought developed and deepened the old and did not replace it. We, as his people in Australia at the end of the 20th century are to mirror the same qualities of God and the same awareness of our origins as that of the people of God in the OT. The NT is full of the idea that Christ's death did not just do something for us individually but did something for us corporately through the creation of new communities of believers to model the new society.



   One example of the difference that His death is to make, is seen in the passage from 2 Corinthians. It speaks of a collection Paul was making for the impoverished church in Jerusalem. Now Paul was not just into welfare because he was kindhearted but because he was aware that something much bigger was at stake. Paul's world was as deeply divided as our own. Deep cultural and economic rifts threatened to give the lie to the one body which he knew to be true. The Jerusalem church was Jewish, old, and poor. The Corinthian church was gentile, new and well-off. How could Christians claim to be the new society in microcosm, when such dangerous differences divided them? The collection was the crux of Paul's letter to them. How better to remind them of their unity with other churches than encouraging them to take responsibility for them in the same way that OT law encouraged Israelites to take responsibility for their fellows fallen on hard times. 'At the present time, your plenty will supply what they need so that in turn, their plenty will supply what you need.' (2 Cor 8:9)



   What of us? What kind of world have we inherited in which to work out our discipleship? It is an unfortunate fact that most of Christian resources be it money, literature, ministry training, media are centered in the developed world while many third-world churches have no hope of paying a vicar even if a trained person could be found. Even within Australia, very few aboriginal churches can fund a pastor. This is a Third World not just on our doorstep but in our hallway.



   I was very encouraged last year when I read in Henry Reynolds' account of the early treatment of Aboriginals (This Whispering In Our Hearts), that prominent among those speaking out against the displacement and the murder of aboriginals were some evangelical Christians. They had been influenced by the work of Wilberforce and others in England during the anti-slavery campaign and found opportunity to speak up for marginal groups in Australia as well. I also heard about Edward Hall who began a newspaper in Sydney called 'The Monitor' in which he spoke out against the acquittal of those responsible for the Myall Massacre. This reminded me of what a key role can be played by Christians who are well-informed about public issues. The Jubilee 2000 is bringing Christians together across the world in a campaign to encourage international money-lending institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to cancel the crippling debt of many third world countries.



   John Yoder speaks of the role of Christian church communities as 'Planting signs of the new world in the ruins of the old' What would it take for us all to take up this challenge? First, we need to be informed; to keep our newspapers and news magazines open alongside our Bibles. Secondly, we need to orient ourselves toward involvement and engagement in the issues of the day and modeling in our own communities the new society within the old. Thirdly, we need to work towards equality of resources within the people of God. As Paul wrote to the Corinthian church: 'Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard-pressed, but that there might be equality. At the present time, your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty may supply what you need. Then there will be equality'.


	Contact us	Preaching Program	Home		Last Week's Sermon

	Sermon of the Week
	21/3/99
	Justice & Christian Community Barbara Deutschmann, Tear Australia	Ex 23: 1-13 2 Cor 8:1-15

	An interesting discussion took place last week around the morning tea table at TEAR when TEAR staff and some volunteers were asked by Steve Bradbury, the Director, to consider what policy we should adopt when people came to the office door asking for money. The discussion went like this: 'I usually tell them we don't give money and I offer them a cup of tea and a sandwich.' ' Look, we should not give them anything at all. Once you help one, there will be a queue.' 'I am not comfortable with turning people away: some seem to be in genuine need.' 'Nonsense. They are all heroin addicts after money for their next fix. You can't do anything for them.' 'They are not all heroin-addicts and even if they were, better to give them some money than have them go and rob the 7-Eleven'. 'I know that some of them are from the special accommodation place and they really have very little pocket money. I think we should definitely help them out.' 'But if they are heroin-addicts, you haven't helped them and you have just wasted money!' 'Look, it is worth taking the risk. You may get taken for a ride by some people, because if you don't, you are missing people with genuine need.' After strenuous discussion, we decided to keep a jar , filled by voluntary donations from staff and give out $5 gifts when asked. This discussion covered all the dilemmas of welfare that concerned people face: Concern for good stewardship of hard-earned money, questions of what really helps poor people, the concern not to group all the poor into one undeserving group and blurring the differences between them. These are hard questions which are at the heart of all welfare debate whether within Australia or outside of it. Grapple we must with it, because Australia and the world, are both becoming increasingly divided into haves and have nots. The annual UN Human Development report shows that the gap between rich and poor is growing larger and larger as each year passes. At the turn of the millennium, this is surely the most serious moral dilemma we face.

	At the heart of the questions is the issue of the kind of society we want to be. Will Australia be marked in the next fifty years as a society of compassion, generosity and forgiveness or as one which is grasping and mean? We are not doing too well. A study last year showed that Australians give considerably less to charity within Australia than people in the UK and USA. For overseas aid, Australia gives 0.3% of the GDP compared the recommended 0.7%. I want to put before you a vision of something better, something that we as a Christian community can model for the rest of Australia.

	The Exodus reading today is a small segment of the law codes given to Israel by Moses after his meeting with God on Mt Sinai. Open it up and let's look at it and try and feel the heartbeat of the material: what kind of society did God expect Israel to be?

