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Isa 1:12-17

12 When you come to worship me,
      who asked you to parade through my courts with all your ceremony?
 13 Stop bringing me your meaningless gifts;
      the incense of your offerings disgusts me!
   As for your celebrations of the new moon and the Sabbath
      and your special days for fasting—
   they are all sinful and false.
      I want no more of your pious meetings.
 14 I hate your new moon celebrations and your annual festivals.
      They are a burden to me. I cannot stand them!
 15 When you lift up your hands in prayer, I will not look.
      Though you offer many prayers, I will not listen,
      for your hands are covered with the blood of innocent victims.
 16 Wash yourselves and be clean!
      Get your sins out of my sight.
      Give up your evil ways.
 17 Learn to do good.
      Seek justice.
   Help the oppressed.
      Defend the cause of orphans.
      Fight for the rights of widows.

This passage has lead to a weeks worth of pondering the question: What am I doing?

I am on staff at a church that is all about relational living and growing in honesty and even reaching out to those who are in need. But when it comes down to it, what am I–the student pastor of the fastest growing church in bell county– doing about the economic injustice around me?

In studying this passage in Isaiah, I’ve learned several things. In order to understand it, I have to understand some background and knowledge of the ancient world. The opposite of HOLY is UNCLEAN. So in the ancient world, to come to God with uncleanness was utterly detestable and could never end well.  If the opposite of HOLY is UNCLEAN then the only thing one could do is to remove the uncleanness from one’s life.  The way to remedy this uncleanness problem was by ritual washings detailed in the Torah. These washings were a sign of moral purification of which the “blood on your hands” was washed away and made clean again.  The blood, the scripture says, is the blood of innocent victims–those found in v.17. So it is not the act of shunning, mistreating, or abusing the underprivileged, impoverished, poor, and widowed that causes bloodshed.  It is the act of omitting or neglecting the oppressed, the orphans, the widows, etc. 

The text speaks in imperatives in v.17, implying what the Israelites failed to do. Learn to do good. Lamad is the Hebrew word for learn and literally means exercise in, or learn something. It says Seek Justice. Darash means to resort or seek out. In the inparative, the meaning is a command to study or practice justice. Justice is the word mishpat in Hebrew, which comes from the root word, shaphat, meaning judge or govern. So the command is to practice justice. Next, it says ‘ashru hamotz, or help the oppressed.  Asher in the Piel imperative stem means to set right, or to righten. So God’s command here is to righten the oppressed ones–to make things right.  Next is shiphtu yatom, meaning defend the orphan–its the same root from before (shaphat). Here, the verb literally means judgment, or the act of deciding a case.  Here it is specifically used for God’s requirement that a man does justice (or argues the case for) the orphans.  Orphans is a symbol of those who cannot take care of themselves, not just kids without parents.  Last is riyvu ‘almanah, or plead for the widow. Riyb is to strive or contend, though in the imperative the idea is to shout, quarrel noisily, shouting clamor involving bodily struggle, the case that is brought forward.  

So here is where we are at: practice and exercise justice, set right the things that are wrong with the people who are oppressed by (fill in the blank), argue the case for and defend the ones who cannot take care of themselves, and with all you have contend and plead openly for the widows.

Now here is the point where I ask myself: What am I doing?  Am I seeking justice for those who do not have it? Am I rescuing the oppressed from the harshness of this world? Am I defending people who cannot take care of themselves? Am I contending for the widow so that she might not be forgotten and uncared for?  Why do I struggle with omitting these things from my faith?  I find it so easy to talk about the contemporary issues facing some of my students in the youth group.  It is easy for me to sing songs on Sunday morning.  Its easy to follow along in the Bible when our pastor brings his message to the congregation.  But why is it so hard for us as evangelicals to really get a grasp on helping those who dont have a voice, an opinion, a fighting chance to survive on their own?? Why are we ok with sending money across the world so that someone we dont know can have clean water or a new pair of shoes, but when it comes down to going across the tracks to the opposite end of town we freeze, make excuses, and end up settling for the check-over-seas option? That is messed up.

So it moves my question from: What am I doing? to What can I do?

The answer to the former as of now is not much.  The answer to the latter is, well… the possibilities are endless. Why not help those that cant really help themselves.  Why not defend those who have no voice?  Why not plead the case for the ones who have no one to take care of them? Isnt that justice?  Isnt that seeking out the things that are right? Isnt that seeking justice?