Hang in here with me, okay?
Every single time I get done speaking to a group of people about the need for diversity and racial reconciliation in the church, someone asks me — every single time — “What can I do?” Sometimes, it sounds like this: “What can I do?” And sometimes, it sounds like this: “What can I do?”
I don’t know your unique makeup or situation or level of awareness or on-boardness. But, I can tell you my story. I can tell you some of the things that have worked for me and some of the things that haven’t. I can tell you where I get the most frustrated and where I find the most hope.
And, I can listen to your story.
I can also tell you this: our racial divisions are not the only places where the church fails to model the oneness we are made for, and that Jesus desires for us.
We have been breaking our backs, setting up walls of stone and drawing lines of division where we should be building bridges. And this, among those who follow Jesus, just like us. The Bible tells us in John 13 they — those who are watching, wondering what this Christ-following business is really all about — will know we are Christians by our love for one another. It doesn’t say we’ll be known by how many people we pack into our sanctuaries, or even by how many cool cups of water we offer to thirsty people, dusty from their journey through life. No. We will be identifiable to the world as people who follow Jesus, because of our love for each other. Even — and especially — the people who make us the most uncomfortable, and who are the most different from us.
Sometimes we get stuck in old patterns that have been handed down to us from one generation to the next. Or, we get our feelings hurt and we lash out and, before we know it, we’ve let our emotions get the best of us and allowed a great chasm to be dug between us and another person (or group of people) in the Body of Christ. Other times, we feel the need to take a stand, but end up with our foot on someone else’s neck — often without even realizing it.
On the night Jesus was betrayed, He prayed for us in the garden before His arrest. His prayer that night, was that we would be one.
“I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as You, Father, are in me, and I in You, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that You have sent me. The glory that You have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and You in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that You sent me and loved them even as You loved me.” {John 17:21-23, italics mine}
We wonder why the world doesn’t get it. We wonder why they don’t believe in Jesus or live the way He taught. But Jesus said they will get it when we figure out how to live as one. The ball is in our court. Not theirs.
{Whew! You’re still here! Yay!}
Many people have told me it’s not really a problem. “People go where they’re comfortable,” many have said to me. “I wish it were different, but if I tried to go to a church like that, I don’t know if I’d be welcomed,” others offer. “The Church universal is diverse,” some submit with great conviction.
But, there is a movement afoot in the Body of Christ.
There is a tug at our hearts for something better. There is a desire growing in the souls of those whose hearts beat to the sound of the Kingdom of God. This low hum rises up from the earth — the way radical things tend to do — a grassroots hunger to love in a way that makes the world sit up and take notice. This is the prayer Jesus prayed for us. The story of reconciliation is a golden thread, woven through the Good News, and connecting Genesis and Revelation and everything and everyone in between.
As William E. Pannell puts it: “Reconciliation is the ministry of the church.”
Oneness in the Body of Christ — the tearing down of all the walls we build up to keep one another at a distance — is our inheritance.
Would you consider sharing your thoughts? Over the next few months, I’ll be working on a book about oneness and reconciliation. And, while the book will touch on racial reconciliation, it will also explore other areas where we find ourselves divided. As Christians, how do we live out the gospel in a way that bridges those divides? I’d love your input. I’d love to hear your stories and your thoughts. Have you found your entry point to this conversation? Have you been wondering about some specific aspect of the conversation, but you’re afraid to ask, for fear of what people may think about you, or whom you might offend? What, in your opinion, is missing from the conversation? And, why does this conversation matter to you?
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