









































Ecclesial Futures
2024 – Volume 5 – Issue 1

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Ecclesial Futures – DOI: 10.54195/ef18685

A R T I C L E

DOI: 10.54195/ef18685

Sharing in the indiscriminate generosity 
of God: Exploring missional engagement of 
racial justice funded by the economy of God

Natalie Magnusson

Abstract
This article further probes three of the findings of the author’s DMin project thesis, 
which explored God’s call of racial justice in a predominantly white, affluent Epis-
copal church. The research revealed theological and missional challenges that inhibit 
the church from joining in God’s mission of justice, namely participants viewing the 
church as the host of missional engagement, white privilege hindering the practice of 
listening and the reluctance of members to articulate the presence and activity of God 
as it relates to justice. In consideration of these obstacles, this article recommends the 
indiscriminate generosity of God for funding the imagination of the missional commu-
nity for faithful innovation related to racial justice.

Keywords: Racial justice, Economy of God, Missional engagement, Luke 14, Practice of 
listening, Eucharist

Introduction
During the summer of 2022, I implemented a Doctor of Ministry research project 
at St Paul’s Episcopal Church in Jackson, Michigan seeking to discern God’s call of 
racial justice in our local community (Magnusson 2023).1 Being a socially progressive 
congregation, I anticipated little resistance from members and, instead, a readiness 
for joining in God’s work of justice in our local community. While few participants 

1 I participated as an active layperson at St Paul’s for seven years preceding the research project. The 
Institutional Review Board of Lipscomb University approved the project prior to its commencement. 
The rector of the church and all participants provided informed consent permitting the church to be 
named and forbidding all individual participants to be named or identified in the project. 



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Ecclesial Futures – DOI: 10.54195/ef18685

opposed the central aim of the project, data reveals theological and missional chal-
lenges that inhibit the church from joining in God’s mission of justice, namely partic-
ipants viewing the church as the host of missional engagement, white privilege 
hindering the practice of listening, and the reluctance of members to articulate the 
presence and activity of God as it relates to justice. This article briefly summarizes 
three of the eight findings of the project and posits the economy of God as an appro-
priate theological framework for deepening missional engagement.

Context and Rationale for the Research Project
St Paul’s is a predominantly white, affluent church located in a predominantly Black, 
low-income neighbourhood of downtown Jackson, MI. In recent decades, the denom-
ination of the Episcopal Church has made intentional efforts to confess and repent 
of long-standing complicity in systemic racism (General Convention 1989: 329–30; 
Spellers 2021). Over the past several years, many members of St Paul’s have learned 
from books and films about racial justice, and the topic has surfaced frequently in 
sermons, prayers, Bible studies and fellowship groups. Unlike some predominantly 
white churches in the US who deny the presence of ongoing systemic racism, St Paul’s 
began the project with a degree of awareness and consensus related to the reality of 
racial injustice and the Episcopal Church’s historical participation.
The project pursued the following research question: How might a congregation of 
the most historically powerful, prominent and affluent church in the US imagine its 
life in the Jackson community in light of Luke 14 and encounters with people who 
experience racial injustice (Spellers 2021: 53)? I was motivated by the disconnect 
between discernible congregational interest in supporting racial justice and our 
insufficient practice of it. The Black community of Jackson is not experiencing equi-
table and just conditions as the result of the church’s proclaimed support of racial 
justice. I found Jemar Tisby’s invitation appropriate for St Paul’s at the time: “[Y]ou 
cannot read your way, listen your way, or watch your way into skillful advocacy. At 
some point you must act” (2019: 214).
I suspected that a contributing factor to our paralysis is that we conceive of racism 
primarily in terms of racial identity and often overlook the exploitative realities of 
racial capitalism, a distinction Jonathan Tran makes in Asian Americans and the Spirit 
of Racial Capitalism. To get at this, Tran believes that asking the questions “What does 
racism accomplish?” “Whom does it benefit?” and “How does it work?” can get us 
closer to the exploitative and commodifying roots of racial capitalism (2021: 294). 
As an affluent congregation, we appear to have more comfort in taking the “love 
our neighbours” or “welcome everyone” approach of antiracism, which falls more 
within the scope of Tran’s identarianism, than we are willing to name our ongoing 
complicity in and benefit from racial capitalism. Tran’s work pulls back the curtain on 
the power of mammon in our lives: “Those Americans worried that justice will take 



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away their advantages like nothing more than to talk about identity. They love diver-
sity, inclusion, representation, multiculturalism, and the like because it leaves their 
stuff – what Jesus in Luke 12 called ‘barns and bigger barns’ – untouched” (2021: 295). 
Therefore, I wondered if our attachment to material comforts is an untapped area of 
the conversation and desired to invite us to confront the greed of our white privilege.

