Solidifying his position as one of the most influential professing Christians on the planet, Bono recently spoke at the National Prayer Breakfast. Guests included the President and First Lady, King Abdullah and Ike and Trisha Thomas of Granbury, TX (I have to name-drop my church members because I certainly wasn’t there!).

Bono referenced the “Year of Jubilee” in his continued call to end poverty while quoting Leviticus 25:35, which reads: “If your brother becomes poor and cannot maintain himself with you, you shall support him as though he were a stranger and a sojourner, and he shall live with you.”

Bono also quoted Luke 4:18: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed.” Bono had already directly alluded to or directly quoted more Scripture than many entire sermons.

While its easy to dismiss Bono’s continued grandstanding and publicity moves, it’s much more difficult to ignore his message, as much as we’d like to. It’s difficult to hear because, on many accounts, he’s right. When he says that “The church was slow” responding to AIDS, it’s hard to argue. While we must be wary of the message’s tendency towards religious pluralism (as Denny Burk rightly points out here), we must also remember that much of what he said truly needs to be heard.
It’s hard to take criticism from a rock star, but when the criticism is right, it matters not the source. For the most part, the modern church has not only been slow to respond to AIDS, but to many social plights. We have lost sight of the fact that the Gospel is for the whole person, the announcement of the reversal of the Fall to a hurting people.

Barring the exception of the “social gospel” movement, the evangelical church has largely failed in its outreach opportunities, whether the poor or the sick, or both. The result has largely been that these “ministries” have been taken over by the government, and the church has made little attempt to get them back where they belong.

If the Gospel is truly as big as Scripture claims, then why do we live it out so small? Christ’s love indwelling us ought to move us to love because God first loved us (1 John 4:19), to truly be His body, reaching out to those in need, if for no other reason, as Bono reminds, “History, like God, is watching what we do.”

• Read the President’s remarks at the recent National Prayer Breakfast.
• Read Bono’s remarks at the recent National Prayer Breakfast.
• Read The Maze of Bonoland by me.
• Read Overflow of the Heart? by me.