Screen time is a tightly restricted and highly valued commodity in our house. Weekend chores are completed in an eager flurry for the reward of ‘Minecraft’. The thought of missing out on your allocation is abhorrent.
But then there’s self-isolation, the kind of isolation where you’re the solo child at home and your parent’s busy on a laptop, and you’re fed up with books and lego, so in a bid to keep you entertained you are fobbed off with being allowed EXTRA SCREEN TIME. Joy of joys!
Until the brothers get home, and they are sniffing around, wanting to establish did the lucky isolating boy go on ‘Minecraft’ even though it’s a week day? Did he watch any TV? How long for, exactly?
Hell hath no fury like a boy who hath missed out on a minute of screen time which his brother has enjoyed. It doesn’t seem to matter that, “The rules are different when you’re off school ‘poorly’!” (nb they are really not poorly!) or that “It all balances out, because you watched TV that day you were off school.” No, it is hard to let go of that outraged sense of injustice and indignation that comes from knowing someone else has had an unequally large slice of the thing that you value.
On Sunday, I got to hear a wonderful sermon on Isaiah 58, “Standing for justice.” In the passage we looked at, the prophet berates people for their false religiousness and directs them to the attitude God really seeks:
“Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please and exploit all your workers. Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife, … Is that what you call a fast, a day acceptable to the Lord?
Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen: to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke? Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter— when you see the naked, to clothe them, and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?”
Our pastor helpfully made suggestions about how we might apply this, ways in which we might live out the kind of sacrifice God really desires: meeting the immediate needs of those suffering injustice, making sure our personal actions aren’t unjust, and working towards breaking societal chains of injustice. Most reassuringly, he suggested focusing on a couple of areas, as it’s unrealistic to be signing every petition, supporting every charity, etc. – it’s overwhelming. But the bit that stood out to me was when he spoke about how quick we can be to call out injustice when we are on the receiving end of it, but how willing we are to overlook injustice to others.
I recently went to a beautiful wedding of a relative, a lovely girl who is very committed to working against injustice (think: working for CARE, volunteering in Nepal, doing a masters in international development). Her diamond ring was conflict-free, her dress was from a social enterprise called ‘Brides Do Good.’ Me, I remember just being really annoyed that whenever you stuck the word ‘wedding’ as an adjective in front of anything (cake, photographer, flowers), it doubled the price. I don’t think our wedding was horribly unethical or anything (my dress came from Oxfam, but that’s more because I like a bargain than anything else) but I think the difference in our attitudes is telling.
Anyway, tonight, as the suspicious tirade came, “Has he been on tech? Really?” (today was actually a pretty good day in that regard, thanks to my lack of live online commitments), I was able to point them to the Isaiah passage. Are we focused on what we’re missing out on, or looking out for others to “loose the chains of injustice”? And, yes, beginning at home. Poor brother, stuck at home when he’d rather be at school, feeling bored and frustrated, how can we say encouraging things to cheer him up in his situation, rather than focusing on what we might have missed out on?
I do feel horribly overwhelmed when I begin to think about all the injustice in the world. When I read the news, I don’t really know where to begin praying, so I sometimes just ask for Jesus to come quickly to put things right. I do hope that this nudge on Sunday, and the very helpful object lesson played out in front of me around the table (what useful little mirrors children are!), might prompt me to have my eyes more open to see where there is injustice and where I might play my little part in alleviating it.
Comments