Method of Research
As a way of stimulating these discoveries, the project revolved around two prac-
tices of listening: Dwelling in the Word in Luke 14 for seven weeks interlaced with 
three occasions called Listening Opportunities as a way of attending to perspectives 
other than our own. I invited all members of the congregation to participate in both 
listening practices and complete surveys after each of the Listening Opportunities. 
Additionally, I selected seven participants to attend a minimum of four Dwelling in the 
Word practices and two Listening Opportunities.2 At the end of the study, I divided 
the seven participants into two focus interview groups and asked the same set of 
questions to each group. In reflection on both practices of listening, I invited partic-
ipants to share regarding their most dominant feelings, moments of surprise, expe-
riences of discomfort and grief, awareness of God’s presence, reoccurring themes 
from Luke 14, learnings from the practice of listening, God’s calling related to racial 
justice, and lingering questions.
Dwelling in the Word is an extended communal practice of listening to God through 
both scripture and one another. The practice followed the same steps each week: 
listen to all or a portion of Luke 14 while noticing the word or phrase that catches 
one’s attention; practise a minute of silence, “find a reasonably friendly looking 
stranger and listen them into free speech” (Keifert 2006, 163); gather again in the 
large group to share what each person heard their partner say, communally observe 
the week’s themes, and conclude in gratitude for God’s Word and the Holy Spirit that 
continues to speak through both scripture and the community. I gathered data from 
the Dwelling practice by keeping field notes of the responses that participants made 
to the text. Additionally, I asked questions during the focus group interviews drawing 
out the participants’ reflections on the Dwelling practice.
On weeks one, three and five of the study, I invited all members of the church to 
participate in Listening Opportunities hosted by three local Black leaders referred 
to as Conversation Partners (CP) in the project. I selected the CPs because they 
are each professionally involved in the work of racial justice in Southeast Michigan 

2 I originally invited eight members of the congregation, four women and four men of various ages, to be 
focus group participants. I selected participants based on their ability to attend the practices consist-
ently and reliably during the summer timeframe of the study.



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and already had a trusted relationship with the rector of the church. CP 1 consults 
with various groups seeking diversity, equity and inclusion as well as advocating for 
racial justice in the local education system. CP 2 was incarcerated in Michigan for 
several years and now works with a non-profit organization to create policy changes 
that yield more just and flourishing conditions for formerly incarcerated persons 
returning to society. CP 3 is ordained by the Episcopal Church and assists congrega-
tions in the work of racial healing in their local communities. I asked the CPs to share 
about local racial justice efforts and appropriate ways that a predominantly white 
church might participate. Each of the three CPs shared a blend of autobiographical 
experiences, information about systemic racism, and opportunities for the audience 
to engage in racial justice.
After the seven weeks, I performed inductive coding of the data gleaned from the 
three Listening Opportunity surveys, the two focus group interviews, and my field 
notes from both Dwelling in the Word and Listening Opportunities. I identified eight 
themes and will explore the implications below of three of the findings through the 
lens of the economy of God.3

The Economy of God
I suggest that the economy of God may serve as a theological foundation for missional 
engagement of racial justice. Jonathan Tran contrasts the political economy of racial 
capitalism with the “deep economy” of God by describing God’s created order as one 
of liberation and flourishment (2021: 21, 207). Alternatively, racial capitalism marches 
to the synchronous beat of scarcity and insatiable consumption while rejecting the 
fundamental notion that the world and everything in it has been created by and 
belongs to God (2021: 210). Tran offers hope that the pervasive forces of scarcity 
and exploitation are mutable, especially when communities seek to share with their 
neighbors in the economy of God.
Due to the prevalence of the prosperity gospel, it is essential to differentiate between 
prosperity and God’s abundant economy (Mumford, 2011: 222). The prosperity 
gospel turns on the claim that God grants economic wealth and physical health to 
the righteous and faithful. The prosperity pursued in this approach often pertains 
more to the interests of the individual or the church than to the wider community. 
Conversely, the abundance of the economy of God is not for self-gain or the aggran-
dizement of the church. Andrea Bieler and Luise Schottroff make this distinction 
by noting Israel’s experience in the wilderness, “The manna economy displays an 

3 The eight themes that emerged from the data are explored at length in the author’s project thesis 
(Magnusson 2023).



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 abundance that does not serve the purpose of accumulation. It serves the purpose 
of nourishment for the day, of fulfilling the basic needs of the community” (2007: 99).

