Über die Autorinnen und Autoren

Chap Clark, PhD (Univ. of Denver), has more than 25 years of experience in youth and family ministry. He is Associate Provost for Regional Campuses and Special Projects and Professor of Youth, Family, and Culture at Fuller Theological Seminary. Chap’s extensive books, articles, and videos focus primarily on relationships. Among his many books are Hurt and Hurt 2.0; Disconnected: Parenting Teens in a MySpace World (coauthored with his wife, Dee); and Deep Justice in a Broken World. Chap and Dee live in Gig Harbor, Washington.

Dr. Kara E. Powell is an educator, professor, youth minister, author, and speaker. She is the Executive director of the Fuller Youth Institute and a faculty member at Fuller Theological Seminary (see www.fulleryouthinstitute.org). Kara also serves as an Advisor to Youth Specialties and currently volunteers in student ministries at Lake Avenue church in Pasadena, CA.  She is the author of many books including Sticky Faith: Everyday Ideas to Build Lasting Faith in Your Kids (with Chap Clark) and Deep Justice Journeys. Kara lives in Pasadena with her husband, Dave, and their children, Nathan, Krista, and Jessica.

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It doesn't take a long list of statistics to convince you that our world is broken. Mission trips, service projects, and supporting children through relief organizations are just a few of the ways that many youth workers engage their students in serving the least, the last, and the lost. As good and helpful as these things may be on the surface, that's where they remain--at the surface. The problems run far deeper than an occasional paint job or fundraising project can solve. But it's not hopeless. Deep social justice is possible in your youth ministry.

Following their bestselling book, Deep Ministry in a Shallow World, Kara Powell and Chap Clark provide you with research and insights that will help your ministry get to the next level. In addition to helping you further understand the Deep Design method (introduced in their previous book), their practical Kingdom of God theology will help you go beyond simply trying to motivate your students to serve those in need, and invite your students (and maybe even your leaders) to wrestle with why those people are in need in the first place. You'll hear from well-known social justice leaders and youth workers who are making a difference in urban, suburban, and small town settings including:
• Jim Wallis (Sojourners)
• Tony Campolo (Eastern University)
• Lina Thompson (World Vision/Vision Youth)
• John Perkins (Christian Community Development Association)
• Shane Claiborne (The Simple Way)
• Larry Acosta (Urban Youth Workers Institute)
• Rudy Carrasco (Harambee Christian Family Center)
• Jeremy Del Rio (Community Solutions, Inc.)
• Noel Castellanos (Christian Community Development Association), and more

In addition to expanding your personal justice commitments, Deep Justice in a Broken World will help you reflect with your own leadership team, and will provide you with online resources to take you even deeper into the journey.

So go ahead, dig deeper into what it means to heal the broken world in which we live. Take your ministry deeper into social justice.

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Deep Justice in a Broken World

Zondervan

Contents

Section 1: Both/And Kingdom ThinkingChapter 1 What's Deep Justice and How Do I Know If I'm Doing It? Kara Powell..............................................8Chapter 2 What Steps Do I Need to Take to Right the Wrongs Around Me? Kara Powell.........................................24Chapter 3 How Can My Teaching Motivate Kids to Deeper Justice? Kara Powell................................................38Chapter 4 Which Jesus Takes Us to Deep Justice? Chap Clark................................................................64Chapter 5 Is the Gospel about Personal Salvation or Social Reform? Chap Clark.............................................82Chapter 6 How Do We Help Students Move from Doing Kingdom Things to Being Kingdom People? Kara Powell.....................98Section 2: Both/And Kingdom LivingChapter 7 When It Comes to Race, Why Can't We All Get Along? Noel Castellanos.............................................122Chapter 8 What Else Is There Besides Silence and Screaming as We Talk about Race? Noel Castellanos........................140Chapter 9 How Can Our Checkbooks Be Tools for Justice? Larry Acosta.......................................................160Chapter 10 How Can Our Youth Ministries Use Their Money So the Poor Gain Power? Larry Acosta..............................184Chapter 11 What's Just about the Rich Getting Richer and the Poor Getting Poorer? Jeremy Del Rio..........................202Chapter 12 Who Is My Neighbor? Jeremy Del Rio.............................................................................224Conclusion How Can We Work Together to Bring about Justice for All?........................................................242

Chapter One

Ice cream has the power to bring deep justice to our broken world.

