The Word in Focus with Dr Larry Taylor

A Labor Day Meditation

Come all you poor workers

Good news to you, I’ll tell

How the good old union

Has come in here to dwell

Which side are you on?

Which side are you on?

Which Side Are You On? is a song written in 1931 by Florence Reece, who was the wife of Sam Reece, a union organizer for the United Mine Workers in Harlan County, Kentucky.

There is an eudaemonic force built into nature drawing everything towards life, light, order, goodness, wholeness, shalom. Alpha and Omega. 

There is an opposing force pulling everything backwards into disorder, chaos, darkness, death, non-being, nothingness, nonexistence. 

Shalom: wholeness, order, self-actualization, peace, harmony, generosity, hospitality, understanding, compassion, friendship, beauty, the arts, equity, justice, wellbeing, creation-care, truth, goodness, forgiveness, love, tolerance, care, faithfulness, tenderness …

Chaos: darkness, death, murder, nothingness, despair, betrayal, hopelessness, strife, violence, jingoism, racism, hatred, prejudice, anger, inequality, lies, manipulation, dominance, greed, injustice, meanness, parsimony, environmental destruction … 

We can join either one. We can use our free-will to align ourselves with the forces of good, justice, righteousness, order, beauty, progress, compassion, love, light, wholeness and shalom; or, we can use our free-will to become agents of darkness, death, chaos, disorder, injustice. 

In scripture, chaos is symbolized by desert wilderness, by deep, cold, stormy oceans, and by spirit beings in the form of stars at night. Chaos is additionally symbolized by snakes, scorpions, lions, dragons, and biblical monsters like Tanin, Nahash, Behemoth, Leviathan, and Rahab/Rahav. Evil people like the Pharoah of Exodus, Nimrod, and the King of Tyre are depicted as agents of chaos in the Bible.

Humans can choose to be agents of light or agents of darkness; ambassadors for good or ambassadors for evil. Agents of light drawing the world towards shalom – Dr. Martin & Coretta King, Mother Theresa, Francis of Assisi, Dirk Willems. Agents of chaos pulling the world backwards into non-being – Nero, Genghis Khan, Tomás de Torquemada, Pol Pot, Stalin, Hitler.

There are contemporary political, military, corporate, and ecclesiastical leaders who are agents of evil pulling creation backwards into chaos; and there are many (most of them behind the scenes and out of the headlines) who are agents of cruciform love and shalom. 

Which side are you on?