Eucharistically-informed Missional Imagination
St Paul’s as Host
One missional and theological challenge that surfaced for joining in God’s mission of 
justice is that some participants unwittingly made suggestions that arranged indi-
viduals and St Paul’s as the hosts and saviours related to racial justice. In Dwelling, 
the group frequently interpreted Jesus’ table instructions to the Pharisees to “invite 
the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind,” as a model for the church to invite 
our neighbours into worship. “So, who are [we] called to invite to our banquet?” 
asked an interviewee in reflection on the text. St Paul’s was typically seen as the 
location where God’s banquet occurs. Conversations often went down the path of 
asking how St Paul’s can become more inviting to our Black neighbors and diverse: 
“I would like people of other races to feel they would be welcome to attend St Paul’s 
and that they would be truly welcomed.” These sentiments led to palpable anxiety 
and concerns such as how St Paul’s could get Black people to attend and remain; 
whites and Blacks not being able to relate with one another; and changing worship 
styles – “Can Episcopalians still revere / embed English culture while appreciating 
/ celebrating / welcoming other cultures? Must we CHANGE to do this?” (emphasis 
original). Members rarely considered that God’s banquet can take place in other 
social locations and on terms other than our own.
I also identified the impulse for some participants to serve as white saviours. For 
example, after CP 2 shared about their experiences of incarceration and current 
efforts of changing legislation, a member approached them offering to speak to other 
groups alongside them, “It might be nice to have a white [person] by your side.… I’d 
like to be your [person].” While the member had the intention of helping the CP, they 
overlooked how the CP was sufficiently compelling on their own as they spoke before 
a predominantly white group.
Willie James Jennings explores how predominantly white churches like St Paul’s have 
come to assume the role of host:

[T]he Christian theological imagination was woven into processes of colonial domi-
nance. Other peoples and their ways of life had to adapt, become fluid, even morph 
into the colonial order of things, and such a situation drew Christianity and its theo-
logians inside habits of mind and life that internalized and normalized that order of 
things…. Indeed, it is as though Christianity, wherever it went in the modern colonies, 
inverted its sense of hospitality. It claimed to be the host, the owner of the spaces it 



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entered, and demanded native peoples to enter its cultural logics, its ways of being in 
the world, and its conceptualities. (2010: 8, emphasis added)

Despite God being the host in the narratives of scripture, the colonial theological 
imagination of Western Christianity continues to have an insidious grip on communi-
ties of faith, even those who have emerging awareness of systemic racism and white 
privilege.

Disconnect Between the Eucharist and Missional Engagement
In reviewing the data, I was surprised that the Eucharist, the pinnacle of Episcopal 
worship, did not give greater shape to members’ understanding of God as the 
host. The Father, Son and Holy Spirit are principal actors in the liturgy, communi-
cating clearly that God is the host of the table (Episcopal Church 2007: 361–6). After 
receiving the bread and wine, the community affirms that this feast is gifted by God 
and sourced from the body of Christ himself: “you have fed us with spiritual food 
in the Sacrament of [Christ’s] Body and Blood” (2007: 365). The weekly gathering at 
the table of the Lord reveals the underlying belief in the unceasing abundance of 
nourishment that God provides. No one would return to a table known to be empty. 
Furthermore, because God is the host of the table and extends welcome to all, 
St Paul’s participates in God’s welcome and inclusion by sharing the Eucharist with 
whomever comes forward to receive. While the church regularly engages this theo-
logically rich sacrament, seldom do members explore together or reflect consciously 
on questions such as, “What understanding of the world is implicit in this practice? 
What vision of the kingdom is carried in this ritual?” (Smith 2009: 199). The Eucharist 
does not appear to inform public engagement and is an underutilized gift for shaping 
the church’s imagination of the relationship between God, church, and world and its 
impact on racial justice.