Guess how much money you, I, the kids in our ministries, and every other American spend each year on mint chocolate chip, strawberry, jamoca almond fudge, rainbow sherbet, just plain vanilla, and all other ice cream flavors?

Go ahead. Take a guess.

$20 billion.

For those of you who like to see a lot of zeroes, that's $20,000,000,000.

Compare that $20 billion with other figures recently released by the United Nations. Providing clean water and basic sanitation for the entire world would cost $7 billion a year for the next ten years.

An additional $4 billion a year for the next ten years could finance basic health care that would prevent the deaths of 3 million infants each year.

So for $11 billion a year for the next decade, just over half of what Americans spend on ice cream, we could give the world clean water and basic sanitation and prevent the deaths of millions of babies. But since there is no Give-Up-Ice-Cream-for-World-Health movement, odds are good that we'll keep eating our mint chocolate chip and much of the world will lack water and health care.

Does that seem just to you?

On September 11, 2001, the terrorists who hijacked four U.S. planes claimed 2,792 lives. Our entire nation-and much of the world-was glued to radios, televisions, and the Internet, desperate to find out why and how so many had been killed.

Yet on that same day nearly three times as many people were killed by HIV/AIDS worldwide. And that same number of people died from HIV/AIDS on September 12, 2001. And on September 13. And that many people have died because of AIDS every day since then. Yet as AIDS rips apart children, families, villages, and entire nations, the world remains disengaged. Tragically, so do our churches and youth ministries.

Does that seem just to you?

Many of us slept on comfortable mattresses last night, and with a flick of a thermostat switch, we kept our homes at temperatures we considered ideal. Last night, approximately 600,000 homeless people sought shelter on U.S. streets. Making matters worse, an estimated 38 percent of those homeless persons were children.

Does that seem just to you?

Perhaps the most alarming statistic of all is that this injustice and poverty is happening in a world in which 2.1 billion of us, or 33 percent of the world's total population, claim to be followers of Christ, who taught in Matthew 25:40 that whatever we do for the "least of these brothers and sisters," we are actually doing for him.

Does that seem just to you?

It doesn't seem just to us either.

A growing number of youth ministries are alarmed by the brokenness of our world and are determined to restore justice.

Maybe you lead one of them.

Some of you are partnering with faith communities of different ethnic and economic backgrounds to create job centers, food co-ops, and college scholarship funds to counter the injustice in your town. Others of you are mobilizing kids and families to mentor under-resourced kids at your local school as well as serve as advocates at your school district for increased funding. Still others are raising up groups of kids who care about the AIDS pandemic-in the United States, in Africa, and in Asia (which is now being called the "new Africa" of AIDS).

The good news is that our hearts are in the right place. The bad news is that many of us are novices who might be doing more harm than good.

This book is for youth workers-rookies and veterans-who don't want to waste another minute doing mediocre service.

It's for youth workers of all colors and classes who hunger to learn from one another, as well as from the people who are most in need of justice.

It's for youth workers-urban, suburban, small-town, and rural-who want to see and be a part of God's deep justice.

WHAT IS DEEP JUSTICE, ANYWAY?

One of the authors of this book, Jeremy Del Rio, wanted to tell his five-year-old son why he was spending so much time on the phone and at his computer, working on his chapters. So Jeremy described social justice to Judah in two very simple words: righting wrongs.

I don't think I've ever heard a better definition.

Deep justice is about righting wrongs.

Righting wrongs is only possible when we understand the difference between service and social justice. Service is vital to the life of faith, a high calling modeled for us consistently by Jesus. But his call to love is also a call to look for more lasting solutions.

God's doesn't extend his call only to the church in the U.S. or the West. In fact, we would all be wise to remember God is already at work in those who have needs. We don't have to muster up our own solutions and "go get 'em" in the name of justice. Often the keys to overcoming poverty and oppression lie within those communities that are the most broken and brokenhearted. Our primary role as youth ministries is simply to come alongside those who are struggling and remove the obstacles that hinder those solutions.

Enter deep justice.

THE PARABLE OF THE CRACKED ROADS

Once upon a time, three youth ministries decided to address an unusual-and dire-problem permeating their city. Somehow, their streets and sidewalks had fallen prey to alarming cracks that crisscrossed the entire town. These cracks were two-to-four inches wide and several feet long, making the roads dangerous and virtually undriveable. No one knew the exact cause of the cracks, yet residents felt trapped in their homes and ventured to work, school, and church only when necessary.

