I aim to use this article to respond to frequent questions I hear from within our community about race and racism. My hope is for this to be updated as new questions are raised.
(For a foundational understanding of why we should talk about racism in the church, check out this article.)
What if I don’t think that racism is a problem anymore?
In a diverse community seeking to live in the unity of the Spirit and the bond of peace[1], we are called not only to tolerate each other but to listen to[2] and defer to each other, considering the needs of others as our own[3].
It is not uncommon, especially for practicing white christians to believe that race is not a major problem in our community. According to a 2019 Barna survey, only 38% of white Christians believe there is a race problem in the U.S. Only less than 50% agree that historically, the U.S. has been oppressive to racial minorities.
This disparity has likely impacted the motivation of white Christians to address racial injustice. Only 35% of practicing white Christians see themselves as motivated to address racial injustice, compared to 70% of black practicing Christians.
Much of this disparity stems from the fact that many white Christians are not listening well to the people of color within their churches or broader church community in their area.
As a church, bound and led by the Spirit, we can do better by intentionally listening to each other, practicing the fruit of the spirit, and striving to to discern the rifts between us.
These are practices we often see in healthy marriages.
For instance, if my wife says to me “We have a problem,” then my wife and I have a problem that needs to be addressed.
Even if I don’t see the problem.
Even if I don’t understand the problem.
Even if I don’t really think there is a problem.
If my wife, whom I love, says there is a problem… we have a problem.
As a member of a local church, I am called to listen to the needs, fears, concerns, and perspectives of my brothers and sisters; even if I don’t get it. I can humble myself and listen, approaching them with curiosity instead of suspicion, with a desire to truly understand, and to reconcile if needed.
Moreover, it is good for me to remember that things that don’t negatively affect me are rarely ‘on my radar.’
Left to my own devices, I rarely think about sexism, ageism, or ethnocentrism. Often, it is the people in my life who are not like me that God uses to reveal to me my blind spots, my besetting sins, my ignorance, my lack of empathy, or the presence of apathy.
For instance, I have been blessed and challenged as I listen to women in our church discuss their experiences with sexism.
I have grown from listening to those of different generations give their perspective on ageism.
I have benefited greatly from being in relationship with those of different economic status how classism and economic segregation has impacted them.
I have matured by hearing men and women of different races and ethnicities speak on racism and ethnocentrism.
As a member of a Jesus-centered community of misfits, we work to discern together what the problem areas are and then, by the power of the Spirit, live in solidarity, mutual love and submission, and together pursue the ministry of reconciliation.[4]
Is racism a problem in today’s church?
While there are many ways to address this question, I will answer with one that I believe is irrefutable and is directly related to the cause of Christ.
Scripture teaches that the church is to be a socio-economic, ethnically, and chronologically diverse community[5]. The book of Acts and many of the epistles highlight some of the ways this proved to be difficult in the early days of the church (for instance, in the book of Acts).
In his letter to the Ephesians[6], Paul argues that it is the inclusion of the ethnic outsiders (ethnos aka gentiles) into the church that puts on display the manifold (many-colored / diverse) wisdom of God to the powers and principalities[7].
The early church was radically diverse.
However, two millennia later, the evangelical church in America is one of the most ethnically segregated[8] institutions in our community.
Even for local congregations that have some degree of diversity within their large gatherings, there is often a noticeable dominant culture that the congregation conforms to[9].
The question is: WHY?
Why are local churches homogenous when they are divinely-designed to be diverse?
One of the reasons our churches are homogenous, contrary to their design, is that the evil of racism continues to infect our community and while many within the church have fought against this demonic force for decades, it still holds power over us.
In fact, our discomfort in talking about it openly within the church, whether from the pulpit or in smaller, more personal relationships, reveals its continued power today. Not only is the American Evangelical church predominantly segregated, it is also often incapable of talking about racism in healthy ways that lead to reconciliation.
While there are certainly many other areas of society that racism has infected, as a Jesus-follower, I am most grieved by the fact that it has impacted His church.
Does the Bible Talk about racism?
Yes and no.
The modern idea of race is relatively new and thus not mentioned directly as such in scripture.
Rodney Sadler, citing Ugandan anthropologist Peter Rigby, states that “race is a recent invention that was conceived to facilitate the formation of European identity and hence unity of disparate ethnic units in the development of Western capitalism and colonialism.”[10]
While ‘racism’ proper is not in the scripture, ethnicity[11] and ethnocentrism are all over the Bible.
The world in which the biblical authors lived was often profoundly ethnically segregated and experienced this segregation as a regular source of conflict, systemic injustice, and fear[12].
Moreover, an understanding of ethnicity and ethnocentrism is critical to understanding a large portion of scripture. Here are just a few examples where ethnicity plays a role in the text:
● The call of Abram to be a blessing to the nations[13]
● The use of ‘nations’ in the Psalms[14]
● Ruth was a Moabite[15]
● Anytime the word Gentile (ethnos) is used[16]
● The Syrophoenician woman in Mark[17]
● The argument between the Greek and Jewish Widows in Acts[18]
● Jesus slandered as a Samaritan in John[19]
● The “Good Samaritan” in Luke[20]
● The Great Commission to reach “All ethnos” in Matthew[21]
● Paul’s use of Jew, Greek, Barbarian, Scythian[22]
● The multi-ethnic image of heaven on earth in Revelation[23]
In many of these accounts, there is a power dynamic at work between the different ethnic groups, with the ethnic ‘insider’ often having an implicit power over the ‘ethnic outsider(s)’.
Ethnicity is all over the Bible. And the reconciled union of the various ethnicities (ethnos/peoples/nations) is seen in the early Church.
Does the Bible talk about Systemic Injustice?
