Soulfood

Gospel Conversations about Race/Ethnicity in Your Church Community

Shai Linne

Two tendencies we have towards this topic – apathy (why are we talking about this) and idolatry (ethnicity and race are everything)

Acknowledge the challenges, talk about it Biblically, talk about it redemptively

Recognize the challenge – there is a painful historical reality (slavery, Jim Crow, segregation, etc). There was a sit-in at the Woolworth’s lunch counter here in Greensboro in 1960. This is barely a generation ago. Professing Christians violently opposed these sit-ins. People living today were alive then – it is a living memory.

The topic is challenging because it has been politicized.

The topic is challenging because Satan seeks to divide us – so there is a spiritual warfare going on as our Enemy stirs up division among us. This is the strongest opposition especially because we don’t recognize it.

We must talk about this topic biblically. Race is not a biblical concept. Ethnicity is the biblical category. Race is a social construct created to justify slavery and discrimination. It has little to no basis in biology/genetics.

Ethnicity is a group of people who are identified together by a group of commonalities. These can be shared ancestry, physical features, history, religion, and cultural reference points/practices.

Ethnos is the Greek word used in Scripture to describe different culture people groups – translated often as nations. The table of nations in Genesis is about ethnos.

Racism exists – but race is not a biblical term. It is a word loaded with faulty assumptions. The term racism is used both too broadly and too narrowly. It has so many meanings as too be meaningless. It is unhelpful in identifying sin. Scripture is helpful!

Particular sins that manifest themselves in the realm of ethnicity:

1. Ethnic hatred – active animosity towards another ethnic group (Esther 9:24, Ex 1:8,22)

2. Ethnic pride – feelings of superiority based on ethnicity (1 Sam 17:8, Rom 2:17-29)

3. Ethnic favoritism or partiality – unjust preferential treatment based on ethnicity (James 2:9, Gal 2:11-14)

4. Ethnic oppression – the unjust or cruel exercise of power/authority towards one ethnic group by another (Ex. 3:9, Judg. 6:1-10)

5. Ethnic idolatry – elevating one’s ethnicity to an idolatrous status (Num. 121-16, Col 3:5)

6. Ethnic neglect – failure to care for others when it is in your power on the basis of ethnicity (Luke 10:25-37, Col 3:5)

All of these are failures to love neighbor as we love ourselves. These are biblical ways to talk about the sins – and when we can identify the sin, we can repent.

How do we talk about this redemptively?

1. Let us wholeheartedly embrace a new “we” – we are transformed by the work of God into a new community. Ethnicity no longer divides us. 2 Cor. 5:16ff we regard no one according to the flesh! My primary we is not my ethnicity, it is Christ – it is the church! This is the glory and the beauty of the new humanity.

2. Let us keep the gospel central! The conversation needs to be about being transformed by the person and work of Jesus Christ – this is of FIRST importance. Doing justice and preaching the gospel are both biblical imperatives – we can’t separate them. But pursuit of earthly justice can also push out the gospel, forgetting that vengeance is the LORD’s.

3. Let us be counter-cultural in how we pursue unity with Christians we disagree with. When the gospel is central in my life I can speak the truth in love, with kindness, gentleness, humility, and respect. 1 Pet 3:8 – we work to strive together towards unity – not demonizing them.

4. Let us assume the best about our Christian brothers and sisters. In the pursuit of ethnic unity we must fight against the impulse to believe the worst about those we disagree with.

5. Let us enter each other’s worlds. Sympathy is important – there is a connection between sympathy and proximity. Do life together and work to meet each other where they are.

What to do?

1. Don’t wait – start now. Have these conversations now so that when the world throws racial chaos at us we have biblical language to speak about it

2. Read!

The collapse of American Criminal Justice – William Stuntz

The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson

The Color of Law by Richard Rothstein

Being Black and Reformed by Anthony Carter

3. Ask intentional questions – reach out to ethnic minorities in your community, asking how we can come alongside to support them. Why bring it up? Because in Christ Jesus we are one in Christ – but this requires work on our part! Gal 3:28 doesn’t eliminate ethnic differences, it abolishes them as qualifiers for salvation. Ethnicity is a celebration of the intentionality of God’s creativity.

We must not allow the way the world has corrupted ethnicity to use it for evil keep us from celebrating the beauty of