Adoption

Just Cause

Posted on by lainamunoz

Amos 5:21-24
(NIV, emphasis mine)
“I hate, I despise your religious feasts; I cannot stand your assemblies. Even though you bring me burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. Though you bring choice fellowship offerings, I will have no regard for them. Away with the noise of your songs! I will not listen to the music of your harps. But let justice roll on like a river, righteousness like a never-failing stream!”

One of my classes this last week focused on Worship and Justice. We looked at what these two have to do with another and what expectations have changed since scripture was written up. I was shocked to discover the call in the Old and New Testaments to the leaders and governments to keep justice in the courts – be fair to the widow, orphan and poor. We have to assume these warnings were written to 1) keep them on track and 2) clean out what was already bleeding through the culture of oppressing those who couldn’t support or even defend themselves.

We as students were given different portions of scripture to look at: what it meant to the people it was addressed to, what it means for us as a collective body of Christ and what it means to us individually. My group looked at Exodus 23. I’ll summarise it for you…

  • Don’t lie about people
  • Don’t pervert justice and lie in court
  • Be fair to poor people in court
  • Be kind to your enemies property
    • Not JUST to them but even their stuff
  • Don’t take from the poor just because they are poor
  • Don’t oppress a sojourner (don’t beat down, put down, dishearten, suppress a visitor, companion, inmate, visitor, lodger, different nationalities, different religions, refugees)

When we as a group looked at what it might have meant for the Israelites we assumed maybe they had corruption in the courts and were probably exposing heaps of poor people because they thought they could get away with it. We assumed there were crooked people who were so wrapped up in the culture of slavery that they had just been delivered from that they were treating others as slaves. Granted, that’s what they knew to do but it still wasn’t just or fair. We assumed they were treating people less than what they would want to be treated like and that they were disregarding taking care of people who didn’t belong to them.

Then we moved to a harder question – What does this text mean to us as the body of Christ?
How do we take on these scriptures in the Church?

 We talked about Public Justice (How society treats and manages others),
and Private Justice (How I treat others and manage myself to benefit others).

So the public justice level around this passage would look more like how many Christians are educating themselves on the elected ‘in-charge’ of our governments and nations. Are they contributing to who is in the courts and even becoming those who are in the judges in courts deciding what is fair for all? Are we as a local church involved and benefiting the community around us? Are we investing in families and defending those trapped in Domestic Violence? Are we doing all we can to find homes, clothes, food, and clean water* for refugees and flood victims alike?

There are many more things the Church COULD be doing but there are loads of things that fall more on the individuals that make up the Church that we should probably be looking at.

Private Justice –
The hardest and most confronting question of all that we addressed is how this all applies to me? How do I treat others?

This was the hardest one to speak out loud.

I grew up in a westernised, bible belt, mostly white’ish people culture. But I also grew up with the news… I knew what areas of Tulsa (and now Sydney) to avoid if I was alone and I rarely ever walk in a park without looking over my shoulder. I grew up with a fear of homeless people because at no point do you know if they’re going to rape you, if they’re mentally unstable, if they’re in a very real sense ‘battling their own demons’ or how they would react to a conversation. But my fear grew out of judgments that began when I didn’t take the time to look them in the eyes as I walk by them on busy Sydney streets. My very judgments dehumanised someone with a story. I wasn’t being fair – I wasn’t being just – I wasn’t being anyone who remotely resembled my Saviour. Jesus, who took the time to look a naked woman in the face and tell her that He held no sins against her. Jesus, who when Himself was oppressed by the government didn’t fight back with entitlement or ‘rights’ but instead STILL SHOWED LOVE to all. I know much this last paragraph makes me seem like an ignorant… dirtyword… but this was my honest heart condition.
My ignorance turned into judgments that disguised itself as fear so that I could neatly sweep it all away as, “I’m just protecting myself”.

Am I saying single girls should stop at every homeless person and strike up conversation? No, that’s not what I’m getting at… But maybe just get involved and start to add humanity back to those around us. Maybe just start to learn the faces and names of those we equate with statistics and numbers.

My thought is that we are already a pretty passionate generation – I think that there are specific desires that are unique to individuals. Where our Private Justice comes in is EDUCATING ourselves on the issues of our hearts and GETTING ACTIVE in those areas.