In an effort to fix the town's problem, the first youth ministry surveyed the damage and came up with a Quick-And-Easy-Physical-Solution. Their plan was to use a thin layer of topcoat to cover the cracks and render the roads driveable and the sidewalks walkable. Residents stood and watched as the adult leaders and kids poured out of their minivans, mixed up the topcoat, and spread it across the cracks like a layer of chocolate icing on a cake. Pleased with the quick repair, the townfolk hugged the kids and cheered as the youth ministry drove off in minivans.

The topcoat worked.

For a few weeks.

But the weight of the cars, the heat of the sun, and the pounding of the rain soon eroded the topcoat. The cracks reappeared, and residents retreated again to their homes. Some thought the cracks were not as severe as they'd been before the topcoat, but no one could be sure.

The second youth ministry, upon examining the town's broken roads, adopted a different strategy. Recognizing that there was a lot they didn't know, the youth figured they'd better learn more about their town's needs and neighbors before making things right. They divided up into teams, some interviewing the residents and others visiting home improvement stores to learn about the type of cement that would best address the problem.

The neighbors had ideas for road repairs that the youth ministry never would have thought of. As a result, the youth ministry was able to develop a Warm-and-Fuzzy-Relational-Solution in which the youth ministry and the neighbors worked side by side filling in the cracks with a customized cement.

The cement worked. For six whole months. But to the students' chagrin, a new series of cracks began to crisscross the roads. Their new friends told them that even though the Warm-and-Fuzzy-Relational-Solution had fixed the old cracks, an entirely new set of cracks had emerged, rendering the roads almost as hazardous.

The third youth ministry, having heard about the first two well-intentioned-but-failed strategies, knew that neither topcoat nor a brand-new cement would make things right. Like those in the second youth ministry, these students spent several days interviewing neighbors and hearing stories and dreams about crack-free driving as well as the pain and fear caused by the unsafe driving conditions. Wanting to avoid the mistakes of the first two youth ministries, the third youth ministry adopted a more radical repair strategy.

The students decided to divide into two teams. The first team was tasked with repairing the current cracks. Recognizing that the very foundation of the city's roads was not right, the team members worked with their new friends to jackhammer large sections of road, dig up the resulting rubble, re-level the foundations, and then lay a brand-new asphalt surface for the roads.

In order to prevent the cracks from reappearing, the second team investigated a few deeper and more complex questions. First, the youth looked into why the faulty roads had been built in the first place, and lobbied at city hall to change the construction code so defective roads would never be built again. Second, they asked their neighbors why they'd been unable to fix their own roads, and raised funds to provide the construction and cement-laying training their neighbors would need to keep the roads shipshape in the future.

This Deep-Systemic-Solution did the trick. Thanks to the new stable foundation and the neighbors' new training, the broken roads were fixed-for good.

WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN NOT-SO-DEEP SERVICE AND TRULY DEEP JUSTICE?

Have you ever noticed the pervasiveness of cracks throughout the streets and sidewalks of your own city or town? The heat of the sun, the wear and tear of cars, and the shifting soil all mean one thing: Pavement is going to crack.

The same is true of our social systems and our relationships. Due to sin, they crack. They break. As a result of this breakdown, our world experiences poverty, disease, oppression, racism, greed, and corruption.

Youth ministries doing only shallow service look at the world's brokenness, feel bad about it, and offer a few Band-Aids. They offer free turkeys to the homeless on Thanksgiving or send clothes to a child in Zambia at Christmas. The good news is that the turkey and clothes fix what's broken.

The bad news is that they fix brokenness for only a few hours.

Youth ministries engaged in deep justice take a different approach. Like their more shallow counterparts, they see the cracks, feel bad about them, and send turkeys and T-shirts. Yet they couple their service with deeper questions like, How did these wrongs come to exist in the first place? How can we help the poor and marginalized fix their own problems? What does God want us to do that will make a difference beyond today?

It's not that it's bad to give out turkeys and T-shirts. It's just that we'll never right the deep wrongs underlying class divisions, racism, and oppression in our world if that's all we do.

