Passing of Ron Sider
Keeping Good News and Good Works Together
I was saddened to hear of the passing of Ron Sider (1939-2022). Sider, an evangelical Anabaptist, has long reminded Anabaptists and evangelicals of their shared commitments. At times he was a provocateur, but his life was always marked by a pastoral and loving concern for the witness of Christians to the systemic problems of our world.
Below is an excerpt from a chapter he contributed to Fully Engaged: Missional Church in an Anabaptist Voice (2015) with Heidi Rolland Unruh entitled “Keeping Good News and Good Works Together.” (You can find the full article here.) Sider listed five principles for keeping word and deed, evangelism and justice, together. I think these are five ways for Christians of either conservative or progressive stripes to remember.
Love. Both evangelism and social action should be motivated and guided by love, which always seeks what is best for the other person, even at a cost. We do not engage in evangelism or social action to enlarge our own, or our congregation’s, “empires” (Mark 12:29–31; 1 Cor 13:1–3; John 3:16–18).
Holism. We minister to whole persons, recognizing that people are more than just souls or bodies. People need both spiritual salvation and tangible acts of mercy and justice. We also are all called to repent of both personal sins and participation in systemic evils (Ps 107:5–9; Matt 9:35; 3 John 1:2).
Relationships. Making the good news real requires incarnational involvement. Both good news and good works are most effective, and have the most integrity, in the context of authentic, bridge-building relationships that reflect the reconciling work of Jesus Christ (2 Cor 5:18; Col 1:15–22; Eph 2:13–19).
Respect. We affirm the dignity and worth of each individual regardless of religious or economic status, grounded in the imago Dei (image of God). This includes respecting each person’s God-given right to religious freedom, so our ministry methods are never coercive or manipulative (Gen 1:27; Prov 14:31; James 2:1–5).
Special concern for those who are poor and marginalized. In both evangelism and social action, we can emulate God’s attentive care for those who are poor and vulnerable throughout Scripture, and Jesus’ intentional ministry of reaching out to those on the margins of society (Deut 15:4–11; Luke 4:18-19; 7:18–22; 1 Cor 1:26).
As the political rhetoric over midterm elections heats up, as worldly divisions creep into the church, and as Christian seek to find ways for their faithful convictions to make a difference in the everyday, these are five guiding principles worth considering.
Is my posture to the world marked by love, does it see the world holistically, are healthy relationships built from it, do people feel respected even if I disagree with them, and do the poor and marginalized around me benefit from it?
