THE CHRISTIAN LEGAL AID CHARTER

A NEW LOOK AT CHRISTIAN LEGAL AID 
PRIORITY OF VOLUNTEER TIME AND CONTRIBUTIONS

Dear Colleagues:

We want to challenge, encourage and energize each of us with what we consider a wonderful opportunity and need to take a new and fresh look at a unique ministry and service which is near to the heart of God Himself and which we may not have carefully considered in this light.  We want to ask each of us to put aside at this time any of our own personal previous notions or attitudes about this subject and to let God speak to our minds and hearts in a new way.  Are we willing to do this?

Christian Legal Aid is More Than Just Another Program

Christian legal aid (“CLA”) for the Christian church and for most of us Christian lawyers, law students and paralegals (the latter two are referred to herein as “Christian Legal Professionals”) has not always enjoyed high favor or a high priority in our professional lives for various reasons.  We have often tended to consider it as just another of many other “good” professional volunteer activities.  Some of these views we believe may be because we have not always approached the subject primarily seeking God’s view of its importance.  We hope that each of us can hear what God has to say about His view of its priority and that it will spark a new commitment to what we believe that He wants CLA to be for most of us in our professional lives.  Please note that we do not speak of or support changing our traditional priorities of first God, then family and third, ministry and service.  This is solely about professional ministry and service.

The scriptures, a number of which we have only recently “discovered,” that we will refer to and the views that may be expressed, may conflict with some of our past attitudes or views. To some, they may even seem controversial.  But we ask you to withhold judgment and consider afresh what, if any, claim God may have for us in furnishing both legal and spiritual professional help to the poor and homeless.

The Christian Legal Aid Charter: 
God Commands Christian Lawyers and Christian Legal Professionals
to Give a High Priority to Christian Legal Aid

Few if any themes in the Bible match the more than 200 scriptures repetitively revealing God’s love and concern for the poor and directions to His people to help them.  Included within these multiple scriptures are many stating that His purpose, desire and commands to His family are to:

(A)    Assist, defend, uphold, maintain and vindicate their rights, and to plead their cases;

(B)     to take up their causes;

(C)     to provide them with justice; and

(D)     and (E) the old and the new testaments) that those who do this will enjoy God’s many blessings, rewards and great satisfaction which come from providing such service.

See the scriptural passages below! Prov. 31:8-9 NIV for example reads: “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute, speak up and judge fairly, defend the rights of the poor and needy.” These multiple express commands to “defend, uphold, maintain and vindicate, to do justice, to plead cases and causes” and the like on behalf of the poor unambiguously includes directions to and resulting blessings for those Christians skilled in the law who are trained to respond to them. Christian lawyers and Christian Legal Professionals are the only ones in the Christian family possessing either the legal or both the legal and spiritual* “equipment” to provide the volunteer service contemplated in Christian legal aid! We submit that God’s clarion call and remarkable emphasis plainly discloses that the poor and such help for them are dear to God’s heart; and that assisting them has a high priority for Him; and further that it should likewise be a high priority for His Church as the body of Christ and for its “legal arm,” Christian lawyers and Christian Legal Professionals. This commanded priority and opportunity therefore which we call the “Christian Legal Aid Charter” is a unique one specific to His church and to its Christian lawyers and Christian Legal Professionals.**

How Can I Carry Out God’s Priority?
How Much Should I Contribute in Volunteer Time or Financially to Christian Legal Aid?

If God indeed is prioritizing a special high call and opportunity for most Christian lawyers and Christian Legal Professionals primarily to serve but also to contribute in Christian legal aid, how much volunteer time or money should I contribute under the guidance of the Holy Spirit?  A typical response is “I’m too busy or I’m over-committed financially.  I can’t do any more.”   Most of us are, but this we believe is not the right answer to God unless we are individually otherwise called or directed by the Holy Spirit or other vital personal circumstances.  The question we suggest dear brothers and sisters in Christ, should not be in most circumstances what I can add – but rather what under the guidance of God can I SUBTRACT from my existing activities or contributions having a lesser priority? “What can I consider reducing which may have a lesser priority for me in God’s eyes if this is needed in order to free up the necessary time or money or both for CLA”?  This could involve some difficult decisions and reducing of some good but not necessarily God’s best and highest priority for many of us.

We suggest that an appropriate amount of such time or money might be 50 hours of pro bono time suggested by the ABA Model Rules of Professional Conduct and by the similar codes of many state or local bar associations; or, if the pro bono or pro deo time cannot be provided, a gift in an amount equaling the reasonable billable value of that time.

What are the Specific Volunteer Services or Funds Needed by the Poor and
by Christian Legal Aid Which Only Christian Lawyers and Christian Legal Professionals Can Supply?

The number one priority need is for initiators and Leaders!  We also need volunteers and substantial financial contributions from those who cannot provide the recommended amount of volunteer time. The main need for volunteer service is for lawyers to initiate and/or to lead the start-up of many of the future proposed one hundred and ten new organized CLA programs in which a number of lawyers join together in providing service.  Lawyers generally are trained and often serve as natural leaders in our community, our society and in legislative, judicial and executive roles. Christian lawyers are no exception. Their leadership also particularly extends to the Church and to the missions and activities of the Church.

As the Bible story of the talents illustrates, God expects each of us to fully use for His purposes all of the rich talents, experience, gifts and finances which He has given us. He expects that “to whom much is given much will be required.” Matt. 25, 15-23, 29; Lk 12:48.  See part F below. We suggest that our volunteer services or contributions can prudently be made to CLS for its Christian legal aid ministry (see CLS CLA ministry below) (or to specific local CLA programs); and that these may be in amounts roughly equivalent to the value of the  50 hours of billable time which we may be unable to provide.

