Christ Church of Oak Brook, in partnership with the Willow Creek Association approached Delack Media Group to produce this powerful video, which was shown at Christ Church’s Sunday services and on their website.
Justice Journey Logo
Christ Church of Oak Brook Press Release:
By STEVE SCHERING
Those in attendance at Christ Church of Oak Brook’s services this Sunday will view a powerful video coinciding with Martin Luther King Day that provides information for the Justice Journey event.
The Justice Journey is an educational and spiritual pilgrimage to southern cities connected with the Civil Rights Movement. The video will feature testimonials from those who have attended previous events.
The journey was developed and run by Willow Creek Church in Barrington. Christ Church is just one of a few that Willow Creek has invited to take part in the event.
“Few experiences I’ve had in life brought me close to God’s vision as those days spent traveling through the south,” said Senior Pastor Dan Meyer, who traveled with the Justice Journey in 2008. “It was one of the most disturbing, stretching and renewing experiences I have had as a member of American society and as a follower of Jesus.
“I can’t recommend it heartily enough to anyone open to better understanding why our culture is the way it is today and how it might start to change for the good.”
Up to 50 participants will travel to the south together on a coach bus. Christ Church will send 10 people to take part in the journey to southern cities of Selma, Atlanta, Birmingham and Memphis to learn about important events during the Civil Rights Movement.
“The Justice Journey is a life-changing opportunity far beyond a history lesson of Civil Rights, but a chance to experience what it means to expose, examine and strip away the judgments and perceptions inherently formed by skin color or economic status to see people as God does — on the inside,” said Dan Shannon, Christ Church member who took part in the 2007 Justice Journey.
The trip will allow participants to build relationships, and its goal is to be one church united racially and socially.
“How a group of complete strangers divided by our history and skin color could, over the course of just a few days, become a family of truth and love more authentic than most have experienced in a lifetime spent with others ‘just like them’ is a miracle for which the only satisfactory explanation is God,” Meyer said.
Participants will be selected through an application process through the Willow Creek Church. Church members can submit their names to fill out an application and take part in an interview process.
“This week-long renewal of the spirit deeply planted a seed to play a part in bridging the gap in social justice and unity that exists for so many of God’s children,” Shannon said. “It is a delightful opportunity to feel the joy of pure Christianity.”