Some of your hearts are absolutely wrenched for the homeless, some want to take care of the elderly, some have a resolve of adopting, some are desperate to help stop domestic violence, some of you can’t sleep at night because you’re broken over those still enslaved in sex-trafficking.

Great, I hope something breaks your heart – I hope you let yourself cry sometimes while praying over these neglecting issues that Christians love to talk about but sometimes never DO anything about.
But, OUR G-D… the one who CREATED JUSTICE calls us also to be just

The Lords desire is more for justice and fairness than for one more ‘Christian’ to write Him one more song, or worship Him one more time for all they have. He wants us to give to and restore those who DON’T have.

So after you forgive me for being a little too honest again, find one of the links throughout this blog and research, get involved, be the just cause… just because.

What Is In A Name?

Posted on by lainamunoz

I have a lot of pride. I got a job when I was young and worked for about 46% of my life (which is gross to think about when you’re only 24) and did my best to ‘provide’ for my wants and needs (I thought I was providing, but I know I wouldn’t be alive without my parents). I carry pride in my friendships, I hold my close friends close (and think they’re cooler than you). I carry pride in my little sister who is absolutely irreplaceable and unmatchable in competition for my affection and attention. She’s the most intelligent and beautiful and talented little person I have ever known and she gives the BEST hugs. I carry pride in my goals that I’ve set for myself, which I’m often humbled by, because lets be honest, sometimes I over schedule and don’t complete things (sometimes I suck at keeping commitments).

Lastly, I carry pride in my name. I suppose really it isn’t MY name, but it is my family name. It’s Muñoz and it means: “on a hill”; my first name [Elaina (I just rocked some of your worlds)] means: “light”

((My name means: “light on a hill”, freak yeah!))

Way to go mom and dad!

After I finalized my divorce, changing my name back was a huge deal for me. I couldn’t wait to be apart of my father’s family again. It wasn’t as if I no longer belonged when my name was different but there is something about a legal, outward label that means I am apart of something bigger than me. I wanted to be re-associated with my father and my father’s family. I wanted to belong to the family that I grew up with. Changing my name back on Facebook sent me into a small gut-dropping panic because some people didn’t even know that my ex and I had even had our first fight (I lied a lot to a lot of people between my 21st birthday and my 22nd. I was asked, “how’s married life?” enough to make my head spin) so I waited until I left for a three week holiday to Ireland to visit my best friend. It was a birthday/vacation gift to myself.

“For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will – to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.” Ephesians 1:4-5

 It’s almost as if we have this duel citizenship with our earthly families and the Kingdom family. He CHOSE us from the beginning of the world before I had a chance to screw up royally, and even knowing all the things I was going to do, HE adopted me. He looked at me and decided that I was allowed to have His name. Not only was I allowed – but also He fought for me to have His name. A name that is higher than anything and everything, that means more than “light on a hill” (Don’t get me wrong, my parents did awesome and my name is sick as). I was given a name by my heavenly Father that has power over the grave AND all of my sins. I have been given a name that looks past my talents and blessings as well as my shortcomings. He not only chose us, but it was all in accordance to His pleasure and will… what?!

He wanted to.

The name of Jesus means: Savior. It means defender, it means deliverer, it means guardian, it means hero, it means liberator, it means rescuer, and it means that I NEEDED HIM. What is in my name is a belonging to the King of Kings and the one who is over all things. My name means that I have an inheritance of eternity and authority at my right hand.

The thing is, that I actually didn’t have to go back and change my name to Muñoz again. I could have left it the way it was so that I didn’t have to go through with the process of sitting at the social security office, the DMV, all of anywhere that I had a bill to be paid, anything social media – but I CHOSE to. I had to choose to take up my name again and allow myself to realize that I belonged.

Jesus is a gentlemen. I’ve always believed that because I’ve always found it to be true in my life. He isn’t barging in and taking my heart captive by force. He is waiting to be sought out and waiting for the permission to make you apart of His family. I don’t know too much that there is to know about adoption but I know that once the child is old enough to understand, they can say no to the adoption. Once we come to an age of understanding we have the ability (and many do) say no to the name of Christ Jesus… and what a painful decision that is.

I choose today to take pride in my name that was given to me at the highest cost. 

“See what kind of love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God; and so we are. The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him.” 1 John 3:1

That we would be called Your own. G-d, I’m not worthy of it but I will accept it. I’m not the best representation but I have a Bible full of ‘less thans’ who have made a way for me to believe. If you can use anything Lord, You can use me.