How should we respond to injustice and issues facing our world? Speaking and taking action hastily can be harmful. Instead we want to seek God first for His solutions which are better than ours. We want to take action and speak as He leads.
In our current world scenario of pandemic, pain and protest, in the midst of injustice and lack of love, we need God and His ways more than ever.
We must learn how to respond to injustice, to respond as He leads. Temporary solutions and laws (which people often don’t follow though they should) are not enough. We need more than words in a social media post (even this one) and more than pointing fingers.
None of these things can change a person’s heart without the working of God’s Spirit. And if we do not find out His way of responding to injustice, we won’t make a lasting difference in the way we could otherwise.
Our Greatest Aim
We must seek God’s will before we respond to injustice or other world issues. Our aim is to become people whose love and honor of God supersedes all else. To honor Him by loving and honoring others who are made in His image regardless of our differences is key.
We must search our hearts for anything that hinders our love of others—whether racism, offense or any kind of prejudice—and put it aside because we are called to love all people as Jesus loves us.
Furthermore, we love others by being an listening ear even with the hard stuff they’ve been through. We love them by responding in the right way. We weep with them in the hurts and injustice they’ve experienced, seeking to comfort them as Christ would.
Will we pass this message along? Will we be the example, seeking God first and praying for others to also seek Him first? We will choose to respond only as He leads, remembering that God knows best?
In an article from The Gospel Coalition, we find reasons to make prayer our first resort:
“If we make prayer foundational in our activism, it also cultivates a natural compassion and empathy, which helps make our convictions for justice more sustainable.”
“Prayer Is Activism” from The Gospel Coalition
God’s Ways Are Best
Because we know that His ways are greater and higher than ours, we must seek to be a people who want to know His will before reacting or taking action.
“For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
Nor are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord.
“For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
So are My ways higher than your ways
And My thoughts than your thoughts.”
— Isaiah 55:8-9 (NASB)
People are hurting, people have been mistreated for reasons they shouldn’t have—even murdered. It hurts to see these things happening around us. People need the love of God displayed to them and then through them and through those after like an unbroken chain.
Again let us take note from TGC’s article:
“…prayer should not be the only way we respond to injustice, but for these reasons and doubtless more, it must not be something we neglect. Before we passionately post about #BlackLivesMatter on social media, let’s pray even more passionately to the Lord of Lords, petitioning our all-powerful, all-just God on behalf of the precious black lives that matter so dearly to him.”
A key takeaway is this: God alone knows all and is fully able to end every injustice in our world. Only God can mend every heart, only God’s way of doing things are able to produce a truly worthwhile result.
We need God. We need to call out to Him to make every wrong thing right and to help us respond firstly in prayer and second in the way Jesus would respond, with His ways and truth. And it starts with wanting to pray as He leads rather than our own desires.
Every one of us is a sinner in need of the Savior, unable to do anything of good apart from Him. We need to get down on our knees and pray, seeking His ways and responding in a way that honors Him and all people because we are all made in His image.
A Prayer
Help me, O Lord, to get away with You to seek You and Your ways first, especially as I seek to respond rightly to the injustices and issues around me.
Give me grace to silence my heart so I can sense Your leadership and take in Your Word, even and especially in the midst of swirling thoughts within and information overload around.
Draw me after You, giving me a desire to be still and find out what is most pleasing to You. In this may I avoid reacting hastily, instead taking a breath to catch myself, then choosing to respond as You lead.
In my thoughts, words, attitudes and actions may I choose to honor and represent You and Your nature as revealed through Your Son Jesus. Amen.
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Yes, yes, yes!! We must be still and allow the Holy Spirit to guide our words and actions in all things, especially when faced with the fragile and explosive circumstances brought about by social injustice.
Thank you for sharing such wisdom.
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Yes, exactly. Thank you for reading and commenting.
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Amen, Amanda. I think it’s important to seek God first because responding to oppression in a spirit of vengeance or anger is not God’s way. I do think that all people being cared for physically, emotionally, and spiritually aligns with the vision of God’s will presented in the Bible! ♥ I pray He will guide my heart and actions in all things.
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Thank you for reading and commenting, Lily.
Yes, I agree. I am amazed when I have seen believers disregard, mistreat or have prejudice toward others because Christ gave His life for every one of us. He calls us to love and serve as He did, including and perhaps most especially the poor, the oppressed and others in need. I pray that more believers will truly have His heart in this regard, seek His will and then take action to serve and love others as He leads.
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I agree with the writer of the above article. I need God than any thing else.
The prayer is very powerful and inspiring to many.
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Thank you. I am so glad the prayer blessed you, Gaudencia.
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