God as Host
Scripture offers many narratives that locate God as the host at the margins, particu-
larly through the numerous table scenes in Luke and Acts. In these volumes, Jesus and 
the Spirit disrupt ancient social conventions of the table and transform it into a place 
of boundary transgression, intimate communion and belonging. Jesus  re  arranges 
the table and establishes himself as the host while simultaneously being one who 
serves (Lk. 22.7–30). Specifically in the Dwelling passage of Luke 14 selected for the 
project, Jesus unseats the religiously, socially and economically powerful Pharisees 
from the host position and rearranges the table in alignment with the kingdom of 
God.
In the parable of the great banquet in Luke 14.15–24, the privileged invitees snub 
the master’s invitation with absurd excuses. One by one, they each tell the master’s 



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servant that they must attend to their possessions: a piece of land, five yoke of oxen 
and a new wife. The parable signals their preoccupation with possessions while also 
exposing the deeper truth of the Pharisees’ preoccupation with themselves. The priv-
ileged invitees do not regard the master as honourable enough for their presence. 
In a culture of beneficence and reciprocal obligation, to associate with this master 
potentially brings shame upon the initial invitees, a risk they are unwilling to take 
(Green 1995: 112–21). Jesus demonstrates to the Pharisees that the Greco-Roman 
code of honour and shame has shaped how they perceive God and God’s kingdom 
more than they realize.
Jesus presses on and dispels societal arrangements of patronage by establishing 
God as the indiscriminate host or “Supreme Benefactor” of the table (Green 1995: 
116). The Pharisees, who are the original hosts in this narrative, suddenly discover 
they have been replaced by a host who has endless room for those who would be 
regarded as having no honour. Laurence Hull Stookey concludes of this passage, 
“The heavenly banquet hall is vast, and God desires urgently that it be filled, for our 
Maker has an expansive nature, and the sharing of good things is at the center of 
divine creative love” (1993: 136). God’s way of beneficence creates an economy of 
shared abundance, which Jesus holds in clear contrast to Greco-Roman exploitative 
practices of patronage.

Eucharistically-informed Missional Imagination
Though the sacrament of the Eucharist has its elevated place in the weekly service, 
St Paul’s imagination for joining in racial justice may be additionally formed by the 
economy of “God’s life as a ‘perpetual eucharist’ for all of creation” (Milbank 1995: 
152). God is ahead of and beyond the church, feeding and nourishing the world long 
before and after the church gets involved. I anticipate that we will begin to be attuned 
to God’s abundance in our community as we learn to consistently show up as guests 
at God’s table wherever it may be found and regularly consider questions such as, 
“How might God be hosting us in our encounters and through our neighbors?” and 
“What gifts are we receiving from our community for which we may give thanks?”

Receiving Through Listening
White Privilege and Listening
Unsurprisingly, white privilege was detectable despite the education about racism 
that the members of St Paul’s had previously engaged. The first CP stood before a 
predominantly white, affluent crowd concluding that, “If we get down to the real root 
of it, in my opinion, fear and greed are the real issue.” When I heard the phrase “fear 
and greed” I anticipated comments or pushback in the surveys. Surprisingly, out of 



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16 surveys for CP 1, only three mentioned the phrase and only one of seven inter-
viewees briefly mentioned it.
Instead, there was a higher prevalence of two things. Participants freely offered 
opinions on the demeanour and effectiveness of the CPs. It is noteworthy that some 
of these comments were shared in response to the invitation for personal reflec-
tion: “As a way of describing your experience while listening, please share one to 
three words or brief phrases that express your most dominant feeling(s) or reac-
tion(s)” (emphasis not on survey). Instead of participants sharing about themselves, 
they reversed the attention of the question and critiqued the presenters. Some 
said CP 1 was “confrontational”, “extreme” and “antagonistic”. Others viewed CP 1 
more favorably by expressing they were “helpful”, “engaging”, “inspiring” and “coura-
geous”. Comments about CP 2 were less polarized and assessed the presenter as 
“effective”, “persuasive” and “mesmerizing”, and “had us eating out of the palm of 
[their] hand”. Participants described CP 3 as “uplifting and encouraging” and “having 
very deep roots in God’s presence, like an ancient tree”. While it could be argued that 
these words and phrases reflect dominant personal reactions of the participants, it 
seems significant how often responses were an assessment of the CP more than a 
self-reflection of the participants’ feelings.
Second, rather than focusing on the substance of the presentations of the CPs, there 
was a higher prevalence of comments about minor things than anticipated. When 
I asked about a surprise during the Listening Opportunities, some noted specific 
details of the personal lives of the CPs, such as their hobbies or the number of chil-
dren they have. While personal anecdotes gave the audience a fuller and more auto-
biographical picture, I wondered why those were the chosen moments of surprise for 
participants. By focusing on the trivial, the white listeners might have been demon-
strating that we have enough societal power to deflect difficult truths and be selec-
tive about our engagement.
Not only did the participants reveal white privilege, but I also discovered it in myself. 
When the first Conversation Partner declared that “fear and greed” are the root issue 
of racism, they quickly moved to a different segment of their presentation without 
expounding upon those words. This could have been a rhetorical strategy, some 
understandable nerves that overcame them, or something I cannot imagine from my 
limited perspective. Whatever the CP’s rationale, I felt uneasy. It was not, however, 
because I disagreed with them. I designed the project with the undergirding belief 
that greed has something to do with racism. My challenge was CP 1’s method of 
delivery. An interview participant shared my reaction: “It wasn’t that you didn’t agree 
with what CP 1 was saying. It was the way [they] said it. It was a matter of delivery. 
[They were] adversarial.”
For days, I found myself vacillating between two thoughts. In the practices of 
teaching and preaching, I believe it is wise to invite others to walk alongside me to 



