The Wounds of the World

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The question now confronting us is this. What does the ministry of reconciliation look like? What goals should we set?

When we study human conflict we see that Satan's method of getting one group to abuse another is rooted in the hard-headed collision of the self-righteous people within each group. Take some truth, polarize the people with different sides of that truth, tempt them to unrighteous judgment, and then watch them wound each other with rejection, harsh words and injustice.....and so it goes on. This has led to a need for reconciliation ministry in at least 14 general categories of deep rooted systemic alienation between peoples and elements of society. Here is a list compiled at a recent conference attended by delegates from over 40 nations:

Note: The hurts of our gender and generation run through all the above and must be addressed as part of this overlapping matrix.

How do we respond to the wounds of the world? The answer lies in the humility of Jesus expressed through His body the church. We love the promise of 2 Chronicles 7:14 "then I will heal their land" but what of the call to "humble ourselves" what does that mean? Why would the humility of a remnant bring healing to the whole land?

Here's why. Individuals can hurt each other through selfish and unjust behavior, but it is also possible for a wound to be sustained by a nation or a people group within a nation. Animosity and bitterness sometimes festers unresolved for generations. The Native Americans, for example, the host people of the U.S. A., have at times been severely wounded by government, the church and society. The book of Ezekiel teaches us that God is looking for intercessors to repair the breaches and stand in the gap. Ezekiel 22:30. Israeli's prophets were once condemned for not doing this "Oh Israel, your prophets have been like foxes among ruins. You have not gone up into the breaches, nor did you build the wall around the house of the Lord to stand in battle in the day of the Lord."

If we have broken our covenants with God and violated our relationships with one another; the path to reconciliation must begin with individual acts of confession. Paradoxically, the greatest wounds in human history, the greatest injustices have not happened through the acts of individual perpetrators, rather through the institutions, systems, philosophies, cultures, religions and governments of human kind. Because of this, we, as individuals, are tempted to absolve ourselves of all individual responsibility rather than take up the priestly ministry that is the calling of the church.

Unless somebody chooses to identify themselves with cooperate entities, such as the nation of our citizenship, or the subcultures of our ancestors, the act of honest confession will never take place. This leaves us in a world of injury and offense in which no corporate sin is ever acknowledged, reconciliation never begins and old hatreds just deepen. I believe that the followers of Jesus are to step into this impasse as agents of healing. Within our ranks are representative of every category of humanity. Trembling in our heavenly Father's presence we see clearly the sins of humankind and have no inclination to cover them up. Thus we are called to live out the biblical practice of Identificational *repentance, a neglected truth that opens the floodgates of revival and brings healing to the nations.

*Identification: As used in this sense, signifies the act of consciously including oneself within an identifiable category of human beings.

The Judeo-Christian ethos present in many national cultures gives us some basis for hope but I believe that reconciliation ministries are primarily the responsibility of the living church because there is no substitute for the atonement for sin provided by Jesus. During the great seasons of revival, the Christian community has always placed considerable emphasis on open acknowledgment of sin and called for changed attitudes and just actions. Today's Christians have the potential to demonstrate a model of reconciliation in the troubled world of the 1990's and beyond.

We can sometimes begin this process by organizing events and ceremonies in which representatives of offended subcultures or representatives of offending subcultures have an opportunity to express regret and/or extend forgiveness. A good example of this is the "Memphis Miracle" of two years ago that ended 88 years of the racial segregation of the Pentecostal movements.

Of course when doing this, we recognize that the human story is filled with complex issues and that today's generation has inherited the task of both honoring righteous ancestors and seeking forgiveness for ancestral sins. Honesty dictates that we embrace both the guilt and the grandeur that has attached itself to our various identities. In this way the intercessors identity (male/female, black/white etc.) is one of the greatest tools that God has given us, not just an accidental result of family biology or heritage.

It is true that when we are redeemed we become part of the transcendent bride of Christ in which there is neither male nor female, Jew nor Greek but the bible also teaches us that we become even more responsible for dealing with the implications of our identity when new life is born in us. We are in no way guilty for the sins of our ancestors or any other group, each person stands before God alone, but God is looking for volunteers who will open themselves to Godly sorrow and confess the sins of the land. This is where reconciliation begins.

It should be our hope that our children will not have to deal with the hatred and alienation that has marked the experience of this and past generations because of Satanic strongholds rooted in the past. We should be inclined to uncover the ancient and modern wounds of injustice, pride and prejudice and to heal them in a biblical way that is to say without self-righteous accusation or dishonest cover-up.


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