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Justice Revival
It is Coming to Vineyard Columbus!
Rich Nathan
February 26, 2008



1. Rich, what is your vision for Vineyard Columbus?

I've always wanted to be part of a church that seeks to be and to do everything the New Testament calls the church to be and to do. I've described this kind of church in the past as a holistic church, or a church that works on all eight cylinders. In other words, it is not enough if the Vineyard is known as a great worship center, or a great preaching church. The New Testament demands more. The New Testament asks:

  • Is the presence and power of the Holy Spirit and all the biblical gifts of the Holy Spirit welcome in the church?
  • Is the church significantly engaged in world missions, particularly among unreached people groups?
  • Is the church committed to spiritual and practical unity with the larger body of Christ?
  • Is the church regularly seeing a steady stream of non-believers coming to faith in Christ and also seeing a steady stream of new believers being baptized and discipled?
  • Is the church racially and ethnically diverse and is it involved in efforts to be a peacemaking force in our world?
  • Does the church equip people for ministry and life?
  • Does the church devote significant resources, in terms of money and people, to make life better for the most marginalized in our society?
  • Are marriages and families built up?
  • Are people loved and cared for in the church?
  • Are folks being freed from addictions and sins that keep them from holy living?
  • Is the ministry being done with integrity so that the leaders of the church are not dominated by the idols of money, sex, and power?
  • Is Christ being represented well by Vineyard Columbus?
Of course, there are many other questions that the New Testament asks of the church, but this gives some sense of the biblical wholeness that I've always longed to see in a church.

2. What is social justice?

Social justice is simply a commitment on the part of Christians to improve the lot of human beings in this world, particularly the lot of the most marginalized to whom God shows particular concern: the widow, the orphan, the immigrant, the unborn and their mothers. The God of the Bible is both a God of justification (he declares us right with himself) and justice (he is concerned about putting the world to rights). Doing justice is one of the major themes of scripture. God hates religion without an accompanying commitment to social justice.

    Amos 5:21-24
    "I hate, I despise your religious festivals; I cannot stand your assemblies.

    22 Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have no regard for them. 23 Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps. 24 But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!
So social justice was the historic practice of the evangelical church before the 20th century. It would have been unthinkable for men like John Wesley or William Wilberforce to consider someone to be a good follower of Jesus Christ, who was not actively involved in improving the social conditions of people in this world.

3. Why is social justice so controversial?

The New Testament scholar, N.T. Wright, gets us right to the heart of the matter when he says:

    "For generations the church has been polarized between those who see the main task being the saving of souls for heaven and the nurturing of those souls through the valley of this dark world, on the one hand, and on the other hand those who see the task of improving the lot of human beings and the world, rescuing the poor from their misery. The longer I've gone on as a New Testament scholar and wrestled with what the early Christians were originally talking about, the more it's borne in on me that distinction is one that we modern Westerners bring to the text rather than finding it in the text. Because the great emphasis in the New Testament is that the gospel is not how to escape the world; the gospel is that the crucified and risen Jesus is the Lord of the world. And that his death and Resurrection transformed the world, and that transformation can happen to you. You, in turn, can be part of the transforming work. That draws together what we traditionally call evangelism, bringing people to the point where they come to know God and Christ for themselves, with working for God's Kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. That has always been at the heart of the Lord's Prayer, and how we've managed for years to say the Lord's Prayer without realizing that Jesus really meant it is very curious. Our Western culture since the 18th century has made a virtue of separating our religion from real life, or faith from politics. When I lecture about this, people will pop up and say, 'Surely Jesus said my kingdom is not of this world.' And the answer is no, what Jesus said in John 18 is, 'My kingdom is not from this world.' That's ek tou kosmoutoutou. It is quite clear in the text that Jesus' kingdom doesn't start with this world. It isn't a worldly kingdom, but it is for this world. It is from somewhere else, but it is for this world."
4. Aren't social justice and the social justice movement distractions from our commitment to preach the gospel?

Social justice is not a distraction from our commitment; it is part and parcel of the gospel of the kingdom. We read in Mark 1:15,

    Mark 1:15
    "The time has come," he said. "The kingdom of God has come near. Repent and believe the good news!"
What is the message of the kingdom? Certainly the center of the message is the proclamation that through one's faith in the sinless life, substitutionary death and bodily resurrection of Jesus Christ (the King), a person can be eternally saved. Thus Vineyard Columbus regularly calls people to put their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ in order to be born again and enter God's kingdom.

