The church loves to lament but often ignores or forgets to lament. I read Soong-Chan Rah prophetic and challenging book "Prophetic Lament: A Call for Justice in Troubled Times" (IVP, 2015). Why does it seem like the cry for justice burns in the hearts of the younger generation and not the older generation? Have we gotten so old and cynical that we have lost a prophetic imagination to imagine a truly just world? There is so much pain, trouble, turmoil, and suffering in the world, why does the American church avoid lament?
Can we see our own blind spots of segregation, racism, capitalism run amuck where the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Why does the church solely focus on individual transgressions and sins while missing the institutional and corporate injustices that keep much of the evil we see in the world firmly in place. Can we so quickly write checks to end human trafficking without seeing the connection for our demand to buy cheap clothing that generates this exploitation of poor people. Do we care about hunger in Africa without connecting the dots to large multi-national corporations that benefits from exploiting these weaker nations. Do we care about our cheap oil from the middle east more than how it continues to fund global terrorism around the world?
Can the American church see its own American exceptionalism whereas God is sending us many Christian immigrants from around the globe to help us and we are so threatened by them. Maybe if America and the wealthy American church lost its wealth, materialism would lose its death grip on us all? Maybe if we lost our position as a world leader we then could lose an elevated view of ourselves? Maybe if we lost our power and leverage over other nations we would join them in understanding what true powerless really feels like? Maybe then we could lament.
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