No justice, no peace. Know
Let go and let God As a piece of popular theology, “Let go and let God”
is trite and profound, hurtful and helpful. It’s hurtful when served with a side of “get over it
already” or “you just have to trust.” T e thinly veiled accompanying message might be “You are taking too long to grieve” or “If your faith was stronger you wouldn’t worry—consider the lilies of the fi eld” (Matthew 6:25–29). It’s trite when the perceived
meaning reduces God to a Magic
justice, know peace. In 1967 at the height of the civil rights movement,
Martin Luther King Jr. declared: “T ere can be no justice without peace and there can be no peace without justice.” King wasn’t simply naming the political realities of
his time (and ours). He was speaking God’s timeless truth. To know peace, God’s people must know justice.
The emphasis is on ‘let God.’
8 Ball® decision-maker (“It is certain”) or absolves per- sonal responsibility (“God’s work, not mine”). Mary Lynn Hendrickson, a director of faith forma-
tion in Stoughton, Wis., wrote: “For people who are in recovery—who have been to hell and back—and found sobriety through Twelve Step programs, ‘Let go and let God’ is a powerful statement. I embrace that phrase from the likes of them and off er it as a supportive reminder in return. All it means is we let God be God instead of ourselves.” In We Know How T is Ends: Living While Dying, the
late Bruce H. Kramer wrote: “T e arrogance of my own able-bodied existence allowed me to believe that I was in complete control of my fate.” “Let go and let God” becomes profound when we
realize “let go” is not about ceding control as if it were ours to hand over to God. Instead, we come to under- stand the emphasis is on “let God.” When illness or other loss empties our arrogant notions of self- suffi ciency and control, we have the grace-space to experience the fullness of God.
Author bio: Sue Edison-Swift is director of Faith Life Resources at Bethesda Lutheran Communities in Watertown, Wis., and is a member of Redeemer Lutheran Church in Stevens Point.
With no justice, there can be no peace. T e very existence of peace or justice points to and
encompasses the other. How can there be rain without water? Or water if there is no rain? So intimate, too, is the connection between justice and peace. Consider the Hebrew word shalom and its cousin,
the word used by Arab Christians to describe God’s reign, salaam. Although both are oſt en translated as “peace,” that defi nition is far too narrow to encompass the lush, rich expanse of the words in their original translation and context. T e words indicate a sense of
completeness: safety, security, prosperity and forgiveness. Shalom/ salaam translates as wholeness. Justice and peace, peace with justice. Indivisible. Jus-
tice without peace? Peace without justice? Impossible. “No justice, no peace, no justice, no peace.” Does this sound threatening? Does it bring to your
mind images of angry demonstrations, violent out- bursts, pandemonium in the streets? Consider the phrase in homonym: “Know justice, know peace.” It’s not a threat. It’s a promise. God’s promise. God’s peaceful kingdom come, God’s justice will be
done—on earth as it is in heaven. Come quickly,
O Lord, come quickly. Amen.
Author bio: Angela K. Zimmann, an ELCA pastor, is a visiting professor of preaching at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg (Pa.).
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www.thelutheran.org
No justice, no peace. Know justice, know peace.
Come quickly, O Lord, come quickly.
©ISTOCK/EMARTO
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