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grapple with a difficult truth. I desire to avoid provoking hearers from shutting down 
too early and wondered if the CP spoke too confrontationally. I sincerely wanted CP 
1’s words to be heard and was concerned that attendees would not have ears to hear 
because of the delivery. However, as I mentally gave CP 1 well-intended suggestions, 
I realized how white privilege and fragility were shaping my assessment and notions 
of effective rhetorical strategies. A person of privilege has the leisure to slowly and 
gently invite listeners alongside them. A person who experiences ongoing oppres-
sion needs immediate justice and should not be expected to remain quiet or peace-
able. Further, I was allowing the predominantly white audience to determine the 
“wisest” course for racial dialogue. I was mentally tone-policing CP 1 and hoping for 
them to conform their delivery in such a way that white people could hear it. I had 
performance standards shaped by white privilege and fragility and was unsettled 
when CP 1 did not fit that mould. While there is value in knowing one’s audience and 
speaking in a way that can be heard, this experience reveals that a predominantly 
white, upper-class audience would be wise to attend to the dialogical problems our 
privilege creates.

Signalling Mastery
Perhaps one could say that the questions on a survey immediately following a speaker 
solicit evaluative responses. In our consumer-oriented society, people are frequently 
asked to rate their customer service representative or answer presidential approval 
polls. Due to this kind of cultural conditioning, participants possibly assumed that 
the survey questions were of that nature. I wonder, however, if the trend of a white, 
upper-class group immediately evaluating the demeanour and effectiveness of the 
Black presenters is more than customer service and more than a deflection tactic. 
This phenomenon might signal what Willie James Jennings calls “the performance 
of the self-sufficient white man” (2020) and Miranda Fricker’s “testimonial injustice” 
(2007: 9–29). Jennings describes how the colonial legacy of Western education has 
distorted our imaginations in such a way that we are enthralled by the performance 
of possession, control and mastery (2020: 6–7). We have learned to love a specific 
kind of intellectual form of whiteness and measure all performances in relation to it 
(2020: 29). A highly educated group that has been historically shaped by the perfor-
mance of white, male priests seems to freely evaluate everyone by these standards.
Fricker uses different terms to explore the listening dynamics between two groups 
of people. She describes how speakers of colour experience “testimonial injus-
tice” because white hearers’ hearing is shaped by implicit biases and scepticism of 
non-white cognition (2007: 2–3, 5–6). The white hearers’ ingrained habit of “judgment 
of credibility” supersedes the testimony of the speaker and blocks the flow of new 
learning (2007: 3). This dynamic increases what she calls “hermeneutical marginali-
zation”, where some social groups are unable to contribute to the pool of shared 



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social meanings (2007: 152–61). While it is impossible to know the extent to which the 
participants’ judgment of credibility was at work, it is valuable to reflect upon these 
possible explanations for the evaluation of the CPs.

