Compassion, Justice, and the Christian Life

Overview
Overview

Compassion and justice are things every Christian says they have in spades, but is the way we're ministering the poor and marginalized showing that?

Year Published

2007

Authors
Topics
Synopsis
The urban landscape is changing and, as a result, urban ministries are at a crossroads. If the Church is to be an effective agent of compassion and justice, we must change our mission strategies. In this compelling book, Lupton asks tough questions about service providing and community building to help us enhance our effectiveness.

Overall Rating

Final Thoughts
This book reminds you to fight for compassion and justice in the areas that you are most passionate, in ways that directly benefit those people based on what they tell you they need.
Year Published

2007

Authors
Topics
Synopsis
The urban landscape is changing and, as a result, urban ministries are at a crossroads. If the Church is to be an effective agent of compassion and justice, we must change our mission strategies. In this compelling book, Lupton asks tough questions about service providing and community building to help us enhance our effectiveness.
Final Thoughts
This book reminds you to fight for compassion and justice in the areas that you are most passionate, in ways that directly benefit those people based on what they tell you they need.

Overall Rating

This is another book I was supposed to read for school but mostly didn’t. I own it, though, so, I figure, I owe it to myself to read it since I spent money on it. It’s actually a relatively short book too. I still struggled to read through it quickly, though, because it’s very challenging, not intellectual wise, but mindset wise.

The main idea of this book is this- is what we are doing to help the less fortunate actually helping them, or is it hindering them? I don’t want to give away too much of the book because it’s one of those that I think everyone needs to read. But Lupton (I really almost typed Lipton) does a great job detailing things from experiences he’s had and heard of.

He talks about how the current approaches to helping the homeless or clothless or foodless may not be actually helping them. It comes down to enabling vs. developing. What can we do to help develop them and bring them out of their current circumstances? Perhaps just giving them free things doesn’t do that. In nearly any addiction counseling they talk about avoiding people who enable you. They allow you to keep your addictions and even (maybe without meaning to) encourage it. Perhaps the program churches and ministries have now are enabling people to be homeless and jobless and what not. How is that compassion?

This book will challenge you to re-think your approach to such ministries. It left me in tears many times. While reading the book I was challenged by the fact that I wasn’t doing enough to help the people in the situations that Lupton presented. Thankfully, though, one of his closing chapters assured me that I was all right. He talked about pursuing those injustices that you are passionate about. Some people are passionate about helping people find housing, others aren’t. That’s not to say that those of us who aren’t passionate about it don’t care, it’s just that it’s not what tugs on our heart the most. You can still help in those areas, but it won’t do very much for anyone for you to invest a ton of time and energy into something you’re not passionate about.

For me, I’m passionate about the people whom the Church has told aren’t good enough; those whom Christians disparage and degrade at nearly every turn, without even getting to know them; those who feel alone in a world of so many other people. I do what I can to help those people, and show them that they are loved; they do matter; God does care. That’s the injustice I’m fighting for. Am I enabling them or developing them is the question I must now ask myself. What about you?

Nick Scarantino