THREE LAYERS OF DEPTH

Just like the first youth ministry facing the cracked roads, when we encounter something that's broken in our world, our first response is usually to respond with some sort of physical, tangible help. We send money, we distribute sandwiches, or we paint buildings.

Recognizing that the money runs out, the sandwiches are eaten quickly, and the paint eventually fades, some youth ministries go a step deeper and offer a relational response. Like the second youth ministry fixing the cracked roads, they take the time to get to know those they are serving, try to learn from them, and even continue the friendship-in person or long distance-for months and years to come.

As we develop deep relationships with others, and as we see victims of injustice not en masse but as individuals with real names, faces, and stories, we will realize there is an even deeper level of response: a systemic response. But few youth ministries are willing to do whatever it takes-for however long it takes-until the systems that perpetuate the brokenness are fixed.

THE TOP OR THE BOTTOM OF THE CLIFF

Imagine one of your students runs into your youth room, shouting that some people who were walking in the hills near your church have fallen down a cliff and need help. You, your adult leaders, and all of your students drop whatever you're doing and race to help those who have fallen from the cliff. You call 911 and provide basic first aid until the paramedics arrive.

The next week, a different student races into your youth room, shouting that the same thing has happened. Again you all drop whatever you're doing and run to help the bruised and battered bodies lying at the bottom of the cliff.

It happens again the next week.

And the next week.

And the next.

Finally, you realize that while your first-aid efforts are helpful, maybe it's time for you to do more than race to the bottom of the cliff and bind up wounds. Maybe it's time for you to shift from a Level 1 or Level 2 response into the more rigorous, but longer-term, help of Level 3.

Maybe it's time for you to camp out at the top of the cliff and stop people from falling in-or maybe being kicked in-to begin with.

NOT-SO-DEEP SERVICE VS. TRULY DEEP JUSTICE

Throughout this book we'll be exploring ways we can move beyond shallow service so we can seek deeper justice for a broken world. But the table below provides a brief comparison.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

DEEP JUSTICE ASKS WHY

As the last row in the table above indicates, deep justice is not afraid to ask why the world is broken, and then take steps to fix it.

Why invites us to truly listen to and get to know the voiceless in our world.

Why requires a long-term perspective because poverty and powerlessness cannot be eliminated in weekend bursts of activism.

Why invites us to interact with social systems-because we cannot truly help individuals until we also change the systems that rob dignity.

Why forces us to face the truth about our own participation in the systems and structures that rob the poor of opportunities.

One word of warning: Why is not a popular question. Others may question you and your motives when you ask why. Bishop Oscar Romero, the martyred leader of the Nicaraguan church, once commented, "When I feed the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor are poor, they call me a communist." Deep justice means not only asking why, but being prepared to do something about the answer.

DEEP JUSTICE IS MORE THAN A PROJECT

It's so tempting to try to distill deep justice into a "project," or maybe even two or three "projects" that we "go and do" with our kids. That's a little bit like saying a marriage basically boils down to a few overnighters and a handful of dinner dates each year. But justice, like marriage, is a daily commitment to be empowered by God's grace to love and serve others every day.

Like a fancy Valentine's Day dinner or an anniversary weekend, justice "projects" may play a part-perhaps even a significant part-in our justice journey. But the real reflection of our commitment to justice isn't whether we raise enough money to take kids on a weeklong spring break trip to serve in a Guatemalan orphanage; it's whether we are willing to view those we serve as "partners" instead of "projects" the other 51 weeks of the year.

DEEP JUSTICE IN REAL-LIFE KIDS

You may be wondering if 13- and 17-year-olds are capable of deep justice. We know they are. We've seen it with our own eyes.

When Kristin was a sophomore in our church's youth ministry, Sarah, her small group leader, started sending out monthly e-mail newsletters to Kristin and the other girls in her group. At the end of every newsletter, Sarah reminded the girls of our spring break trip to inner-city San Francisco, encouraging them to go.

When it came time to sign up for the trip, Kristin was the only one from her small group who signed up. She didn't know anyone else going on the trip, and she almost chickened out. But Sarah kept prodding her to go, and Kristin packed her bags and headed to San Francisco with the rest of the team.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Deep Justice in a Broken Worldby Chap Clark Kara E. Powell Copyright © 2007 by Chap Clark and Kara E. Powell. Excerpted by permission.
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