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This is a guest post from Steve Hamilton, a young Vineyard pastor in Maryland who is  active in mobilizing the church to help the victims of human trafficking.  Steve hosts his own blog, verse by verse.

The pathos [sorrow, suffering, pity are synonyms] of God is on the prophet. It moves him. It breaks out in him like a storm in the soul, overwhelming his inner life, his thoughts, feelings, wishes and hopes. It takes possession of his heart, giving him courage to act.”

- Abraham Joshua Heschel

You know how when you are in a conversation with someone and stumble upon some topic that they are really into, and they start getting all passionate and animated, and it makes you take a step back and say “Okay…tell me how you really feel about that…”; well, I believe for God, that issue is justice or what we might more precisely call biblical justice.  Biblical justice is the more precise term that I prefer, mostly because it reflects the range of justice issues that I see God clearly and deeply cares about, as witnessed in scripture and in my own experience.  The issues of biblical justice are social, economic and environmental.  They are also intertwined and interconnected.
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Thirty years ago, evangelicals started talking about “worldviews.”  I first remember hearing it from Francis Schaeffer. It began innocently enough–as an attempt on the part of evangelicals to become a little more thoughtful about the faith. But a hundred years of separating the head from the heart, as if there are two homes within which to house your faith–and we know which one is superior–had taken their toll. Soon “worldview” was reduced to another piece of the evangelical apologetic armor, a little pop anthropology to go with our pop psychology.   People sent their high school kids away for a month to learn about “the Christian worldview” and its nemesis “the secular humanist worldview.”
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Something’s happening in American Evangelicalism. We are waking up from a stupor. We are attempting to fear our founder more than we fear our movement’s group think.  Because He is asserting his proprietary rights over His brand–a brand which has been the subject of trademark infringement for too long.  We are standing up to be counted as  conscientious objectors to the evangelical culture war that has been distracting us from the evangelical mission.
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I stumbled into a concern for the environment.  It’s not something I sought out.  It was thrust upon me.  And my interest in this topic is fueled by my concern for the gospel, which has been getting a bad name of late.  For good reason.  Because we pastors have allowed the gospel to become polluted by political ideology. 
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As a young pastor many years ago, I couldn’t help but look around for pastors to be like.  Oh I know we can’t be like anyone but ourselves, but part of that process involves admiring certain others if for no other reason than to encourage the best in our ourselves.  Let me suggest someone for you to admire, young pastor: try Tri Robinson on for size.  Tri just did a post in the Huffington Post titled, Please Forgive Us.

Tri pastors the Vineyard Church in Boise Idaho.  Idaho is the most conservative state in the union.  It’s not blue, it’s not purple, it’s deep red.  And Tri by culture, temperament and conviction is a pretty conservative guy, theologically, and I’m guessing–though he doesn’t wear it on his sleeve–politically.  Yet he has the boldness, the conviction and the humility to do a guest column in the Huffington Post, that paragon of the liberal media, titled, Please Forgive Us.
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My friend Rich Cizik, a prominent leader of the National Association of Evangelicals resigned recently after the proverbial firestorm of protest.   He candidly answered some questions posed by Terry Gross on NPR’s “Fresh Air.“  Cizik revealed the following things about his personal views when asked: that civil unions in his view are OK, that it might be wise for the government to offer contraceptives to those who can’t afford them in order to reduce the number of babies who are aborted rather than born, and that he voted for a Democratic candidate (Barak Obama) in the Democratic primary in his state.
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Because we need to work together to solve problems that cannot be solved without our working together.  It’s a simple as that.  During the era of culture war (the 1980’s through the beginning of the new millenium), the basic structures of society were functioning.  We had a highway system, a phone system, an energy system, a political system, an economic system, that more or less worked for the majority of people.  We had the luxury of being sharply divided.  People could gain power by highlighting our divisions, rather than focusing on what we had in common.

Sadly, many religious people fell for this power grab, listening to voices of paranoia and fear. (Did anyone see the letter from James Dobson imagining 2012 if the hated liberals took over?  As paranoid as the anti-religion zealots who see faith as the root of all evil.)
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Man, do I feel optimistic lately.  Why?  Because of my kids.  They have a different take on the world, and it’s a take the world is due.  We baby boomers have taken things as far as we can with our current Oldsmobile. Our battles lines are firmly fixed, but from their perspective, wearing thin.  Now it’s time for us to listen to their take on the world as much as we’ve been yammering on about ours.  Then, having listened and learned, we’ll be able to see what we’ve been through in a new light and offer, not more information (they can get it faster than we can generate it)  but what they actually crave from us: wisdom, the one thing it takes time and experience and trial and error to gain.

The culture wars are boomer wars.  We inherited them from our fathers who lived in a binary world of good and evil neatly separated by geographic boundaries.  The evil empire was over there, far away from our fields of presumed good. I actually played cowboys and Indians assuming the cowboys were the good guys.  Pick up sides and duke it out; we boomers did it every day all summer long playing baseball in the streets.  May the best side win.  One side fits all.  Side in. Side out.  Are you on our side or the side of our enemies?  Neither, says this newer take on the world before us.  Maybe it’s time for us boomers to sit down, shut up,  and take off our shoes.
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So I need to explain something. I’ve been to the same place for vacation for the past 28 years. I know, boring as the post office. Which is exactly the way I like vacation. Maybe as a result, vacation clears space in my head. Maybe for God to speak. Several years ago, I’m guessing now but 1998 or 1999, I’m praying on vacation and a voice gets through saying, “Pay attention to what I’m doing among liberals.”
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My new grandson, Micah Timothy, that is. Born Saturday night, 18 minutes after arrival at the hospital. His dad, my son, had every father’s dream come true: driving the car with horn blasting and lights flashing because momma went from zero to fifty in the labor lane and caught everyone off guard. But now he’s here. The future, that is, with a name and a face. Outfitted, is he, for decades to come that many of us will not see. What are we doing to insure that the world he inherits isn’t too grim a place to inhabit? Not enough right now. Instead, many in my own wider faith tribe are acting as though this talk of looming distress is a load of boo-honkey. We’re betting against the facts, I humbly submit, wagering the likes of Micah’s future.
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