But that is not the circumference or totality of the message of the kingdom. The ultimate goal of the kingdom goes beyond the salvation of us as individuals (wonderful as that is) and involves the restoration and renovation of the entire universe. The message of the kingdom is a fulfillment of the prophet Isaiah's vision in Isaiah 65:17, 20-25,

    Isaiah 65:17
    "See, I will create new heavens and a new earth. The former things will not be remembered, nor will they come to mind.

    Isaiah 65:20-25
    "Never again will there be in it infants who live but a few days, or older people who do not live out their years; those who die at a hundred will be thought mere youths; those who fail to reach a hundred will be considered accursed. 21 They will build houses and dwell in them; they will plant vineyards and eat their fruit. 22 No longer will they build houses and others live in them, or plant and others eat. For as the days of a tree, so will be the days of my people; my chosen ones will long enjoy the work of their hands. 23 They will not labor in vain, nor will they bear children doomed to misfortune; for they will be a people blessed by the Lord, they and their descendants with them. 24 Before they call I will answer; while they are still speaking I will hear. 25 The wolf and the lamb will feed together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox, but dust will be the serpent's food. They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain," says the Lord.
This message was echoed by all the prophets. So the prophet Micah says this:

    Micah 4:1-4
    In the last days the mountain of the Lord's temple will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and peoples will stream to it. 2 Many nations will come and say, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths." The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. 3 He will judge between many peoples and will settle disputes for strong nations far and wide. They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore. 4 Everyone will sit under their own vine and under their own fig tree, and no one will make them afraid, for the Lord Almighty has spoken.
The apostle Paul speaks about the cosmic sweep of this message of the kingdom. He tells us that not only we, but the entire creation, will be freed from the curse of the fall (Romans 8:19-21). In Ephesians, the apostle Paul again enlarges the scope of the message beyond our individual salvation when he says in Ephesians 1:9-10,

    Ephesians 1:9-10
    he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, 10 to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment-to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.
Let me give you an illustration of the difference between the narrow focus of contemporary American evangelicalism and the big focus of the Bible. I will use a simple boating illustration.

D.L. Moody, the great 19th century evangelist, described his calling and said that he essentially understood the world as being like an ocean liner that hit an iceberg. God had said to him, "Moody, it is your job to pull as many drowning people out of the water into life boats as you can."

Now, that may have been Moody's calling. I don't fault him at all for his understanding of his particular calling. But his 'life boat theology', which claims that really the only thing that matters is evangelism- pulling as many folks into life boats as you can- has been both a blessing and a great curse for contemporary evangelicalism. On the one hand, it has created an evangelistic urgency. And it is evangelical churches that are growing because of this passion to rescue folks. On the other hand, by narrowing the focus simply upon getting people to say the Sinner's Prayer, we have had almost nothing to say about whole slices of life.

Let me suggest an alterative theology -'Ark Theology'. Noah's Ark not only saved people, it preserved God's other creatures as well. The covenant that God made with Noah and his descendents was not only with humanity, but we read in Genesis 9:10 these words:

    Genesis 9:10
    and with every living creature that was with you-the birds, the livestock and all the wild animals, all those that came out of the ark with you-every living creature on earth.
The rainbow that was an eternal time was not just a sign between God and people, but we read in Genesis 9:12, 15 and 17 these words:

    Genesis 9:12
    And God said, "This is the sign of the covenant I am making between me and you and every living creature with you, a covenant for all generations to come:

    Genesis 9:15
    I will remember my covenant between me and you and all living creatures of every kind. Never again will the waters become a flood to destroy all life.

    Genesis 9:17
    So God said to Noah, "This is the sign of the covenant I have established between me and all life on the earth."
The Ark Theology - that God intends to restore all of creation, every realm, every creature, every part. Or as Abraham Kuypur, the great Dutch theologian and politician said nearly 100 years ago, "There is not a square inch of the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ who is sovereign over all, does not cry: 'Mine!'"

Life Boat Theology: Jesus wants to be Lord of your life. Ark Theology: Jesus is Lord over the universe.

This enormous plan, involving the renovation and restoration of the entire universe is what we pray for when we pray the Lord's Prayer, "Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven."

