So close.

Everyone, rejoice.  Not only is my last exam tomorrow, but with it will come the return of Christie, the faithful blogger.  I haven't had a whole lot of time to read (you should see my summer reading list!) lately, so I will have lots to share in the coming weeks as I dig into some writing that doesn't involve cranial nerve nuclei and the like.

I did, however, read Good News About Injustice recently and thought I would share the thought of Gary Haugen's that stood out the most to me.  Gary was the head of the U.N. investigation into the Rwandan genocide, and he is also a founder of the International Justice Mission that sends lawyers to fight cases of slavery, brutality, etc. in countries where the voices of the oppressed are not being heard.  He had this to say:

"If we really want to know God, we should know something about where he has been - and what it has been like for him to suffer with those who are hurting and abused...He knows that we can never comprehend the smallest fraction of the oppression and abuse that he has had to witness.  But we can know him better if we try to understand something about his character and experience as the God of compassion - the God who suffers with the victims of injustice.

If nothing else, it will help us understand why the God of justice hates injustice and wants it to stop.  If we had to see it and hear it every day like our God does, we would hate it too.  To understand where the God of compassion has been is to begin to understand God's passion for justice.  Justice, for our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, is not a good idea, a noble aspiration, a theoretical satisfaction or an impersonal principle - it is his beating heart.  He is "the man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering" who weeps with those who weep (Isaiah 53:3; John 11:33-35)."

His perspective is a really great one to grasp on to, because his life's work has been fighting injustices, and IJM is doing a great work, by putting the world to rights one case at a time.  It's good stuff.

Speaking of good stuff, I've mentioned it before, but I'm really digging Brett Dennen these days. You should check him out.  

This was really a way to procrastinate, so I must get back to work...but my next post will be of my time in Nashville with my friend Blair! Yay!!!