Rachel Wilson

It was a dispiriting sight. As I surveyed the room I realised that not only were we three years older, several thousand pounds poorer and a few pounds heavier, we were all very jaded. Our university lecturer, an expert in his field, was bringing our final module to a close with the words…

‘In conclusion, we should all take heart because all our efforts …well, they probably don’t do any harm.’

He certainly didn’t look sure of himself and I didn’t take heart.

I’d chosen to do a degree in International Relations and Development with the hope of being equipped to serve God in my chosen field. Specifically, I wanted to help tackle some of the horrific injustices that are daily committed against the poor: global atrocities like human trafficking, enslavement and abuse. I felt somewhat equipped with knowledge and strategies, but in this lecture it was like any hope of genuine success had been surgically removed.

The development sector, like every other, has lost confidence that there are any abstract rights and wrongs, any objective and universal truths about who and what a person is and what counts as a transgression against them. Real advances in tackling injustice and violence against the poor require authority. Without authority, hope wanes.

‘The battle for justice in the world is not fought where we think it is. The struggle against injustice is not fought on the battlefield of power or truth or even righteousness. There are pitched battles waged on these ramparts, but the war is ultimately won or lost on a more forward front. In the end the battle against oppression stands or falls on the battlefield of hope.’ (Gary Haugen, Good News About Injustice)

As Christians, whether tackling injustice on a global or local front, from a secular or church-based platform, our level of hope will be directly mirrored in our level of love for the vulnerable, our willingness to engage in their cause, our determination to stand for what is right and our longevity of service in doing so.

Below are three reasons, among many more, why we must readdress this issue of hope and refuse to settle for anything less than a hope-filled, joyful approach to justice.

1) Because our commission is compelling

In Isaiah 1:17, God commands us to ‘seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow’. He does this with no sense of naivety or ignorance about the tonnage of power wielded by the strong against the weak, or the scale that oppression will take.

Acts of violent oppression against the poor are not new. Psalm 10 makes it clear that advances against the poor have been carefully strategized and executed since biblical times. Not only this, but the same considerations apply for the oppressor: a weighing up, and a conclusion that he will not be called to account (10:6). Thus, for him, the benefits outweigh the costs. Similar considerations must today be in the minds of some of the individuals behind human trafficking – now the third most profitable criminal industry, after arms and drug trafficking.

The Psalmist is confident that God sees these acts, hears the cries of the victims and is able and willing to break the arm of the wicked and evil man, calling him to account. As the pattern of scripture shows again and again His primary (although not ultimate) way of doing this is through His people.

2) Because our commission is achievable

In every generation God has raised up individuals and groups to meet tides of injustice head on. Behind these individuals are faithful givers, pray-ers and supporters.

In the summer of 2006 I had the privilege of working with one such group. Let me share the story of Elizabeth, a trafficked victim rescued with the help of International Justice Mission (IJM), and explain her journey between Psalm 27 and Psalm 34.

Elizabeth was seventeen when she was tricked into travelling across the border. Expecting to find legitimate work at her destination she instead found herself held captive inside one of Asia’s many brothels. Elizabeth clung to her one source of comfort, her Bible, and, when not forced to be with customers, sat in her room, number 5, and prayed for rescue. In the midst of extreme suffering Elizabeth wrote many verses on her wall, the most prominent being Psalm 27:1-3, and the words sum up the resolve of many of God’s image bearers around the world today:

The Lord is my light and my salvation –
whom shall I fear?
The Lord is the stronghold of my life –
of whom shall I be afraid?
When evil men advance against me
to devour my flesh,
When my enemies and my foes attack me,
they will stumble and fall.
Though an army besiege me,
my heart will not fear;
Though war break out against me,
even then I will be confident.

It was around this time that Elizabeth began to form a friendship with a supposed customer, Eugene. Eugene was an undercover investigator for IJM, an international human rights organisation built on the certainty that God is both just and able to use his people to bring rescue and relief. Once a portfolio of evidence had been collated, complete with undercover footage from inside the brothel, investigators worked with local police to secure a raid date. Elizabeth, as well as 28 girls and young women, seven of them minors, were set free that night.

IJM staff describe being with Elizabeth as being in the presence of greatness. Her story has encouraged countless supporters and on a recent visit to see Elizabeth, Sharon Cohn-Wu (Senior Vice President at IJM) asked her if she would mind reading the Psalm aloud. ‘No’ she said, ‘that Psalm was for when I was in the brothel, but God rescued me. I will read you Psalm 34:

I sought the Lord, and he answered me;
he delivered me from all my fears.
Those who look to him are radiant;
their faces are never covered with shame.
This poor man called, and the Lord heard him;
he saved him out of all of his troubles.
The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him,
and he delivers them.’

During my three months at IJM one of the things that struck me as most strange was the amount of laughter in the office, and the deep sense of hope that seemed engrained in the fabric of the organisation.

Whilst I was there, two of the investigators returned from short-term undercover work. They showed me video footage of little girls in a dark brothel being lined up for the picking. The investigator beamed, ‘they’re out now.’ I was obviously so pleased but was also curious as to how stayed so positive, knowing that there were hundreds more brothels in that city. ‘We saw six pimps arrested on one trip; think how many children, over how many years that represents. And soon we’ll go back and we’ll do it all again.’

Psalm 10 ends with the words ‘so that man, who is of the earth, may terrify no more’. The investigators and staff I worked with that summer were convinced that man’s existence, power and ability to do evil is framed and limited. We serve a God whose existence, power and ability to do good is without boundaries, unframed and all-surpassing.

The work of justice is achievable.

3) Because success is guaranteed

Nothing secures hope more than knowing the way the story ends. At present, our job is to rewind the final picture, bringing the future total establishment of the kingdom into the present. But our resolve, and our levels of hope, are grounded in the fact that Jesus is going to return, ultimately, and bring justice to the earth.

At the beginning of the film Ocean’s Eleven, a casino mogul describes the previous attempts to rob casinos in Las Vegas. In only one of the attempted robberies did the man even make it past the front door. The camera focuses in on this guy, carrying bundles of cash and elated that he’s escaped the scene of the crime uncaught. If we were to press pause and stop the movie there, it could look as if the robbers, the murderers, the oppressors and the traffickers get away with it.

But before he has even left the car park, as anyone who has seen Ocean’s Eleven (or attempted to rob a casino!) knows, he is immediately gunned down by casino security, and dies in a heap on the floor. If we stop the story in the wrong place, it can look like injustice triumphs. But when we wind the tape forward to the end, it becomes obvious that no injustice is allowed to go unrighted. When we fix our eyes on the certainty of an ever-increasing kingdom of justice and peace, one in which wrongs are righted, death destroyed and pain undone, it grounds our fight for justice in a victory that is finally certain. It means our success is guaranteed.

We have a difficult, but compelling and thoroughly achievable, commission. The guarantee of Christ’s kingdom is that it will be filled with ever-increasing peace and justice. And one day, He will return to right all wrongs and undo all injustice. This gives us hope – the sort of hope that gives powerful foundations for pursuing justice on the earth, so that man may terrify no more.

(For more information on the work of IJM in the UK please visit www.ijmuk.org, and for their work in the USA visit www.ijm.org)