Sin, Race, and One Hope – The Church is Made for These Times

There is no doubt that Marley was dead. This must be distinctly understood, or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to relate.

Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

This Broken World

In A Christmas Carol, Dickens, at the start, orients his audience to a critical foundational truth. There is no sense to the story without knowing that Jacob Marley was dead. Without knowing the truth of history, a miracle might go unnoticed.

It is a broken world. It is not the kind of broken that is isolated or repaired easily. The brokenness is in each of us, to the very core. It invades our thoughts, feelings and actions. And it surrounds us. Our actions are naturally tainted with us. The artist signature of all the endeavors of humanity is a mix. There is ingenuity, beauty, and passion that make us consider the “better angels” of humanity. Yet, it is all marked with our dark side. Our fear, greed, and ignorance warp it. It shows in the present and ugly wrong of racism and prejudice. This is not new, and that makes matters exponentially worse. We are carried along the current of a broken history. We have built our nations, art, and technology on broken foundations. The voices of history are a record of our wrongs. Refugees, slavery, and plunder are not the exclusive news of the 21st century. Each corner of the globe has the story of slavery, war, and theft. They are our birthright. Nor is it far away. It is in the Capital Region of New York State, my city, and yours.

Our Two Worlds

As Christians, we live in two worlds. The Christian is at once a resident of their nation, and lives with a stream of ethnic identity and history. Yet we are simultaneously, and more importantly, citizens of the Kingdom of God. This is where the miraculous work of redeeming men and women can be seen.

Our nature is to divide. We can divide based on point of view, gender, nationality or politics, just to name a few. But difference is part of us, and anyone who says we must be blind to it is blind to its beauty and the genius of our Creator. They are blind to the powerful communal interdependence differences forge. Difference – and the complimentary nature of it – is a wonder and a blessing that is sacred. However, after the fall, the sacred shattered. Difference became division. We divide first from God and then from one another. Division becomes destructive when we degrade and dehumanize the image of God in anyone.

It is the nature of God to unify. The sacred Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit holds together- until the moment when Christ takes all the sins of a fractured people upon Himself while on the cross and cries out, “My God, why have you forsaken me?” For a moment, the nature of our division threatened the source and hope of our unity.

But, beloved Church and friends, God in His forever goodness and unity is greater than all our darkness and division. Redemption changed the flow of sin and bridged the great divide – first between people and their God, and then between one another. The Bible says there is no longer the division that separated us (Galatians 3:28; Colossians 3:11). The Body of Christ is one in Him. Like a broken man or woman after a corrective surgery, there is a rehabilitation that follows, that allows us and the world around us to realize the fruit of the healing.

The Unchanged Message of the Church

Our call as Christians is not just to be healed, become self-satisfied, and then treat the great gift of redemption and ultimate restoration as a power that ends with us. We cannot be people who stall the dynamic force of the Gospel on a spiritual cul de sac. The Church must be a highway with on-ramps for others everywhere. When we take on the Name of Christ, we become ambassadors. Our second and greater citizenship commands us to be “ministers of reconciliation.”

I am not speaking against addressing a particular situation with the vehicles provided to us through nations. I have marched for causes, voiced concerns to civic leaders, and debated with others to try to win them over on a number of issues. I believe we need to address our situation, but like our citizenships, we address it in two ways. The earthly kingdom, at least for Americans, any US citizen can address by conventional means. One only the ambassadors of the Kingdom, the Nation of Priests, can do. If we do not realize this, nothing wonderful can come from this story.

The Church must know that God is involved in our affairs specifically for the purpose of solving the problem of human evil, or nothing wonderful will come from this story. We must know that the source of the brokenness still comes from sin, us breaking the laws of God, or nothing wonderful can come from this story. The Church must know that Jesus came to engage us and our sufferings, and that He died because of evil and because of good. The evil of every man, woman, and child in every time needed to be dealt with. It was. In the death of Christ, we do not simply see another mistake in our family scrapbook. It is not just the result of Hebrew oppression, or the corrupt religious powers, or even the betrayal of one by another that sent Christ to the cross. While these elements all played a part, the death of Christ was also God’s plan to fix the wrong that plagues all of us, the wrong that is not easy to repair and impossible to ignore. We must be about the work of Ambassadors and priests of our God who conquered sin and death through his own horrific and unjust agony, or nothing wonderful can come from this story.

