Honestly, my head is spinning right now. Our lives get completely tossed upside-down during the total shock of the coronavirus lockdown, and then in a split second we are in chaos as a society.
What am I supposed to say?
Do I, as a pastor in a church family, say anything? Can I really add anything of value to the thousands of church and civic leaders who are speaking out? Can I add anything of value to the millions of social media posts out there?
I feel terribly inadequate because, honestly, I am a white male from a middle-class comfortable society. The killing of George Floyd and the ensuing protests—followed by the chaos in many cities around America, including our own—have left me shaking my head. I certainly have plenty of thoughts, many of which are conflicting. But it was absolutely inexcusable, and even evil, for someone that has power over us to take a life in this way. We have seen it time and time again, and our society as a whole is understandably sick of it. But can I even understand personally all of pain that goes along with these events of abuse, social injustice or inequality?
I am feeling that I have to step in as best I can for the sake of our congregation, trying to give at least a little wisdom (if possible) to this complicated situation. I am going to frame this in a way that helps me sort some things out.
There are many call-outs by those who have been abused, mistreated, and demeaned. I have tried to sift through it all and make a list of key words and phrases to help me sort through this. Words like understanding, minority, lament, abuse, dignity, inequality, social hierarchy, and justice are just a few of the words to help frame this whole conversation. I am going to do my best over the next few weeks to help you walk through my thoughts, word by word. I pray that it helps you.
UNDERSTANDING
How can we come to understand better? In this case of racial tension, I must defer and listen to those I respect who share the same love of the Savior that I do, but have experiences that are very different from mine. Some of these people I personally know; others I don’t know, but they have my huge respect.
I defer to my friend and fellow pastor Andrey Sims from Christ the King Church in Federal Way. He is African American. He grew up in Chicago and was schooled in Dallas. He hosted a couple of regional meetings a while back to help Christ followers seeking to understand the problem and how to respond in the name of Christ. The events were held in response to yet another racially motivated death, followed by yet more social unrest, in America (there seems to be an endless number of these). Many races were represented in and contributed to these meetings. It was outstanding and helpful, and a good step in the right direction. I remember one of the key points: Listen and try to understand. No one, of course, can fully understand another person’s journey, but if we don’t stop in a respectful way and truly try to listen and take in all that is being said, we are selfish, self-consumed, and not giving other lives the dignity that God gives them.
I defer you to Dr. Tony Evans. Quite well known in evangelical circles, Dr. Evans is a long-time pastor in Dallas, Texas, who happens to be African American. He has spoken and written about this topic, and it’s all available to you through an internet search. He has some wonderful thoughts for us in his series, “Oneness Embraced,” on RightNow Media.
[This Christian streaming service is free to LifeWay’s members through the church account. To get access to “Oneness Embraced” and the full library of RightNow Media content on racism and racial reconciliation, contact the church office.]
I defer to Tony Dungy, the Super Bowl winning football coach who is not only the first African American coach to win the Super Bowl, but more importantly is a devout and outspoken follower of Christ. He has some incredibly insightful things to say on this topic that can help shape our understanding. Seattle’s own Brock Huard, former UW quarterback legend, sports announcer, and outspoken Christ follower (who is a white man), has a podcast called Above and Beyond. In April 2017 Huard interviewed Coach Dungy about Dungy’s journey of faith in Christ and the racially divisive issues he has faced.
I defer to a couple in our own LifeWay Church family, our own saintly family members Elgin and Dorothy Taylor, who were the first African American missionaries from America to serve in Japan more than 50 years ago. Their personal journey is recorded in their book, Taking Giant Steps in World Missions (available at LifeWay). It is a missions story, not a race story—but undeniably, a portion of their story of following their calling to serve Christ in the world was affected by the color of their skin. When serving overseas, they were held up with some measure of honor; upon returning to the southern United States, they were degraded to sit in the back of the bus as black people with less dignity than the whites. It makes me cringe and breaks my heart.
I am a Christ follower. I believe that I want to listen to God’s Word as the loudest voice in my life, far above all other voices and news.
God’s Word says that humanity was created to bear His image.
God’s Word says that the actions and lifestyle of sin that I struggle with reflects the same fallen nature as Adam and Eve, and Cain’s murder of his brother Abel.
In other words, hatred is my humanistic response if I have not submitted myself back to God. If I live in a way that relies only on my own devices, I am out to destroy the dignity that God has placed on others. I must learn to understand. I must listen and understand other people’s journey. I must listen and understand God’s ultimate truth.
I will be working my way through other important words in the next few articles—words like hierarchy, justice, lament, reconciliation, and the sanctity of life. A book that most of us read as teens in school was Paradise Lost. I believe that paradise is lost because we have lost our sense of the sanctity of life that God created.