Judges 6:1-12

Impoverished people cry out for help! 

My experience on the Board of International Justice Mission burned images in my mind of impoverished men, women and children, igniting righteous indignation in us as Board members. Something, someone had to do something about the injustices committed against those being oppressed. And so, we worked to set people free and to correct the broken justice systems.

The people of Israel were suffering under the power of Midian. The story is told in the Bible in Judges chapters 6-9. For 7 years the Midianites invaded the land of Israel to ravage it, “And the Israelites cried out to the Lord for help!” (Judges 6:7)

There is a cry going up to God out of the mouths of God’s people in Canada. It is a cry of “What is wrong with our country?” Charles Colson, in his book The Good Life (Tyndale, 2005), writes of a culture where people of all age groups have stopped seeking truth because, “They have been told, from their preschool days on, that one person’s opinion is as good as another’s, that each person can pick his or her own truth from a multicultural smorgasbord.” Abdu Murray carries this same sentiment in his book, Saving Truth (Zondervan, 2018), written 13 years later. Murray says, “The creep of post-truth is seen in how we gather information about the world to conform to what we want to be true, not to what is actually true.” There is an impoverishment in our land brought on by the invasion of post-truth thinking.

God’s solution to impoverishment is to send a prophet and a mighty man/woman of valour (Judges 6:7 & 12). The prophet delivered the Lord God’s message to the people whereas the man of valour stepped into the battle. Both are necessary in order to destroy the outworking of the enemy of impoverishment in Canada today.

Destroying the enemy is about following the path less travelled! This path invites us to choose it if we, the people of the EMCC, want to address the outworking of impoverishment in our land. The pressing question is, “How will the EMCC respond to the voice of God?” Without doubt God hears the cry of impoverishment from His people. Without question He is prepared to respond. What is needed is a people prepared to say, “Yes God!”

Kervin Raugust
President, EMCC