By: Jer
As I am in the beginning phases of this journey, I wish I could report that I had another fantastic week of reflection and prayer. Unfortunately, I can’t. Sure, I have been busy, but there were definitely moments when I chose to watch sports, read a book, or just do random things, when I could have been praying. Now, this isn’t about feeling guilty, but for me, it speaks to a greater theme of living without urgency. Nothing necessarily bad would happen to me if I didn’t pray about social justice or the needs of our community. So, why not just put it off until tomorrow?
It’s similar to the idea of how we might only pray when we feel like we need God because something bad is happening. There doesn’t seem to be as much urgency to pray when things are going well. For me, this is one of the ways that living with privilege influences me. Whether it’s being financially stable, coming from a stable family, owning a house, having the flexibility of working part-time; all of these privileges have given me a sense of comfort and a huge margin of safety. I’m not at the brink of disaster. When I consider why I don’t have a sense of urgency, it’s often directly related to being privileged. I’m not directly being marginalized. I’m not suffering right now. My life isn’t dependent on every single action I take because if I get it wrong, it’ll be ok.
Even as I am writing this, I’m fully aware of how this sounds. It’s easy to settle and stay comfortable, to think oppression and marginalization doesn’t impact us. It’s easy to think it’s THEIR problem and not feel like there’s any urgency to pray. It’s easy to see this world as us and them because then I do not have any responsibility for them and they do not have any responsibility for me. But if God has called us into relationship with this world, then we need to pray with urgency. If anything, this journey is revealing about how far I have to go in surrendering who I am and where I come from to be led by the One who gave up everything to be with us.
“In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing …” Phil 2:5-7