Practical Advice for Priests and Ambassadors of Christ.

See the Image of God in Men, Women, and Children

Everyone that ever was, is, and will be has been made in the image of God. It is the common mark in us all. Though sin has marred us, the creative genius of the maker formed us in the image of God. The intellect, will, and emotions of humanity are shared from that source (Genesis 1:27). We are to embrace the nuances of perspective and pigment. In so doing, we are not simply welcoming and including another kind of person into our small world; we are embracing the unifying image of God in all mankind. To our shame, the Church has known this and not always taught this. In fact the Church has at times taught the opposite. At times churches still do.

Confront Bigotry in the Mirror

To make change, the change must start with us. Like all good advice, we must live it out ourselves or we become hypocrites. Before we point out the speck in the eye of another, Jesus said we must remove the log from our own. We have bigotries and biases ourselves. We must steal away our justifications for them, confess, and repent of them.

Be a Voice in Our Own Group

The value of the Body of Christ has to be our exalted identity. It is an eclectic ekklesia. With in Christ as our first identity, we can then go to the people who know us through our ethnic identity, our affinity, skills, or our hobbies – where we live, labor, and leisure – and bring Jesus with us. It is where we are accepted and have, or can have, influence that we need to speak the truth in love. We are uniquely designed and divinely guided to be the People of God where we are. Don’t compartmentalize truth to being spoken just to the church. Instead, be a priest to your people.

Everyone Needs to Hear the Voice of Another Group

“I know I don’t understand,” many will say, regarding the issues and experiences, the history and challenges that face another group. This can be used as a convenient place of exit from dialogue and action. It is correctable. Listening, asking questions even again and again so that we can understand one another more fully, is a wise course of action. I am grateful for the black pastors who pastor diverse people yet speak directly about the ills that have befallen many African Americans, and call the church to engage these ills with prayer and action. Friends like Eric Mason, Doug Logan, and Léonce Crump have educated me. They have shared their stories, heard mine, and changed me in the process. Several times they shared because I was aware that I did not know, and asked. The humble man becomes a wise man because he is not ashamed to ask for a teacher.

Pastor Your City, Together

We can recognize the problems of our cities and work together to solve these problems, and demonstrate solutions. Activism, manifestos and legislation are helpful, for a moment. They are like first-aid that keeps us alive long enough to find a true cure. The ministry of Jesus taught me that truth and grace are spoken and shaped only on the platform of presence (John 1:14). Church pastors of different races, generations, and denominations need to make the unified statement of oneness in Christ. We need to practice a wholeness to the Body in our worship, service and message in our cities. After service this Sunday, I immediately walked to neighboring Bethel Baptist Church to talk with Reverend Dr. Eric Shaw, their pastor. I volunteered myself and our church to work together to make a statement of presence, truth, and grace to our community. A history of ministry together made that easier.

Elevate the True Cure Even as the World Burns

For any of this to work, for something wonderful to come from our story, it means the Church must know Jesus and who they are in Him. They must love what he loves. They must live with passion and action married to that mission.

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, and friends who are not Christian, I say what we have said for 2,000 years – Jesus is the hope of the world. He is not the savior of theories, creeds, or people from the past. He is the Savior for today as people continue to hate one another and create even more complex and humanly impossible situations to solve. Jesus can make the persecutor precious to a people they once feared. Jesus can take the cowardly comfortable and make them courageous in confronting injustice. Jesus can take the heart dead with hate or locked in despair and give hope. Jesus can heal the divisions between people and their God, and ethnos (people group) vs. ethnos. Jesus, who healed these divisions in the midst of occupation and an unjust execution, calls us to be His body in our time. If we are His, then the Church is made for times and tragedies like this.