Willow Branches in Autumn Winds

The theme that I read over and over again in scripture is God’s concern with what kind of a people we are becoming–both collectively and individually. Are we becoming the kind of people who actually care about the other person…the poor and the oppressed…the widow and the orphan?

OR

Are we becoming the kind of people who find ways to demonize and devalue other people, so that we can justify hoarding wealth and resources for ourselves?

Do we look for ways to baptize selfishness, or is the unconditional love of God that we’ve accepted making us more loving and generous people? Is grace something that we merely accept, or is it something that we embody?

Do we care more about the government trying to take our “hard-earned money” to help the poor and oppressed than we care about the fact that they are poor and oppressed?

Do we use one verse (out of context) from Second Thessalonians to justify our way out of more than 2000 verses of scripture that deal with our responsibility to the poor and oppressed?

(SIDE NOTE: Did you realize that the prophet Ezekiel identifies the “sin of Sodom” as the fact that they were “arrogant and overfed” and that they “did not care about the poor and the oppressed”?)

Are we so troubled by the plight of the poor and oppressed that we wrestle with the complex nature of the problem and the inadequate solutions offered by political leaders on all sides, or are we suckers for T.V. personalities whose confident, righteous-sounding rhetoric gives us ways to justify our selfishness, greed, and/or prejudice?