Injustice has been always with us,
and God has always hated it.
Long ago Yahweh’s word came through
Jeremiah, denouncing King Jehoiakim for his unrighteous exploitation of his
builders. But injustice, exploitation and oppression have certainly not ended
there.
“He pled the cause of the afflicted
and needy,” the LORD said of Josiah; “Is not that what it means to know Me?”
The lamentations of the oppressed
come before his throne, ever since Abel’s blood cried out from the ground. BR
Jeremiah 22:13-19
“Woe to him who builds his house
without righteousness
And his upper rooms without justice,
Who uses his neighbor’s services without pay
And does not give him his wages,
Who says, ‘I will build myself a
roomy house
With spacious upper rooms,
And cut out its windows,
Paneling it with cedar and painting it bright red.’
“Do you become a king because you
are competing in cedar?
Did not your father eat and drink
And do justice and righteousness?
Then it was well with him.
He pled the cause of the afflicted
and needy;
Then it was well.
Is not that what it means to know Me?”
Declares the LORD.
“But your eyes and your heart
Are intent only upon your own dishonest gain,
And on shedding innocent blood
And on practicing oppression and extortion.”
Therefore thus says the LORD in
regard to Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah,
“They will not lament for him:
‘Alas, my brother!’ or, ‘Alas, sister!’
They will not lament for him:
‘Alas for the master!’ or, ‘Alas for his splendor!’
He will be buried with a donkey’s
burial,
Dragged off and thrown out beyond the gates of Jerusalem.” NASB
“…But we feel that there is a
wrong, a serious wrong, affectingly cruel in its influences, which has long
been depressing the hearts of the most devotedly pious woman. And this wrong is
inflicted by pious men, many of whom, we presume, imagine that they are doing
God service in putting a seal upon lips which God has commanded to speak. —Phoebe Palmer (1807-1874),
Promise of the Father ch. 1
“I thought it disgraceful to be
called an Indian; it was considered a slur upon an oppressed and scattered
nation, and I have often been led to inquire where the whites received this
word, which they so often threw as an opprobrious epithet at the sons of the
forest. I could not find it in the Bible and therefore concluded that it was a
word imported for the special purpose of degrading us. —William Apess (1798-?), A Son
of the Forest ch. 2
“I call upon the professing
Christians…to show me a page of history, either sacred or profane, on which a
verse can be found, which maintains, that the Egyptians heaped the
insupportable insult upon the children of Israel, by telling them that they
were not of the human family. Can the whites deny this charge? Have they not,
after having reduced us to the deplorable condition of slaves under their feet,
held us up as descending originally from the tribes of Monkeys or
Orang-Outangs? O! my God! I appeal to every man of feeling—is not this
insupportable? Is it not heaping the most gross insult upon our miseries,
because they have got us under their feet and we cannot help ourselves? Oh!
pity us we pray thee, Lord Jesus, Master. —David Walker (1796?-1830) Appeal, article I
Prayer of Intercession
Grant, O God, that your holy and
life-giving Spirit may so move every human heart, that barriers which divide us
may crumble, suspicions disappear, and hatreds cease; that our divisions being
healed, we may live in justice and peace; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
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