So when we Christians feed the hungry in the name of Jesus, or heal a sick person in the power of Christ, or work for peace in this war-torn world, or help reconcile a marriage, or extend help to immigrants, or work for the responsible care of the environment, these actions are not a distraction from our commission to preach the gospel of the kingdom. Rather, we Vineyard people are living out our calling as kingdom people to partner with God in bringing about the healing of the entire universe.

5. What are your hopes for members of Vineyard Columbus regarding social justice?

I have several hopes for the Vineyard regarding social justice. I hope that we become a church that breaks out of the boxes that church tradition tries to impose upon the evangelical church namely, that evangelical churches are not supposed to be involved with improving the social conditions of people in this world. I have a hope that Vineyard would not exist for itself, but for Christ and for the world. And I also have a hope that the Holy Spirit would change the inclinations and tilt of our hearts.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once said that perspective is a matter of what a person sees when he or she gets up in the morning. If when you wake up in the morning the first thing you see is a tiny inner-city apartment that is poorly heated and roach-infested, then that is your perspective. If the first thing you see in the morning is a 4000 sq. ft. house that you live in and you open your eyes to massive skylights that communicate to you that all is right with the world, then that is your perspective.

My hope is that members of Vineyard Columbus would seek to walk in the shoes of those whose perspectives are shaped by poverty, racial oppression, and personal suffering. My hope is that the tilt of the hearts of Vineyard Columbus members would be towards the poor (and not just the rich), towards the sick (and not just the well), and towards peacemaking.

6. What is a Justice Revival?

My friend, Jim Wallis, in his book The Great Awakening said,

    "Imagine something called Justice Revivals in the powerful tradition of revivals past, but focusing on the great moral issues of our time. Imagine linking the tradition of Billy Graham with the tradition of Martin Luther King, Jr. Imagine a new generation of young people catching fire and offering their gifts, talents, and lives in a new spiritual movement for social justice. Imagine such revivals taking place in cities' great convention centers, but resulting in thousands of small groups for ongoing discipleship, training, and action in every neighborhood of those cities. Imagine disillusioned believers coming back to faith after many years of alienation, while other seekers discover the power of faith for the first time. Imagine social movements rising out of spiritual revival and actually changing the wind of both our culture and our politics. Imagine a fulfillment in our time of the words of the prophet Amos: 'Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.' Just imagine."
We plan on three nights of preaching and worship. On Wednesday night, April 16, we will call people to make a commitment to Christ. Matt Redman, the writer of many of our worship songs, and his band will join us for worship. On Thursday night, we will call people to work for justice in the Central Ohio community and we will host the Raymond Wise Gospel Choir as our worship leader. And on Friday night, we will focus on issues of global justice. Worship we will be led by Vineyard Columbus' new worship pastor, Clarence Church, together with some worship leaders from other churches in Central Ohio.

Then on Saturday, thousands of members of Central Ohio churches will fan out into our community and to dozens of servant evangelism projects such as fixing up local schools, visiting nursing homes, and working on homes for Habitat for Humanity.

7. What do you hope to accomplish through Vineyard's hosting of this Justice Revival?

We have several goals that we hope to accomplish through the Justice Revival. First of all, we want to transform the public face of Christianity here in Central Ohio. I want our city to know that we followers of Jesus are not at war with our city. I want Christians to be Jeremiah 29:7 people, who "seek the peace and prosperity of the city [where we live] and pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, [we] too will prosper."

I want hundreds of people to be saved through this Justice Revival and to come into fellowship with local churches throughout our community. I want to see churches across Central Ohio united in the practical service of our city and in reaching our city for Christ. Many of Columbus' largest churches are already involved in helping to host this Justice Revival including First Church of God, Grove City Nazarene, Faith Ministries, Reynoldsburg United Methodist Church, First Community Church, Rhema Christian Center, and New Salem Baptist. We also have several other Vineyards involved.

Through the Justice Revival we want to help redefine what it means to be a Christian disciple so that thousands of Christians will understand that they can't be good followers of Jesus without also committing to Jesus' agenda which includes feeding the hungry, welcoming the stranger, clothing the naked, giving care to the sick, and visiting the prisoner (Matthew 25:35-36).

We particularly want to call attention to the condition of children in our city by having local churches adopt local public schools for the purpose of mentoring kids. And finally, we want to call attention to global issues of justice especially the Darfur, the tragedy of global sex trafficking, the 30,000 children a day who die of malnutrition and preventable diseases, and the billion people on our planet who live on less than $1 a day.

