power on Social Justice

What is needed is a realization that power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anaemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice.

One of the great problems of history is that the concepts of love and power have usually been contrasted as opposites, polar opposites, so that love is identified with a resignation of power, and powe...

Sometimes evil can feel so strong, so powerful, that its damage seems permanent and the final word on the subject. In this short excerpt from Philip Yancey, we see a reversal, perhaps a foretaste of w...

AIM Commentary Ancient Lens “ What’s the historical context?” Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled A contemporary commentator ends each daily program with these words, “Let not your hearts be trou...

Lord–Father, Son and Holy Spirit: Thank You that there’s no place we can hide from Your Spirit, no place we can flee from Your presence. We can’t go beyond the reach of Your love, nor out-distance the...

The sin of injustice is defined in the Bible as the abuse of power—abusing power by taking from others the good things that God intended for them, namely, their life, liberty, dignity, or the fruits o...

The sin of injustice is defined in the Bible as the abuse of power—abusing power by taking from others the good things that God intended for them, namely, their life, liberty, dignity, or the fruits o...

Lord God, we rejoice in your resurrection and in your promise to return. Help us live today as people who await the fulfillment of your kingdom. We confess we often look for comfort outside of you. Be...

The standard account of power says there’s only one kind of power in the world and we, the good people, must get on the right side of it, using it to bring justice into the world. Power is power. It i...

Power is meant to be shared with the goal of empowering others. Hoarded power weakens others and exalts oneself. Power, when grounded in biblical values, serves others by liberating them. It acknowled...

Christian politics concerns how we integrate our confession that Jesus is Lord with our call to love our neighbors.

There are few words in any language that can equal dikaiosis for theological depth and resonance. It has been at the center of scholarly debate for centuries. Known largely as “justification,” it is s...

The Power—the Spirit—is thus a social power, working to bring all minds into its own unity, sometimes by similarity and at other times by contrast. There is a diversity of gifts, but the same spirit.

Stewardship means to consciously take up our cultural power, investing it intentionally among the seemingly powerless, putting our power at their disposal to enable them to cultivate and create.

Since Jesus isn’t attached to the same things we are, he can take the God-view, which is about more than redeeming our individual lives. God means to redeem the world, which is going to require some m...

Break our hearts, Jesus That we may weep as You weep Love as You love Break our hearts Jesus and raise our voices that we may speak and act so all may be safe so all may have opportunity so all may k...

Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did, and it never will.

Leader: How good it is to sing praises to our God! People: Great are You, Lord and mighty in power. You understand everything about each one of us. You heal the brokenhearted and bind up our wounds....

Preaching Commentary The Fast-Paced Gospel “Immediacy” defines the Gospel of Mark’s rendition of Jesus’ ministry. Its fast pace reads like a comic strip of heroic proportions. Before one miraculous...

Heavenly Father, we confess that we often place our hopes in the powers that we see in the world, allowing ourselves to be lifted and brought down by people and institutions that are flawed and fleeti...

I am not interested in power for power's sake, but I'm interested in power that is moral, that is right and that is good.

Most people entering ministry- are idealistic about their own and others’ capacities to act and to influence others. Our wishful thinking compels us to expect all the adults involved in our ministries...

“Mary’s ‘Magnificat’ has been banned from public proclamation in many countries due to the revolutionary nature of these verses. ‘He has brought down rulers from their thrones’? Just imagine this plas...

The Sermon on the Mount contains some of the most difficult ethical injunctions in all of scripture. Many of us do not know how to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. Martin Luther K...

Lord Jesus Christ, strip us of all false notions of power. Teach us to love the world as you love it, with a generous share of selfless compassion—the foundation for true power. Amen.

Most Holy Lord, we speak with eloquence, but have no love. We speak truth to power, pontificate, and smugly consider our knowledge superior to others, but display little to no charity. We give sacrifi...

What do you want to achieve? Greater riches? Cheaper chicken? A happier life, a longer life? Is it power over your neighbors that you are after? Are you only running away from your death? Or are you s...

There is a strength, a power even, in understanding brokenness, because embracing our brokenness creates a need and desire for mercy, and perhaps a corresponding need to show mercy. When you experienc...

Power is present in almost all social situations we find ourselves in. Whether it be the corporation you work at, the village zoning committee, the street crew you work on, the neighborhood, the playg...

My goal is to speak the truth in love. There are a lot of people speaking the truth with no love, and there are a lot of people talking about love without much truth.