Building Mission into Society II

In my last post I explored the principle in Leviticus 19:9 - 10, showing how it builds mission into society, i.e. in the way you work you have conscious and intentional provision for the poor and disadvantaged.

In fact the concept goes even further than this. It enables such people to keep their own dignity by doing their own work to provide food for themselves. In other words instead of the farmer simply giving some of his hard earned crop away, which would be a fine thing, there is the invitation for others to actively share in the crop by harvesting from God's provision for themselves.

This would be especially poignant in a society where if you had no land, it would be difficult to work for yourself for such provision. The principle effectively 'lends' or 'spares' them some land from which to glean, enabling them to work just like other privileged people. If they work hard, they too can do quite well (as per the story of Ruth). This system thus levels the playing field, enabling privileged and unprivileged alike to work productively.

It is therefore a system of grace, operating on more than one level. And once again it is built into the normal rhythms of the society.

Building mission into society

Leviticus 19 verses 9 & 10 give a very important principle: leave some slack that others can freely pick from. It is gloriously simple - in your natural harvest there is provision for those who would otherwise struggle.

I wonder if the foodbank we opened this week could be considered as an equivalent for our culture of these verses: in your shopping build in some extra capacity that is made freely available to those in need. Both have a sense of building mission into society, i.e. in the way we operate provision is made for those in need. What takes it a level above the welfare state is the active consciousness of it - it is not simply a tax that disappears into the ether, but instead you purposefully leave slack for the benefit of others in your locality.

The Leviticus 19 verses goes against the grain (excuse the pun) of how much of our society operates - since we strive to squeeze out every last fraction of a percent of productivity. Yet right from beginning Israel was taught to create a society that deliberately had some inefficiency, but it was an inefficiency that would enable the society to be richer overall. Mission was built into the way society was to operate.

You Can't Say Fairer Than That?

Ezekiel 18 spells out a scenario of direct justice: your behaviour controls your outcome of life or death. Evidently the people did not expect this, presuming a parent's legacy would bear on their own standing (see v19 - possibly because of Exodus 20:5). Certainly the whole exile deal was an expression of generations of diverging from God's standards.

Perhaps the concept of direct justice could now be seen as a relief from the inherited situation: "Our fathers may have sinned, but at least God will now measure us on our own merits".

But God goes even further: if you repent your own prior wickedness you will be forgiven (v21f). In other words there is scope for our own lives and thus our own scenario to change. Now you can't say fairer than that? There is a way out, even if you yourself have messed up you no longer need to be consigned to doom.

Yet maybe with that comes a responsibility: to indeed repent of what has gone before whether it be your inherited legacy or your own personal wrongdoings. You can't simply 'blame the parents' any more for your own demise - you have to take responsibility for your own actions.

Is that fair? You bet - no matter what has gone before, and what influences that has put into you, God gives you scope for change.

Unregulated Behaviour

In his letters Paul gives out various instructions and advice to the growing churches - coping with the practicalities of messy real life. Yet he also has in mind a better way: living by the Spirit. Allowing the Spirit to develop God's own nature in us will transcend and surpass any list of instructions, making rules and formulations redundant.

Galatians 5 gives us a list of nine:

Love - the overflowing of yourself for one another 

Joy – a delight in life that comes from God irrespective of circumstances

Peace – a calmness, again from God irrespective of circumstances

Patience – waiting in expectant hope

Kindness – offering a better way, a new opportunity, even if not deserved

Goodness – generosity, an outpouring from God in your life

Faithfulness – sticking with it, even in the difficulty and the bad

Gentleness – a quiet, considerate humility

Self-control – strength in control, able to master competing forces on your life

Note how each of these flows from God. Furthermore many of these flow out to other people. They will all inevitably affect our relationships with others. As such they are all key attributes for mission, whether actively by the way we behave towards others, or passively by what people will observe in our lives.