8. Why are we inviting Jim Wallis in to help us put on this Justice Revival?

The idea of doing Justice Revivals was Jim Wallis' idea in the first place. Jim proposed it to me and to Bishop Timothy Clarke, and other Central Ohio large church pastors.

Jim said that over the last decade the Lord kept prompting him to do Justice Revivals around the country and asked us if we would host one. The collected group of large church pastors were thrilled by Jim's offer to help us put on one of these events.

9. Jim Wallis has been somewhat identified with the Christian Left in politics. Is this where Vineyard Columbus is going?

As pastor of Vineyard Columbus, I have absolutely no desire (nor agenda) to move our church towards a left, right, or centrist political perspective. In fact, I hate the way the world has compromised and co-opted the Christian church and forced us into its labels and molds. There is one goal for us as a church and it is not to be Democrat or Republican - it is to be biblical! To the best of our ability, we are called to follow Jesus in our generation.

So, if the Bible calls us to be completely committed to protecting the lives of the unborn, it bothers me not at all if that position is generally regarded as a right wing, or Republican position. And if the Bible calls us to creation care, it bothers me not at all, if that position is generally regarded as a left wing, or Democratic, position. As Pastor Rick Warren put it: "Left Wing? Right Wing? I want the whole bird," to which I say, "Amen!" I want Vineyard Columbus to be fully biblical even if our position can't fit into the tight boxes of contemporary secular politics.

10. Do you agree with all of Jim Wallis' views or the views of Sojourners, the magazine that Jim publishes?

Of course not! Jim and I do have a high degree of agreement about many fundamental issues including who Jesus is; what the cross of Christ accomplished; the need for faith and repentance in Christ to be saved, etc. But my standards for partnering with people to do an event does not require 100% agreement on all issues. I strongly believe in what the Christian philosopher, Francis Schaeffer, and Christian leader, Charles Colson, call "co-belligerency." We can partner together with various groups to accomplish certain moral goals without becoming that group, or agreeing with them on all issues.

Thus, Vineyard Columbus could easily partner with Roman Catholics in fighting abortion without agreeing with the Roman Catholic view of the Mass, or with the Pope's authority. Vineyard Columbus could likewise easily partner with mainline churches to work against gambling casinos in our state without agreeing with the mainline church perspective on biblical authority. And we could work with Muslims, or Jews, to protest the abuse of the poor through pay-day lenders without Vineyard Columbus becoming Muslim or Jewish.

11. What if I'm a member of Vineyard Columbus, but I don't agree with our hosting a Justice Revival?

It is not necessary to agree with everything that a large church family does. But it is absolutely necessary that when we disagree, our disagreements are civil and that we give one another the benefit of the doubt. The Bible commands us to believe the best about each other (1 Corinthians 13:7); to be kind and never rude (1 Cor 13:4-5) and to never be divisive or judgmental towards one another (Rom. 14:1-8).

12. Rich, do you have fears regarding hosting this event?

My dear friend, Ken Wilson, who pastors the Ann Arbor Vineyard, showed me a chart that I found very helpful.

Illustration:

Evangelical
Charismatic
Social Justice
Liturgical

What has happened in the last generation is that there has been border-blending among the four great movements in the church. So we find many evangelicals, who feel very comfortable praying for the sick and casting our demons; and there are many evangelicals, who engage in liturgical practices such as using the Anglican Book of Common Prayer in their devotional lives, etc.

But while there has been a huge move of border-blending, there are still many corner-dwellers, people who believe that it is entirely wrong for someone in their camp to engage in practices associated with one of the other three camps. Corner-dwellers get really mean and mad when we step out of our traditional boxes.

So, for examples, some conservative evangelicals and fundamentalists get mean and mad when we claim to be evangelical, but we engage in border-blending with one of the other wings of the church. Like the Pharisees of Jesus' day, some angry corner-dwellers may set themselves up as the judge of what is biblical; like the Pharisees they get really mad when we associate with "the wrong sort of people," and like the Pharisees, they are constantly looking for reasons to accuse border-blenders for our supposed theological errors.

13. Rich, any closing thoughts or dreams?

I look forward to a day when an evangelical church that does a Justice Revival not only doesn't create any controversy, but hardly raises an eyebrow. I look forward to a day when Christians who hear about a Justice Revival say: "So, what else is new? Of course, evangelical churches are involved in social justice. That is what Christian churches are supposed to do. We are supposed to follow Jesus, who is both the God of Justification and the God of Justice!"

 
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