or many people today, especially in the younger generations, religion has been tried and come up short. They point to the fanatics who perpetrated the horrors of September 11 in the name of Allah, to the mayhem in the Middle East, to Christianity's bloody history of persecution, and conclude that all religion is a disaster.

This history is true, but the conclusion is wrong. The most oppressive empire that the world has known-Communism-was driven by atheistic ideology. Religion isn't bad per se, but only as it is manipulated for political ends.

The other side, in both history and life today, deserves telling. It is this: religion has led and leads to humanity's kindest deeds and noblest lives. When religion gets off the high horse of debate and power seeking and puts on work boots, it transforms the world.

Among the multitudes who have ever called on God, one person, one life, stands apart for its power for good and lasting impact. Jesus of Nazareth, the humble peasant from Galilee who died in His early 30s, has had incalculable influence on humanity. Biblical scholar Reynolds Price rightly called Him "the single most powerful figure . . . in all human history," asserting that "no one else's life has proved remotely as powerful and enduring as that of Jesus."¹

That life continues to attract and amaze, stirring up hundreds of books and articles within the past decade. It is a subject far too complex for me to explore here; I simply note its salient point: the religion proclaimed and lived by this Man was intensely practical. It was religion in overalls, religion in work boots.

Jesus occasionally engaged in theological debate, but He never left the matter in debate. When an expert in Jewish law tried to entangle Him with questions, Jesus sealed the discussion by telling a story-the parable of the good Samaritan, a person outside the pale who acted with compassion toward someone in need.

Throughout the years of His teaching the same emphasis sounded. "Blessed are you who are poor," He said at the outset of His public work, "for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now." (Luke 6:20, 21).² And later: "When you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed" (Luke 14:13, 14).

Here is the most startling fact about this startling person: Although He claimed an intimacy with God that no one else can ever know, He identified with those whom society had marginalized-the poor, the weak, the sick, the dispossessed.

In His last parable, the sheep and the goats, He made the final test of our standing with God hinge on the way we relate to the hungry, the thirsty, the sick, the strangers, and the prisoners. "I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me" (Matt. 25:35, 36).

You cannot escape the force of these words: The only religion that counts is one that is prepared to put on work boots and get its hands dirty. Without this dimension, church-going and theologizing and preaching are not worth a fig.

And what Jesus taught, He lived. Most of His time, in fact, was spent in doing rather than talking. He was always on the move, and everywhere He went He brought hope, healing, and new life to the hungry, to the thirsty, to the stranger, to the naked, to the sick, to the prisoner. "He went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil" (Acts 10:38).

This special issue of the Adventist Review is dedicated to the work of the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA). Seventh-day Adventists in general are a practical people known for their good works manifested in extensive hospital and school systems. But through the worldwide ministry of ADRA our faith perpetuates the work of Jesus at the level of most basic human needs. ADRA is Adventism in work boots.

I am proud of ADRA and grateful for its large band of faithful workers who toil in heat, in drought, in lonely places, in dangerous places. They are there because that is where Jesus would be if He were here today. Because that is where He is here today.

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¹ Reynolds Price, "Jesus of Nazareth Then and Now," Time, Dec. 6, 1999.
² All biblical references in this article are from the New International Version.

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William G. Johnsson is editor of the Adventist Review.