The Needs are Great

There can we believe be no real dispute as to the need for CLA.  ABA and other local bar studies indicate that only twenty percent of the legal needs of the poor are being met by all types of legal aid efforts; and CLS estimates that existing Christian Legal Aid, that is, providing combinations of both legal and spiritual help, meet less than one percent of the estimated need.  Virtually every community has a high concentration of the poor requiring these Christian-oriented services and a substantial number of Christian lawyers and Christian Legal Professionals who can provide them. 

CLS Can Equip Any Christian Lawyer or Christian Legal Professional To Lead  and to Serve

CLS, with twenty years of experience promoting and equipping Christian Legal Aid programs, offers technical assistance to potential leaders in starting and conducting new programs and help in training leaders and its volunteers and staff.  It employs easy to use training and operating methods.  This equips any Christian lawyer or Christian Legal Professional (under a lawyer’s supervision) who has a sincere desire to serve the Lord, to lead, to teach or to otherwise help the poor under His enabling power. CLS provides the needed preparation for CLA service to Christian Lawyers and Christian Legal Professionals regardless of how limited their experience may be.  If you respond to His call for leadership, volunteer service or contributions in faith and you pray for His assistance you can count on His supplying whatever you need to carry it out, I John 5:14, 15 NIV.  He has always done this for leaders and others called by Him. We can assure you from first-hand experience that you will share, along with that of most participating lawyers, some of God’s richest rewards and blessings from such service or giving as He has promised.

John D. Robb Director of CLS Legal Aid Ministries PO Box 1888 Albuquerque, NM 87107 Tel: (505) 768-7216 Fax:(505) 768-7395 jrobb@rodey.com

Brent M. McBurney Deputy Director of Legal Aid Ministries PO Box 1528 Springfield, VA 22151 Tel: (703) 642-1070 ext. 3206 Fax:(703) 642-1075 bmcburney@clsnet.org

God’s Concerns and Commands

A.

PROV. 31:8, 9 – “...defend the rights of the afflicted and needy.” 

PS. 72:4 – “May He vindicate the afflicted of the people, save the children of the needy.”

JER. 5:28 – “They do not plead the cause, the cause of the orphan that they may prosper and they do not defend the rights of the poor.”

JER. 22:16 – “He pled the cause of the afflicted and needy. Then it was well.”

PROV. 22:22 & 23 – “Do not rob the poor because he is poor or crush the afflicted at the gate for the Lord will plead their case.”

PS. 12:5 – “Because of the devastation of the afflicted, because of the groaning of the needy, now I will arise, says the Lord. I will set him in the safety for which he long.”

PS. 72:12 – For “He will deliver the needy when he cries for help, the afflicted also and him who has no helper.  He will have compassion on the poor and needy and the lives of the needy He will save. He will rescue their life from oppression and violence.”

B.

PS. 140:12 – “I know that the Lord will maintain the cause of the afflicted and justice for the poor.”

JER. 5:28 – “They do not plead the cause, the cause of the orphan.”

JER. 22:16 – “He pled the cause of the afflicted and needy then it was well.”

C.

EX. 23:6, 7 – “You shall not pervert the justice due your needy brother in his dispute.”

DEUT. 10:18, 19 – “He executes justice for the orphan and the widow.”

PS. 72:2 – “May He judge thy people with righteousness and the afflicted with justice.”

PS. 82:3 – “Vindicate the weak and fatherless, do justice to the afflicted and destitute.”

PS. 140:12 – “I know that the Lord will maintain the cause of the afflicted and justice for the poor.”

PS. 146:7 – “Who executes justice for the oppressed.”

ISA. 10:1, 2 – “Woe to those who enact the civil statutes and to those who constantly record unjust decisions so as to deprive the needy of justice and rob the poor of my people of their rights.”

ISA. 11:4 – “But with righteousness He will judge the poor.”

D.

PS. 41:1 – “How blessed is he who considers the helpless. The Lord will deliver him in a day of trouble. The Lord will protect him and keep him alive and he shall be called blessed upon the earth.   ...The Lord will sustain him on his sickbed. In his illness Thou dost restore him to health.”

PS. 112:9 – “He has given freely to the poor. His righteousness endures forever. His horn will be exalted in honor.”

PROV. 14:21 – “He who despises his neighbor sins; but happy is he who is gracious to the poor.”

PROV. 22:9 – “He who is generous will be blessed for he gives some of his food to thepoor.”

PROV. 28:27 – “He who gives to the poor will never want.”

PROV. 29:7 – “The righteous are concerned for the rights of the poor.”

JER. 7:6, 7 – “If you do not oppress the alien, the orphan or the widow...then I will let you dwell in this place in the land that I gave to your fathers forever and ever.”

JER. 22:16 – “He pled the cause of the afflicted and needy. Then it was well.”

E.

MATT. 25:31-46 – “And the King will answer and say to them truly I say to you to the extent you did it to one of these brothers of mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.”  “These will go away into eternal punishment. The righteous into eternal life.”

LK.14:13, 14 – “When you give a reception invite the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind and you will be blessed since they do not have the means to repay you; for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

2 COR. 9:9 “As it is written He scattered abroad, He gave to the poor, His righteousness abides forever.”

F.

MATT. 25:15-23 & 29  – (The Story of the Talents)

LK. 12:48 – “And from everyone who has been given much shall much be required; and to whom they entrusted much ofwhom they will ask all the more.”