God’s Economy of Encounter
In a “zero-sum” constructed world, white privilege maintains the myth that there is 
not enough space for multiple voices and perspectives to be shared, so the asser-
tion of one voice means the negation of another voice (McGhee 2021: xix). The habits 
of criticizing, correcting and directing – Andrew T. Draper calls this “exercising the 
ethnographic gaze” — help white listeners to maintain control of the assets of the 
conversation, even if the thoughts go unspoken (2018: 204).
An additional barrier for interracial conversations and encounters is that white, 
upper-class people tend to view white people as having and deserving all the goods 
and racialized others as having all the needs, which is ironic on the heels of contending 
that white people demonstrate a scarcity mindset! With seemingly endless access 
to education, employment and resources, white listeners have difficulty recog-
nizing the deficiencies and needs of the white community and the abundant gifts 
existent in other racialized groups. Complicating matters is the misconception that 
goods consumed with financial capital are more valuable than gifts that cannot 
be purchased. This perceived imbalance of surplus and needs between racialized 
groups predisposes white listeners to have an unreceptive posture.
In God’s economy, however, the gifts of God are always at hand. Encounters with the 
other are occasions for God’s abundance, not scarcity. Though we believe that God’s 
Spirit is poured out upon all flesh, we struggle to embody the truth of this statement 
(Mather 2018: 14). Asset-Based Community Development expert Michael Mather 
insists that many of God’s gifts go unnoticed because we are asking the wrong ques-
tions and looking for the wrong answers (2018: 17). Rather than focusing on needs, 
he suggests that communities learn to ask things such as “Who are the healers, 
teachers and artists around here, and how may we invest in them so that their 
gifts may flourish?” (2018: 33). Additionally, Andrew T. Draper suggests that white 
Christians “practice hearing and speaking the glory of God in unfamiliar cadences” 
(2018: 203). Whatever and however a person communicates their experience may 
be received as a gift. Draper wonders, “What if we as White people saw correction 
and anger as gifts given to us by people of Color, gifts that signal a desire to relate 
in a healthier manner?” (2018: 184). These gifts reveal passion and engagement, not 
apathy and resignation. As the members of St Paul’s practise receiving what is unfa-
miliar or what might be perceived as undesirable, I anticipate we will discover the 
abundance of God’s gifts for the work of racial justice.



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Speaking of the Living God
Where is God?
For several years preceding the project, St Paul’s utilized the phrase “Celebrating 
Christ’s Presence in a Changing World” as a way of communicating to our neighbours 
what St Paul’s believes about Christ, the church and the world. Given the ubiquity 
of the phrase, I was surprised to discover that several participants were hesitant 
to name the presence of God during the project. As I was processing the Listening 
Opportunity surveys, I noticed that the question that was most frequently left blank 
was the question that asked, “If you were aware of God’s presence today, write 
1–2 sentences to describe what you noticed.” Out of 44 responses, this question was 
left unanswered 16 times, far more than other questions. Possibly due to the over-
whelming nature of systemic racism, one response said, “If anything, it feels like He’s 
decidedly absent.”

Hesitant Speech
There are several reasons why participants were less likely to name the presence 
of God in these instances. One is that Christianity in the West has largely kept God 
out of public matters, especially when it comes to social justice (Dupont 2013). God 
is experienced in the worship setting, and possibly during private devotions, but not 
often in other arenas of our lives. This has largely been shaped by the Western theo-
logical and ecclesial imagination that locates God in the church and positions the 
church over and against the world. When Christianity has been brought into public 
matters, it has often been for the sake of further subjugation of already marginal-
ized groups, such as efforts of some conservative Christians to limit the rights of 
the LGBTQ+ community. This kind of public engagement has not fostered a sense of 
God’s presence and has typically done the opposite.
One interviewee named the troublesome history of Christians using the Bible 
to condone slavery, which causes this participant to feel some hesitancy around 
involving the Bible in discussions on racial justice. It seems less complicated to avoid 
God in the discussion and advocate for racial justice on humanitarian terms. This 
participant expressed that they want to avoid evangelicalism, and I suspect that their 
avoidance is shared among much of the congregation. In my observation, Episco-
palians often try to distinguish ourselves from American evangelicals. In the effort 
to keep from misrepresenting God’s presence, we find greater comfort in avoiding 
speaking about the activity of God altogether.
Additionally, Charles Taylor has identified that we find ourselves in an age of disen-
chantment and secularism where the assumption and belief that God is present 
and acting in miraculous ways has faded (2007). This posture has become so prev-
alent that many progressive Christians rarely attribute anything to the presence 
and activity of God. If something miraculous occurs, it is more often deemed as a 



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fluke rather than the work of God. In Dwelling, for example, the comments largely 
exhibit ed an intellectual criticism and curiosity about Luke 14 and less often consid-
ered how the Spirit might be calling us to respond.

