When I was in high school, I remember a specific conversation I had with my dad in the car on the way to church. At that time, there was a gender hierarchy in the church leadership guidelines, and I was asking him why that was. Why were women not allowed to hold certain roles, even if it was clear they had been gifted by God with preaching and teaching abilities? In my mind it didn’t make sense. Was it that there is some malfunction in women’s brains that allow them to understand and accept the Gospel, but prevents them from communicating it without speaking heresy? Anyway, I asked my dad (who was on the elder board of our church at the time) why the elders weren’t talking about the legitimacy of the restrictions on women in the church. And his answer to me was this – “well, we don’t see a need to talk about it right now. It’s just not a priority”. And I was thinking “Of course it’s not a priority to y’all, you’re all men! who already hold positions of authority!” The problem was that he and the other elders weren’t on the receiving end of the injustice – it was literally the same frustration I and other women were feeling that led them to see it as a non-issue.
Isn’t that the same mindset we’re using to ignore the overt and covert racism in our churches, in our cities, and in our own hearts? The privilege my dad had to allow him to say that to me is the same kind of privilege white people hold when they say “Well, it doesn’t really seem like an issue we need to talk about. Racism was killed by legislation in the ’60’s, so why should we bring it up now?”. Here’s the thing – white people hold the majority of positions of power in this country. We’ve never experienced what it’s like to be Black and live in America. Truthfully, we have no right to say racism isn’t an issue when we’re not on the receiving end of the injustice.
Another similarity between white privilege and my dad’s male privilege from the conversation above: My dad is a wonderful, compassionate, Jesus-loving, intelligent, hard-working person. I can’t say enough good things about him, he’s probably my favorite person on this earth. It took him 45ish years of life to develop the God-given wisdom and qualifications to become a church elder. I think he was absolutely right for that position, but here’s the thing – gender was never a factor for him that might’ve held him back from any positions in the church. Whereas, prior to 2016, if a woman at my church had the same qualifications and giftings as my dad, she would be automatically barred from certain positions of authority. In this same way we can understand white privilege. If your argument of its nonexistence is “you can’t say that applies to me. I’ve worked hard to get where I am”, I’m not fighting you that you put in the time and effort to build your life. Instead I’m saying white privilege allowed you to move through the ranks of life, of your career, of your social status, of your community – without ever having to be concerned that the color of your skin would negatively impact you. Again I will say, if you’re a white person reading this, you and I have no idea what it’s like to be Black in America. We are not allowed to claim the nonexistence of systemic racial injustice.
I’ve been silently (and maybe sometimes not so silently) reflecting on the failings of the church for a few years now. What I’m about to speak on absolutely is not me saying the church has failed in its entirety. I don’t think that’s a power we hold anyway. But I’d like to, as your sister in Christ, hold my brothers and sisters accountable for a specific sin struggle that usually we’d rather not talk about. Prep yourself for a defensive reaction to what I’m about to say, and please try to recognize it and put it aside for a second so that you can just listen to what I have to say. I’m not condemning – just calling us out on the unholy habits we have that we should’ve done away with a long time ago. It’s not in 100% of our churches, but enough of them.
The American church is failing at love and basic empathy. In the American spirit of individualistic protectionism, we’ve put constraints on the love we have for the world (where Jesus Himself put none). Each person has their own unique constraints, but generally these constraints have to do with the people who don’t share any demographic groups with us. Or the people our preferred politician tells us to stay away from. Or the people our social media timelines tell us are committed to destroying our way of life. Yikes. Can we just throw all of that out for a second and look at how God tells us to treat every human, regardless of how we feel about them? As followers of Christ, that’s all we should care about anyway.
“Love your neighbor as yourself”
“Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you”.
LOVE THEM. ALL O’ ‘EM.
To be clear, no human is actually our enemy. How often do we remember “our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against the powers and principalities of hell” (Ephesians 6:12)? Instead, we choose to place the label of “enemy” on people that God Himself gave everything for, people He loves *literally* to death. We actively and willfully dishonor God by pitting ourselves against other image-bearers. And I’m not speaking as someone who’s immune to that tendency. I fail at this all the flipping time. In past weeks, I’ve been asking God to reveal/remove my own apathy toward oppressed and marginalized people groups as well as my own prejudice against those on the conservative side of the racial arguments who unsympathetically deny systemic racism. But the point is that we MUST put our collective hope in Jesus to change that in us, to lead us so regularly to His heart that His way of life is the only way of life we see or want.
What is the church’s intended relationship with the world? I’m sure you remember the Great Commission. Would you agree with me that in many churches in America, the Great Commission has been monetized and commercialized? Would you agree with me that Jesus’ intention in giving us the Great Commission was never that we would spend thousands on airfare and luxury accommodations to carry the white man’s burden to a third world country for a week and return feeling really good about ourselves? Would you agree with me that His intent was instead that we would view the whole world, not as enemies, but as versions of ourselves prior to knowing the unbelievable love of Christ? I hear confirmation in that when Jesus told the people to love their neighbors as themselves. No human can be our enemy when we recognize and empathize with them as individual image-bearers in the same position we were in prior to knowing Christ. We should be fighting each other to be the ones on the front lines of providing physical and spiritual care to those in need, not fighting against or subjugating the rest of the world as if God didn’t create them in His image too. Church, we are called to listen to, empathize with, and seek justice for the cries of the oppressed. We are not at war with other image-bearers.
A lot of this has been rant-ish, so let me end with a word of encouragement. Specifically, a word that God has spoken to me recently.
“You’re never gonna be perfect. But you’re always gonna belong to me.”
God (literally) stopped me in my tracks with that a couple weeks ago. In my effort to “act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly”, I was really noticing a lot of the places I was failing to do those things. And it’s really easy for the death spiral to start in my mind when I start thinking of things like that. But God stopped that from happening by reminding me of what is true. I’m never gonna be perfect, but I’m always gonna belong to Him. It’s totally true, I promise. Read this:
“So, my brothers and sisters, you also died to the law through the body of Christ, that you might belong to another, to Him who was raised from the dead, in order that we might bear fruit for God.” Romans 7:4
How specific or vague is your doctrine of what changed as a result of Christ’s life, death, and resurrection? Because in this passage, you can confidently add this into the mix: we (YOU. ME.) are no longer subject to the system that says our failings separate us from God. My concern will never ever ever again be that my failings change God’s opinion of me or my standing in His kingdom. Instead, I’m free to fail! I’m free to run back to the way of Jesus as many times as I need. Because I know His mercies are endless (Lamentations 3:22-23). Because I know He promised that for every time I am faithless to Him, He remains faithful (2 Timothy 2:13). Because I know that He is good and He said that the work is finished (John 19:30). Because I know that I’m under a new and living way that allows me to follow Jesus imperfectly (Hebrews 10). (My last post was actually about this too, so go take a look if you feel so led).
If you are a follower of Jesus, then you’re a follower of Jesus. All I encourage you to do is just to do that. Follow Him, study His way, His truth, and His life. Go straight to the source, and live your life from there. I’m begging you – don’t let your worldly affiliations bleed into how you treat image-bearers. That’s really the heart of what I wanted to say here. Sorry not sorry it took this big long post.
(Though if it makes you feel better, if I typed out everything I was thinking this’d rival the brick that is the unabridged version of Les Mis sitting on my bookshelf.)
-Hal
Soundtrack of a Blog:
29. Grace & Mercy by Jess Ray