Yes.
Joshua Ryan Butler has a great study on it here.
I have written about the biblical view of Justice here.
If I am white, am I automatically considered guilty of racism?
I think I get where this question is coming from, and I’d like to respond, with a couple of considerations.
First, whenever someone accuses me of a particular sin, I have a choice. I can choose to view myself as ‘above it’, get defensive, and say things like “how dare you accuse me of ____”
Or, I can humble myself and pray through the words of Psalm 139:
‘Search me, God, and know my heart;
test me and know my concerns.
See if there is any offensive way in me;
lead me in the everlasting way.’
If I understand scripture correctly, there is no evil that I am ‘above’[24].
When my friends, peers, or even enemies accuse me, I can seek to justify myself or I can go to Jesus and ask him to search me and know me.
At the end of the day, the one accusing me doesn’t decide if I am guilty or not.
Frankly, neither do I.
That’s a call that only God makes[25].
Second, for those of us coming from an individualistic culture that elevates the self over the community, we ought not fail to see how evil works within communities.
There are occasions in scripture where members of a people group confess the sins of their community[26], recognizing that as an individual we are often shaped by our community in unseen ways.
We see in scripture that confession does not necessarily imply culpability.
However, there does seem to be a responsibility that one inherits from their forefathers. Dr. Michael Rhodes argues that:
“Leviticus 26:40–44 suggests that one reason the present generation needs to repent of the sins of their forebears is that sin causes a rupture that must be repaired. What’s required is not just that the present generation confess their sins and the sins of their ancestors, but also that they “make amends (yirṣû) for their iniquity” (26:41b, 43). If the damage one generation does is not fixed in their own day, that damage does not simply disappear at their death. The wrong must be righted, and the job may well fall on their descendants.
The wrong that must be atoned for may be a wrong committed exclusively against God. But the reality that later generations inherit the obligation to repair an earlier generation’s sins also applies to sins against one’s neighbors. This type of intergenerational repentance stands at the center of Leviticus 25’s depiction of the Year of Jubilee”[27]
This sentiment of responsibility to make restitution for past generations’ sins is also found in the ideas of the Puritans. In his book on repentance, Thomas Watson states:
“Let him restore his ill-gotten goods to that man’s heirs and successors. If none of them be living, let him restore to God, that is, let him put his unjust gain into God’s treasury by relieving the poor.”[28]
Watson believed that if the one wronged party is no longer living, the wrongdoer is to make financial recompense to someone else who is in need or has been injured. He also considers the scenario in which the descendants of the deceased wrongdoer consider what needs to be done to make recompense. Addressing this, Watson argues
“Then they who are his heirs ought to make restitution. Mark what I say: if there be any who have estates left them, and they know that the parties who left their estates had defrauded others and died with that guilt upon them, then the heirs or executors who possess those estates are bound in conscience to make restitution, otherwise they entail the curse of God upon their family.”[29]
To confess the evils done by our ancestors, forefathers or current community is not the same as being guilty of the sin. When we confess, we recognize that we are not above it, and, like those before us, prone to similar, if not the same, sinful thinking and behavior.
Moreover, corporate confession and repentance presents us with an opportunity to pursue justice, which may include restitution, even if we were not directly responsible for the original offense.
So to answer the question directly: no, being white does make a person guilty of racism.
But it is certainly dangerous to ignore that this evil has infected many of those who came before us and if we believe we are above the influence of our cultural forbearers or we fail to see that we may be beneficiaries of a system that hurts others to elevate ‘people like us’, we have likely missed the point.
[1]Ephesians 4:2-3
[2] James 1:19
[3] Philippians 2:2-4
[4] 2 Corinthians 5:18
[5] Genesis 1:26-27, Romans 4, Galatians 3-4, Colossians 3, Ephesians 2, Revelation 5:9, 7:9, 10:11, 11:9, 13:7, 14:6, 17:15
[6] Especially Chapters 3-4. Most English versions translate ‘ethnos’ as ‘Gentile’.
[7] Ephesians 3:10
[8] Emerson, Michael O., and Christian Smith. Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America. New York: Oxford University Press, 2001.
[9] Edwards, Korie L. The Elusive Dream. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008. p8
[10] Peter Rigby, African Images: Racism and the End of Anthropology (Oxford: Berg, 1996)p1-5
[11] Kuecker, A. (2011). The Spirit and the “Other”: Social Identity, Ethnicity and Intergroup Reconciliation in Luke-Acts (The Library of New Testament Studies) (1st ed.). T&T Clark.
[12] Kuecker, A. (2011). The Spirit and the “Other”: Social Identity, Ethnicity and Intergroup Reconciliation in Luke-Acts (The Library of New Testament Studies) (1st ed.). T&T Clark. (37-38)
[13] Genesis 12:3 uses miš·pā·ḥā, which is nations, race, family
[14] E.g. Psalm 46.
[15] Ruth 1:4
[16] For instance, in the book of Acts.
[17] Mark 7:26
[18] Acts 6:1
[19]John 8:48
[20] Luke 10:33
[21] Matthew 28:19 (notice ‘nations’ is ethnos)
[22] Colossians 3:11
[23] Revelation 21:24 & 26
[24] Jeremiah 17:9
[25] Proverbs 21:2
[26] See Joshua 7, Ezra 9, Isaiah 6, Daniel 9, Matthew 25, Acts 2, Romans 5
[27] https://hebraicthought.org/repenting-intergenerational-racist-ideology-scripture-intergenerational-sin/
[28] Watson, The Doctrine of Repentance, Ch. 3, “Ingredient 2: Sorrow for Sin.”
[29] Watson, The Doctrine of Repentance, Ch. 3, “Ingredient 2: Sorrow for Sin.”