Jesus, Compassion And JusticeSample

Remembering Peace

The drug dealers camped on cardboard outside my front door in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, doling out crack cocaine. They were my sworn enemies.

Further down the block, a well-dressed young Somali man watched over them at a distance, cell phone in hand. His name was Fasil. I was impressed by his manners. So slick, friendly and polite, while dealing death from the pocket of his $300 jeans. He was 23 years old.

I was torn by repulsion at their death-dealing. A fury rose up within me at the mascara - streaked faces of girls who had to do the unthinkable to get another hit of the poison they kept tucked away in the folds of their clothes. These young men were clearly in the enemy camp. They were literally killing my friends, one illicit hit at a time.

Jesus had been gently pleading with me about his love for these drug dealers. I told Jesus, “I don’t want to go there. I don’t want to love them. They hurt my friends. They profit from other people’s misery.”

But Jesus simply whispered, “Love your enemies. Do good to those who hate you.” (Luke 6:27)

One of the ways we enter the Upside-Down Kingdom of Jesus as children is to embrace peacemaking. Do you remember the divine name that the prophet Isaiah gave to the promised Messiah? Jesus is the Prince of Peace who teaches us not to carpet bomb our enemies, but to love them (Matthew 5:44).

Many folks who hear me speak about Jesus’ teachings on non-violence assume that I am talking about passivity. “Am I supposed to do nothing?” they ask – as if that’s the only alternative.

There is nothing passive about nonviolence and there is nothing “doormat-like” about loving our enemies. On the contrary, Jesus is calling you and I to bravery, creativity, compassion, conviction, cooperation, courage and inner strength.

So, along with some friends, we invited Fasil and the other dealers to join us for a picnic in our community garden one day. We hoped to get to know them better and earn the right to speak into their lives. But no-one showed up. In fact they were conspicuously absent from our block that whole day.

Then when the picnic was almost over, Fasil walked into the garden and bowing slightly, expressed his gratitude for the invitation but regretted that he had already eaten. We sparked up a friendship that day that led to opportunities to delve deeper into his life choices. He asked me if I had anything he could read and I lent him a simple introduction to Jesus.

Jesus subversively walked alongside and loved the exploitative tax collectors of his day, because Jesus is in the business of transformation. Transformation for the oppressed. But also transformation for the oppressor. And it always starts with love.

So, why have the non-violent teachings of Jesus in his great Sermon on the Mountainside been largely ignored, dismissed as impractical, or explained away by those who call themselves his followers?

As someone greater than I once said, it is not that Christianity has been tried and found wanting, the problem is, it has not been tried at all.