Healing is Possible
Inherent in the claim of the economy of God is a living and active God. The Spirit of 
God, the giver of life, is the source of the ever-flowing stream of justice and righteous-
ness (Amos 5.24). When Christian communities seek to participate in God’s work of 
justice, we confess that God is interested and involved in creating more just condi-
tions for all of humanity and creation. It is not purely up to human efforts to address 
systemic racism. In mysterious ways, God brings unexpected harvest (1 Cor. 3.5–9). It 
is easy for the daunting work of racial justice and the seemingly endless bad news of 
police brutality, unjust incarceration, housing discrimination, underfunded schools 
and banned literature to cloud our vision. Further complicating efforts of justice is 
our own attachment to white privilege. The project demonstrates that St Paul’s could 
benefit from attending to the ongoing work of God in the world, thereby increasing 
trust that God can bring liberation and justice.
The Dwelling text for the project offers good news in this regard. Luke 14 opens with 
a healing that appears to be disconnected from the table instructions that follow. 
One Sabbath day, Jesus is eating in the home of a leader of the Pharisees when a 
man with dropsy – excessive water retention – suddenly appears before him (Hart-
stock 2013: 342). Jesus heals him, and it seems as though the purpose of the healing 
story is to expose the tension between Jesus and the Pharisees’ Sabbath customs. 
However, Chad Hartstock demonstrates that dropsy was a prevalent metaphor in the 
ancient Greco-Roman world for greed, such as Diogenes referring to money-lovers 
as “dropsies” (2013: 349). Hartstock insists that Luke employs dropsy as an accusa-
tion of the insatiable greed of the Pharisees (2013: 353).4 Luke’s audience would have 
readily made the connection. Those with never-ending desires for wealth and power 
are akin to those who suffer from dropsy and in need of a miraculous healing they 
cannot generate themselves. While Jesus elevates mercy, healing, and liberation for 
those who have been marginalized, he also offers healing for those attached to priv-
ilege. In this simultaneous healing, Jesus offers a new vision of human flourishing for 
all.

4 Several instances in Luke highlight the theme of the greed of the Pharisees: 11.39; 12.15, 18, 45; 16.1–14, 
19–31. Contrast with Zacchaeus’ generosity in 19.1–10.



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Taking a Risk on the Living God
At St Paul’s, there are not many spaces where members speak of God’s involvement 
in our lives other than the bold claims about the activity of God in the liturgy. I have 
heard a few people timidly share accounts of God’s stunning work in their lives while 
being quick to offer a caveat, “Now, some of you might not believe this, but …” In 
large part, members take a curious and intellectual approach to the Bible. On the 
one hand, unbridled engagement with the text is a gift. Many of the questions and 
comments at St Paul’s would never be spoken in a conservative Christian setting. 
On the other hand, intellectual inquiries and bold critiques of scripture appear to 
hinder the community from hearing the calling of the Spirit. As an effort to separate 
ourselves from that which might be regarded as undiscerning theological speech of 
conservative evangelicals, the St Paul’s community has swung in the opposite direc-
tion of struggling to identify the presence and activity of God. Therefore, I see an 
opportunity for St Paul’s to grow in our belief in the living God and risk articulating 
what God appears to be up to in our community (Hagley 2019: 124–6). As we make it 
a regular habit to share how we sense and believe God is present in our daily lives, 
we might realize that God can heal us from our attachments to privilege more than 
we imagined.
Contrary to what is often assumed in Christian spaces, humans move from experi-
ence to theology rather than from theology to experience (Love 2023: 132–3). Mark 
Love discusses the theological significance of the practice of reflection in the life of 
the congregation: “We seldom draw people into meaningful reflection on their expe-
riences. Because we do not think of experience as a source for theology, we do not 
ask our members to consider how their experiences are related to what God is doing 
in the world” (2023: 133). Today, within any church context, there are endless daily 
experiences people may bring forward for theological consideration. As St. Paul’s 
struggles to articulate the presence of God outside of worship, the regular prac-
tice of communal storytelling might be one avenue for surfacing the activity of God. 
Practising theological reflection together as a community brings in necessary other 
perspectives and guards against the formation of self-serving theological conclu-
sions. Additionally, for those who are uncomfortable with making theological claims, 
we hold space for future corrections by using words of possibility, “God might be 
present or leading in this way…” Risking theological speech trusts that the economy 
of God is generous with grace and mercy when we get it wrong.
In bringing attention to the power of God for justice, in no way do I desire to promote 
a pollyannaish approach to racism. Injustice is alive and well in the US, and it is 
beyond time for white Christians to participate more radically in racial justice. In 
this endeavour, we discover that hope and celebration are bundled up with discour-
agement and lament. I am heartened by Ruth A. Meyers’ eschatological frame for 
this tension: “Our thanksgiving does not deny the suffering and struggles of the 