	The first few verses concern the justice system. The process of law in Israel was to be as fair as the laws themselves. There is instruction for the witness: 'Don't spread false reports, side with the crowd or give favoritism to the poor' There is instruction for the complainant: make sure that you don't let what is happening in the court-case influence just treatment of your neighbour outside court. There is instruction for the judge and jury about impartiality. There is also concern for employment conditions for all people including aliens and slaves (v12). There is also deep concern for the poor. Land owners were to refrain from cultivation and harvesting every seventh year to enable the poor to glean (v10). This instruction is mirrored in other places in the OT with laws exhorting farmers not to harvest to the edge of the field and not to go back over and fallen grain, thus allowing the landless to gather and eat. God was concerned that poverty not become an entrenched feature of life in the new society. To sum up, there is concern for persons and property but special care for the landless; the poor and the alien.

	One thing that is very clear in OT law is that justice was to flow from knowledge of God , not just knowledge of the law. This is the reason that the law is given to the people after the Exodus, after they had experienced God's compassion and power in the rescue from Egypt. The laws match the God: justice and compassion such as they had experienced in Egypt were the hallmark of the laws.

	Not only were the laws marked by the character of their rescuing God, they were also to be marked by the experiences of the people of Israel. They had moved from being a rabble to a people, aliens to loved citizens, an oppressed refugee-group to a redeemed and renewed society. Their law would always carry that recognition: 'Don't oppress an alien; you yourselves know how it feels to be aliens, because you were aliens in Egypt.'(23:9) The way they were to function together would always carry a quality of compassion along with the justice, a quality of grace along with fairness because they knew what it felt like to be oppressed then rescued. When we reflect on Australia's history we see how little these qualities have marked our society and its legal system. Despite our origins as colonies of convicts and adventurers, aliens if you like, we paid scant regard to the rights of the native population. The new start that many found in Australia did not produce justice and compassion for the indigenous inhabitants and we are all diminished by that now and wrestling with the consequences.

	The Exodus law-codes were written a long time ago and they were written for a society very different from our own. It was an agricultural society which knew nothing of the Industrial Revolution or the complex global economic situation which we face today. Can we seriously consider that it may have something to say to us? Don't some of the laws show more than a little naivety? There is no evidence that the Jubilee principles were enforced or enforceable! What does this all mean to us? Does it make any difference that Christ has come, that he has died his death, and risen again? Can we find in the NT any similar concerns to those we have noticed in Exodus 23?

	Yes , it does make a difference. When Luke wrote his gospel, and wrote of Jesus' approaching death, he recorded that Jesus spoke of it as his 'exodus'. The Exodus and the giving of the law in the OT is mirrored and enlarged in the New by the work of Christ in rescuing and in reshaping us into the new people of God. The new law he brought developed and deepened the old and did not replace it. We, as his people in Australia at the end of the 20th century are to mirror the same qualities of God and the same awareness of our origins as that of the people of God in the OT. The NT is full of the idea that Christ's death did not just do something for us individually but did something for us corporately through the creation of new communities of believers to model the new society.

	One example of the difference that His death is to make, is seen in the passage from 2 Corinthians. It speaks of a collection Paul was making for the impoverished church in Jerusalem. Now Paul was not just into welfare because he was kindhearted but because he was aware that something much bigger was at stake. Paul's world was as deeply divided as our own. Deep cultural and economic rifts threatened to give the lie to the one body which he knew to be true. The Jerusalem church was Jewish, old, and poor. The Corinthian church was gentile, new and well-off. How could Christians claim to be the new society in microcosm, when such dangerous differences divided them? The collection was the crux of Paul's letter to them. How better to remind them of their unity with other churches than encouraging them to take responsibility for them in the same way that OT law encouraged Israelites to take responsibility for their fellows fallen on hard times. 'At the present time, your plenty will supply what they need so that in turn, their plenty will supply what you need.' (2 Cor 8:9)

	What of us? What kind of world have we inherited in which to work out our discipleship? It is an unfortunate fact that most of Christian resources be it money, literature, ministry training, media are centered in the developed world while many third-world churches have no hope of paying a vicar even if a trained person could be found. Even within Australia, very few aboriginal churches can fund a pastor. This is a Third World not just on our doorstep but in our hallway.

	I was very encouraged last year when I read in Henry Reynolds' account of the early treatment of Aboriginals (This Whispering In Our Hearts), that prominent among those speaking out against the displacement and the murder of aboriginals were some evangelical Christians. They had been influenced by the work of Wilberforce and others in England during the anti-slavery campaign and found opportunity to speak up for marginal groups in Australia as well. I also heard about Edward Hall who began a newspaper in Sydney called 'The Monitor' in which he spoke out against the acquittal of those responsible for the Myall Massacre. This reminded me of what a key role can be played by Christians who are well-informed about public issues. The Jubilee 2000 is bringing Christians together across the world in a campaign to encourage international money-lending institutions like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund to cancel the crippling debt of many third world countries.

	John Yoder speaks of the role of Christian church communities as 'Planting signs of the new world in the ruins of the old' What would it take for us all to take up this challenge? First, we need to be informed; to keep our newspapers and news magazines open alongside our Bibles. Secondly, we need to orient ourselves toward involvement and engagement in the issues of the day and modeling in our own communities the new society within the old. Thirdly, we need to work towards equality of resources within the people of God. As Paul wrote to the Corinthian church: 'Our desire is not that others might be relieved while you are hard-pressed, but that there might be equality. At the present time, your plenty will supply what they need, so that in turn their plenty may supply what you need. Then there will be equality'.

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