Season 19: Lent Week 4 | Opposing Violent Injustice: Bringing Light to the Darkest Places

This season we are focusing on justice as an aspect of spiritual formation and we believe Lent to be the perfect season to explore this connection. Using A Just Passion: A Six-Week Lenten Journey, and the lectionary, we will look at various aspects of justice, its importance to God and why the modern church has often regrettably failed to live out God’s call to “do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with the Lord.”

Ruth is joined by Gary Haugen on today’s episode. Gary Haugen has spent most of his career fighting injustice at the systemic level as a lawyer and founder of International Justice Mission. Ruth and Gary discuss the moment Gary realized he’d grown up his whole life in the church never once hearing a message about how much God cared about justice. They talk about the ways in which the poor are chronically vulnerable to violence, how the church often isn’t doing work that addresses this issue, and how, at IJM, attention to their own spiritual formation is crucial in sustaining their justice work.

Lectionary scripture for this week:
1 Samuel 16:1-13
Psalm 23
Ephesians 5:8-14
John 9:1-41


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Listen to other episodes from Season 19 Access past podcast seasons


Gary Alan HaugenGary Alan Haugen is an American attorney who is the Founder, CEO, and former President of International Justice Mission, a global organization that protects the poor from violence throughout the developing world. Gary has been recognized by the U.S. State Department as a Trafficking in Persons “Hero” – the highest honor given by the U.S. government for anti-slavery leadership.  He is the author of several books, including Good News About Injustice (Intervarsity Press) and, most recently, The Locust Effect: Why the End of Poverty Requires the End of Violence (Oxford University Press).


Journey with us this Lent! Our season is inspired by A Just Passion: A Six-Week Lenten Journey, and many of our guests are contributors to this resource.

Mentioned in this episode:
Just Courage by Gary Haugen
The Locust Effect by Gary Haugen

Music Credit:
Kingdom Come by Aaron Niequist
O Sacred Head, Now Wounded from Lent Music in Solitude

Support the podcast! This season, in addition to receiving overflow conversation from the episode, patrons at all levels will receive weekly reflection questions intended to help them journey through Lent with both the podcast and the resource A Just Passion! Become a patron today by visiting our Patreon page!


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We desire to see churches and Christian organizations become communities of authentic spiritual transformation – and that begins with transforming leaders. We seek to strengthen the souls of pastors and leaders, equipping them to guide their churches and organizations to become spiritually transforming communities that discern and do the will of God in their settings. Read more about the Transforming Center.

The purpose of the Beyond Words blog is to offer helpful and hopeful content and conversation that strengthens the souls of leaders and the congregations and communities they serve. All comments are monitored and the TC reserves the right to delete those that are not consistent with this goal and purpose. Access our comments policy.

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