48
Ecclesial Futures – DOI: 10.54195/ef18685

world, but rather locates them in the larger horizon of the arc of salvation history” 
(2014: 168).

Conclusion
When I began my research project at St Paul’s, I hoped it would yield clear and imme-
diate paths for the church’s participation in racial justice in the city of Jackson. Instead, 
I discovered some deeply rooted theological challenges that inhibit our participa-
tion in the mission of God, specifically viewing ourselves as the host, white privilege 
hindering receptivity in the practice of listening, and hesitancy in naming the liber-
ating activity of God. In this article, I have identified that these inclinations are each 
reflective of racial capitalism’s economy of scarcity and considered how locating 
ourselves within the indiscriminate generosity of God’s economy could reshape our 
engagement in matters of justice.
Regarding the first identified challenge of participants inadvertently viewing the 
church as the host, I suggest that the liturgy of the Eucharist contains great poten-
tial for reorienting churches around God as the host. In this, churches may discover 
the abundance of God that is available beyond the walls of the building and around 
the tables of our neighbours. The second challenge reveals how white privilege 
continues to exert itself in progressive spaces, skewing perceptions of the gifts of 
God that are available in all people. By cultivating the practice of hospitable recep-
tivity, churches may discover the abundance of God in the neighbourhood that is 
available for justice. Finally, the research reveals that a church’s reluctance to iden-
tify and articulate the activity of God potentially weakens the church’s partnership 
with the living God in the work of racial justice. Through the practice of risking theo-
logical speech in storytelling, churches may become more attuned to the power and 
presence of God in the social fabric of our communities and experience the neces-
sary empowerment for justice. While socially progressive churches might be eager to 
take swift actions of justice, the work appears to be hindered without missional and 
theological impulses flowing from the generous and indiscriminate economy of God.

About the Author
Natalie Magnusson serves as the assistant director and an assistant professor of 
the Master of Religious Education in Missional Leadership at Rochester Christian 
University in Rochester Hills, MI. She received her Doctor of Ministry in Missional 
and Spiritual Formation from Lipscomb University in 2023. Contact: nmagnusson@
r ochesteru.edu

mailto:nmagnusson@rochesteru.edu
mailto:nmagnusson@rochesteru.edu


49
Ecclesial Futures – DOI: 10.54195/ef18685

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	EDITORIAL
	Editorial Volume 5 Issue 1
	Nigel Rooms

	ARTICLE
	The Two Crises of the Church
	Jonna van den Berge-Bakker and Marten van der Meulen
	Orthodox Perspectives on the Church as an Evangelizing, Eucharistic Community: A Case Study of the Orthodox Parish of St John of Kronstadt, Bath, UK
	Alison Ruth Kolosova
	Sharing in the indiscriminate generosity of God: Exploring missional engagement of racial justice funded by the economy of God
	Natalie Magnusson
	A Missional Church Strategy in an Era of Humanlike Chatbots
	David Hirome
	Digital Worship as Fostering or Inhibiting Social Inclusion and Social Cohesion
	Geneva Blackmer
	Proclaiming and Embodying Peace in Pacifist Japan: a Reformed Church Perspective
	Stéphan van der Watt
	Reflections on Faithful Innovation in the City of Saint Francis: ICEF Conference Report
	Scott J. Hagley, Dorte Kappelgaard, Dustin Benac and Scot Sherman

	BOOK REVIEW
	Hartman, Tim. 2020. Theology After Colonization: Bediako, Barth, and the Future of Theological Reflection
	Reviewed by Pieter Labuschagne
	Müller, Sabrina. 2023. Religious Experience and Its Transformational Power: Qualitative and Hermeneutic Approaches to a Practical Theological Foundational Concept
	Reviewed by Shaun Joynt
	Spijker, J. van ‘t. 2021. To Participate: Looking for an ecclesial structure to be a witnessing church today
	Reviewed by Rein den Hertog




