The ELCA's front burner

If we take our clue from the Scriptures, we would look at different issues than those that so fixate our attention such as sexual orientation, historic episcopacy, liturgical traditions, church growth and doctrinal or constitutional correctness. We’ve become sidetracked in our focus, and many hurting people stand to lose in our pursuit of ecclesiastical purity.

We don’t listen well to the world’s poor. They’re not on our councils or committees. Not many make their way into our worship services. Few of us invite them into our homes as Isaiah suggests in chapter 58. Our memberships consist primarily of society’s privileged. Church budgets reveal what’s on our front burner.

We won’t listen well to the poor if we remain confined to our communities of safety and comfort. When Moses left his palace in Egypt to see what was happening to those whose lives were made bitter by that country’s economy, he experienced a radical change in his life. He discovered that what was happening to those on the margins was done in the name of national security and economic prosperity (Exodus 1).