Reflections: Social Justice Working. Social Justice Working is an expression of compassion, focused on bringing God’s justice to bear on work activities. It is also an expression of shalom, a word often weakly translated as ‘peace’ but which means so much more. It is about bringing about completeness, wholeness, wellbeing and harmony. Social Justice Working means that you focus on the way things could and should be, the way things would be in all their fullness. This especially relates
to working relationships and work structures. In practising this spiritual discipline, there are some simple behaviours we can demonstrate in the workplace: a. Striving for workplace reform to ease the burden on vulnerable workers, consumers or suppliers. b. Agitating for equal opportunity. c. Seeking to express compassion in the workplace. Many Christians interested in justice know well Micah 6:8, where the Lord explains that he is not as pleased by sacrifices as by those who “act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” The rest of the passage describes some of the unjust work practices that displease God, including ill-gotten treasures, dishonest scales, false weights and those who speak deceitfully.
Questions: How can you work for justice in your
workplace, noticing the vulnerable or suffering?
Prayer: Lord of justice and truth, We are conscious of your passion for peace and wholeness, so please help us to weave justice into our activities at work. Help us to be conscious of the ways our working might be exploitive, harmful or unfair, and to have the courage to change what we can. Amen.
We have been reading the Bible with Kara Martin. Tomorrow we begin a new series, A Funny Thing Happened Along the Way in Israel, with Catrina Henderson.