On Earth as it is in Heaven

On this day in 1865, federal orders were read in Galveston, Texas to free all slaves. The Emancipation Proclamation had outlawed slavery two and a half years prior, but slave release had not yet been enforced in Texas due to the limited reach of Union troops. One hundred and fifty-five years later and the video recorded over reach of law enforcement is pointing more and more people to the reality that the legal mandate of racial equality continues to go unenforced.

Black lives in the United States have always suffered under the oppressive violence of a racial caste order. No one denies that there have been great advances in civil rights reform and social practice over the past century and a half. To anyone paying attention, however, it is painfully clear that racism persists as a lethal, modern problem.

The practice of lynching African-Americans did not end with the Jim Crow era, it merely adapted to the dominant culture’s shifting socio-political landscape. Lynchings are no longer carried out by men wearing sheets over their heads, but by civilians who assume taking a black life falls under a state’s citizen’s arrest statute or by police officers conducting a sanctioned carotid restraint.

In Letter from Birmingham Jail, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote, “Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself.” Our country is experiencing, once again, an oppressed people’s overflowing desire for liberation and equality.

King also expressed that “white moderates [are the] greatest stumbling block in [black people’s] stride toward freedom.” To be a moderate is to avoid extremes of behavior and expression, which is an untenable disposition for any Christian witnessing injustice.

Right now is a time to abhor the evil of racism and it has been this time for a very long time.

We also need to be grieving the deaths of Amadou Diallo, Patrick Dorismond, Ousmane Zongo, Timothy Stansbury, Sean Bell, Oscar Grant, Aiyana Stanley-Jones, Ramarley Graham, Trayvon Martin, Tamon Robinson, Rekia Boyd, Kimani Grey, Sam Dubose, Freddie Gray, Terence Crutcher, Alton Sterling, Jamar Clark, Jeremy McDole, William Chapman II, Walter Scott, Eric Harris, Tamir Rice, Akai Gurley, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, John Crawford III, Ezell Ford, Dante Parker, Michelle Cusseaux, Laquan McDonald, George Mann, Tanisha Anderson, Akai Gurley, Rumain Brisbon, Jerame Reid, Matthew Ajibade, Frank Smart, Natasha McKenna, Tony Robinson, Anthony Hill, Mya Hall, Phillip White, Eric Harris, Alexia Christian, Brendon Glenn, Victor Manuel Larosa, Jonathan Sanders, Joseph Mann, Salvado Ellswood, Sandra Bland, Albert Joseph Davis, Darrius Stewart, Billy Ray Davis, Samuel Dubose, Michael Sabbie, Brian Keith Day, Christian Taylor, Troy Robinson, Asshams Pharaoh Manley, Felix Kumi, Keith Harrison McLeod, Junior Prosper, Lamontez Jones, Paterson Brown, Dominic Hutchinson, Anthony Ashford, Alonzo Smith, Tyree Crawford, India Kager, La’Vante Biggs, Michael Lee Marshall, Jamar Clark, Richard Perkins, Nathaniel Harris Pickett, Benni Lee Signor, Miguel Espinal, Michael Noel, Kevin Matthews, Bettie Jones, Quintonio Legrier, Keith Childress Jr., Janet Wilson, Randy Nelson, Antoine Scott, Wendell Celestine, David Joseph, Calin Roquemore, Dyzhawn Perkins, Christopher Davis, Marco Loud, Peter Gaines, Torrey Robinson, Darius Robinson, Kevin Hicks, Mary Truxillo, Demarcus Semer, Willie Tillman, Terrill Thomas, Sylville Smith, Alton Sterling, Philando Castile, Terence Crutcher, Paul O’Neal, Alteria Woods, Jordan Edwards, Aaron Bailey, Ronell Foster, Stephon Clark, Antwon Rose II, Bothan Jean, Pamela Turner, Dominique Clayton, Atatiana Jefferson, Christopher Whitfield, Christopher Whitfield, Christopher McCorvey, Eric Reason, Michael Lorenzo Dean, Ahmed Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd…………………………………………………………………………..

And our grief must produce action as well as tears. In a recent NPR article entitled, Evangelicals Grapple with Racism as Sin, Trillia Newbell expressed how she believed the Church needs to be responding to racism, “I want to hear that we are mourning and weeping, that we are active in our community, that we are going to work to love our neighbor as ourselves…” As we weep with those who weep we must also go to work!

Racism must move Christians to not only lament with the psalmist who asks God to tear out the fangs of the wicked (Psalm 58:6), but to go to work, like Job, to break the oppressor’s fangs (Job 29:17). The Church must be a grieving and active protest to injustice and to be this we will need to be dressed to the hilt in God’s love for he alone is able to harmonize grief with hatred of evil and make it virtuous (Colossians 3:14).

If you aren’t protesting the fist of racism as it shakes in the face of God and strikes his Black image bearers then ask God and others to help you get there.

But the Church is to be more than prayerful protestors. We are to be God’s active agents who are passionately and creatively administering love so that his kingdom spreads throughout our communities. John Perkins writes,

I am all for churches being a part of the nonviolent marches and protests that have happened in the wake of violent killings, but these protests happen only after a tragic event has taken place. I want the church to be what prevents these acts from ever happening. I want the church to be the community that is so dedicated to loving our neighbors, to caring for the poor and neglected, and to living out true reconciliation that these killings do not even take place…God has always wanted the vulnerable in society to be cared for. He never intended for them to languish in poverty, abuse, slavery, homelessness, or other types of devastation. When we care for individuals who are trapped in these ways, when we show them love and help them move toward freedom and wholeness, we participate in bringing a little part of God's Kingdom back into alignment with His greater plan.

Injustice and oppression must break the Church’s heart so much that we are stirred up to love and good works until our prayers and actions declare in unison “God’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6:10-11).

*A prejudiced criminal justice system is only one of the burdens oppressing African-Americans. Voter suppression, restricted access to housing and educational resources, a historical trauma narrative, etc. are not shocking enough to garner media coverage, but the Church needs to become educated on the oppression facing people of color. The following books will provide a good introduction to the issue of racial injustice: Dream with Me, Divided by Faith, Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria, The New Jim Crow and The Color of Compromise. If you are a parent to young children here are some book recommendations that you can use to spark ongoing discussion.

Article Photo by Nathan Dumlao on Unsplash