God Loves Society

 

The witness of this church in society flows from its identity as a community that lives from and for the Gospel. Faith is active in love; love calls for justice in the relationships and structures of society. It is in grateful response to God's grace in Jesus Christ that this church carries out its responsibility for the well-being of society and the environment

 

 

God Loves Society

Why should the church as a whole be

involved in society?

There are no doubt reasons within the synod that explain this interest, e.g. because the synod assembly or synod council decided that there be a

committee for this purpose or because a particular social need is affecting the way people live and work together, and so on. There are also ELCA       

Constitutional commitments that answer the question. (See Appendix A).

                    \Christians are social creatures who live among, work under, interact withstand respond to the people, institutions, and social forces that comprise society.

It is very difficult to avoid society. We need the wisdom and strength of one another to engage society. If we are attentive to the Holy Scriptures, we will not seek to avoid society, but address it together.                                                                       

                                                                                                                                   

 

In this section, we will: • examine deeper reasons why the church should be involved in society and in particular as an institution or corporate whole.  After reading this portion of the manual, we hope you will have:

 • deepened appreciation for the Biblical basis for the church's involvement in a growing interest in the holistic nature of God's mission

•  received support in your commitment to engage society as a corporate whole

 

                                                                                                                               

Privatization of religion and society                                         

Should the church engage society:                                                                                

 

a. through the life of each baptized person                                                                 

 

b. as a corporate whole                                                                                                

                                                                                                                                   

c. by both individual Christian lives and as a corporate whole?                                                                     

                                                                                                                                   

 

The obvious answer is, of course, "c." One of the most challenging parts of church in society work is to help the church say "c" when, by habit, it tends to say "a." Why is this so?                                                                                                             

                                                                                                                                   

It is the calling of each baptized person to "strive for justice and peace in all                                                 

the earth" (Affirmation of Baptism, LBW, 201). Individual Christians regular

ly take responsibility as members of families, practice their citizenship, and                                                   

participate in the economy. They have the opportunity to love and seek jus-                                                 

tice. The importance of this personal engagement with society cannot be over-                                             

estimated.                                                                                                                    

                                                                                                                                   

However, there are strong forces at work in American society to privatize the way religion manifests itself. Among these forces are:

 

•       An emphasis on God's will directly, privately, and subjectively available to people

 

•       The voluntary response of each individual to God, emphasized by American Protestantism

 

•      Division between the material and spiritual. Christianity for many people belongs to the spiritual realm which is inner and private rather than public and social

 

•      The centrality of an individual's rights, dignity, choice and freedom

 

•      Separation of church and state which is easily misunderstood.

 

These forces, plus disillusionment with institutions, have led many people to separate religion, especially religion understood as a corporate activity, from public concerns. They feel that if religion has a public and social side to it at all, this is lived out in person-to-person relationships rather than corporately.

 

In the Apostles' Creed, Christians confess: "I believe in the communion of saints." They believe that the Church exists not only as individuals but in community-a new society that transcends boundaries of time, geography, and institutions. It has a corporate character that is both visible and invisible.

 

In the case of the ELCA, this corporate nature of the church manifests itself in congregations, synods, and the churchwide organization. The church as a body ordains, consecrates, or commissions its leaders, sends out missionaries and commissions chaplains, and often as a whole acts for justice and mercy.

 

Let's review the story of salvation wearing social eye glasses.

 

God's creating work

 

God loves human society and created humans to be in society.

 

See Genesis 1 and 2; Colossians 1:16-20. The Holy Trinity is a "community" of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit united in perfect love and equality. What does this imply for human beings who are made in God's image (Genesis 1:27)?

 

18                                         A Manual for Effective Synodical Church in Society Ministry

 

 

•      Before the story of the flood, Genesis 6 says that "the Lord saw that the wickedness of humankind was great in the earth" (v 5)

 

•      Joseph's brothers plotted to sell him into slavery in Egypt (Genesis 37:25-28)

•                                                 Egyptian society oppressed the Hebrew people (Exodus 1:8-14)

 

•      The people of Israel were dissatisfied with God's ruling over them and wanted an earthly king (I Samuel 8:7)

 

•      The rich of Israel oppressed the poor, used fraudulent business practices, and offered the needy no fair hearing (Amos 4:1; 5:10, 12; 8:5-6)

 

•      The religious leaders of Jesus' day self-righteously rejected social outcasts (John 8:1-11) or considered working on the Sabbath of greater importance than healing (John 9).

 

Corporate sin

 

Sin is not only the rebellion of individuals against God. It is also society's rebellion, as Jesus said:

 

And this is the judgment, that the light has come into the

world, and people loved darkness rather than light because

their deeds were evil. (John 3:19) This love of darkness manifests signs of death in society:

 

•      social distinctions that are enforced through status symbols and through oppression

•      discrimination destruction of the environment rebelliousness towards persons in authority and toward rule of law extremes of inequality in the distribution of resources - blindness to the image of God in other people and, therefore, using people for selfish ends

•     jealousy, unrest, and conflict

 

 

In the Bible, the first human society consisted of Adam and Eve. Though they had a unique relationship with God, God made them responsible for the na ~ ural world. God gave them the capacity to have children and commande~ them to use this capacity so that the earth might be populated (Genesis 1:28).

 

Things we typically associate with society-such as some sort of social organization or government, laws, conflict, work and play, language, reverence for God, creative skills, consumption of resources-can be found in the societies that the Bible describes.

 

Two key societies

 

The Bible is largely the story of God's relationship to two societies: the people of Israel and the early Christian church. Among them, we see many elements common to all human society:

 

•  efforts to organize their life together (cf. Numbers 1, Deuteronomy 16; Acts 6:1-6)

 

•  laws and rules (cf Exodus 21-23; Matthew 5-7)

 

•  revolts against leaders   (cf. Numbers 16; II Corinthians 10-11)

 

•  internal tensions over how inclusive or exclusive to be (cf Jonah; Acts 15:1-21)

 

•  language

 

•  external tensions with earthly powers (cf II Kings 24; Revelation 13)

 

Unlike other societies, these two societies play a special role in God's plan to bring all human community, and the creation itself back to God.

 

Humankind's creating work

 

God created not only human life but life in society. God gave humans the capacity to fashion what is good. Because of sin, human society also creates what is a departure from God's will, as the Bible thoroughly illustrates:

 

 

 

God's redeeming work

 

God loves society in spite of its sinfulness. Sin is not part of what God created society to be any more than it is part of what God made each woman, man, and child to be.

 

God' s love for society is confirmed by God becoming part of human society in the birth of Jesus.

 

•              God placed Jesus into the family of Joseph and Mary

 

•      He was part of the Jewish nation and traced his heritage to David and Abraham

 

•      His life was ordered according to many social expectations except those that manifested a sinful rejection of other people.

 

Jesus probably learned the craft of his father but later in life practiced the life of a Jewish rabbi. He gathered a community around himself and to them he imparted teaching about life with God, and teaching and example of loving the neighbor. He associated more with social outcasts than with social elites, though he loved them both. He entered into controversy with the politically powerful who put him to death.

 

As much as Jesus' life was shaped by the society into which he was born, his life was also shaped by the community he shares in the Holy Trinity, i.e. God's society.

 

•      He claimed that the Spirit of God was upon him (Luke 4:18)

•      He said that he is one with the Father (John 14:10)

•      He announced the inauguration of God's rule which requires a turning of one's life away from what is not pleasing to God, and toward what pleases God (Mark 1:14-15)

•      Jesus did more than repeat the tradition of the Hebrew nation-he said, "But I say unto you ...." (Matthew 5:21-22, 2728, 31-32)

        •    By example, he encouraged his followers to be nonconformists, to be salt and light (Matthew 5:13-14),

              if conformity with society meant breaking faith with God's rule.

 

 

Jesus creates a new society: the Church

 

After he rose from the dead, Jesus told his followers to wait in Jerusalem until they were "clothed with power from on high" (Luke 24:49). Fifty days after Easter, on the Day of Pentecost, Jesus sent upon his assembled followers the Holy Spirit, the sign of the dawning of God' s rule (Acts 2). The Holy Spirit empowered Jesus' followers to be his witnesses "in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth" (Acts 1:8).

 

Jesus' death and resurrection formed a new human community:

 

•      a society based on faith in the Gospel rather than on civic laws or social rules

 

•      a society knit together in love and justice rather than by power and privilege

 

•      a forgiven society extending God's forgiveness instead of blame or shame

 

•      a society guided more by God's Word of judgment and mercy than by opinion, fads, trends, and earthly standards

 

•      a community that embraces all people and cares for the creation

 

•      one that is eternal rather than temporal

 

•      a society whose symbol is the cross rather than the symbols of success

 

•      a society turned outward toward the world rather than inward.

 

This last difference from earthly society is very important. The new society known as the Church does not exist for its own sake nor to preserve its own life. It exists for the sake of the world, just as Jesus gave his life for the sake of the world.

 

Finnish Lutheran theologian Antti Raunio nicely sums up what happens when Christians, into whose lives God's love in Christ is poured, give themselves to God and their neighbors:

 

As Christians have received love and support from Christ and his church, so they in turn show love and support to Christ and Christ's own who need him. Thus, they bear all of the misery and injustice that innocent people suffer. All of this should be on their hearts in such a way that they defend the unfortunate and work and pray for them as much as they can. The Christian community is not only a spiritual and inner unity; but it also realizes itself in working for all who suffer in this world.

 

 

 

A history of collectively addressing society

 

There is nothing new about the Lutheran church's social and public face:

 

•   for over 60 years, Lutherans together have worked with government to resettle immigrants and refugees through Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Service (LIRS)

•              for over 50 years, Lutherans have had an advocacy presence in Washington, D.C., now known as the Lutheran Office for Governmental Affairs (LOGA)

•              for 40 years, Lutherans have had a presence at the United Nations, now recognized as the Lutheran Office for World Community (LOWC)

 

•              the first Lutheran state public policy advocacy office began in Pennsylvania in 1984. Today there are 20 such offices.

 

•              many Lutheran social ministry organizations are the result of congregations banding together to address needs-and

many are 100 years old.

 

These are only a few examples of the way Lutherans in the United States have been the Body of Christ in and for the world, in witness to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

 

Summary

 

When the church engages society it is relating to part of God's creation.  Because society is part of God's creation, God loves it, though like the individuals who comprise it, society is under the power of sin and death. In Jesus, God entered human society. In his life, death, and resurrection he constituted a new society, the Church, through which God makes visible God's love for human society and the rest of the created world. God's love for the world embraces it in its totality and has begun to re-shape it spiritually and socially. But, the fulfillment of this change awaits the return of Christ at the end of time. The Church encounters society both through the lives of individual Christians and corporately as a community of believers.