University of North Carolina Press
For the greater part of my life I have been trying to understand exactly how people, who claim to be Followers of Christ, are often those who are the most uncomfortable with people who are different than they are. Racial difference, Cultural difference, Gender difference, Religious difference, the list goes on and on. We just are plan uncomfortable and more often then not fearful of anyone of any perspective that is not ours . . .
The question I did not understand was how so much of this posturing was done in God's Name. I saw, and still do not see, nothing in the Bible nor does anything from the Holy Spirit speak to my heart that would even remotely lead me to believe that God has a favorite.
Religion and the Racist Right - traces some of the roots of racism and how religion has been impacted and vice versa. This book traces the development of British-Israelism and its transformation into Christian Identity here in the United States.
While a very small fraction of our population would ever embrace the extreme positions that these men preached such as the existence of a Pre-Adamic race, Demonization of the Jews, Inferiority of non-white people, etc., it is clear to me how some of these assumption have become a part of the fiber of DNA of our current and past white culture.
For me personally it helps me understand some of the folks in my personal history . . . not that I agree in the slightest but it helps me understand . . . . the only way for us to value one and other, the way Jesus values us, is to understand why we have the limp or the "thorn in the flesh" that we have.
Having been raised in the center of the Protestant / Fundamentalist / Pentecostal era I know and was subjected to the teaching of many of the names and denominations who have been, throughout history, on the fringes of this line of thinking.
One of the major issues that face Anglo / Saxons in the future coming to grips with how it feels to be in the minority. What kind of future we want for our children and our society.
Christians, True Followers of Jesus, should be on the forefront of this conversation . . . Leaders in reconciliation . . . but often times we are the ones who are creating and maintaining the divisions.
We can never move forward until we come to some understanding as to how we got here.
This book will give you insights into some of the extreme religious foundations of our modern society and how that warped thinking has diffused down to the mainstream.
2 comments:
Folks who believe God whispers to them and nobody else have always been spiritually dangerous because this belief-system accomplishes two truth-distortions at once -- it attempts to make God small (read ... manageable, malleable, and tamable) and it attempts to make them big (read ... to be feared, revered, and stood in awe of).
Of course, God can't be tamed anymore than any of us can sit on our own laps. And none of us deserve to be revered any more than we deserve the taste of strawberries and cream. And yet how easily we lust for both these lies to be true.
We lust with envy that God would be smaller. And we lust with pride that we would be bigger.
Paul wrote in Ephesians 4:22-23 ...
22 that, in reference to you former manner of life, you lay aside the old self, which is being corrupted in accordance with the lusts of deceit.
23 and that you be renewed in the spirit of your mind
I like the phrase Paul uses here ... "lusts of deceit" because there's perhaps no greater deceit than lust. And lust isn't just sexual. It's wanting what we don't have, even if we know it will kill us. Like Frederick Buechner writes in his book "Wishful Thinking", "Lust is the craving for salt of a person who is dying of thirst."
I'm no expert, and I'm certainly not a professional theologian, but I think that much of our mis-steps as Christ's followers would take care of themselves if we gave more time and thought to listening to, understanding and obeying God ... and less time and thought trying to figure out how to be God's mouthpiece.
Uttering the phrase "thus sayeth the LORD" should scare the begeebers out of us. Even the most confident of prophets had inferiority complexes. Misunderstood. Seldom listened to. Chased out of town with regularity. Hardly ever invited over for dinner more than once. Being God's mouthpiece is one misunderstood gig -- and it's all too often taken up by people who are more ego-driven rather than Spirit-led, and more fear-based than Christ-centered.
And yet, you can't get around the fact that God does indeed ask us to speak for Him. I guess that one of the litmus tests for whether God has really asked us to speak for Him, should be that while speaking we should be quaking in our boots because our reverence for being God's mouthpiece demands it, more than because we're afraid somebody will misunderstand us or read something into what we've said that God never intended.
God asks pastor-teachers to speak on His behalf weekly, and even sometimes more often! This makes me think of the words of Reinhold Niebuhr in his book "Leaves From The Notebook Of A Tamed Cynic" (which is a collection of Niebuhr's journal entries as a young pastor in Chicago).
From Niebuhr's journal in 1915 ...
"They say a young preacher must catch his second wind before he can really preach. I'd better catch it pretty soon, or the weekly sermon will become a terrible chore.
"You are supposed to stand before a congregation, brimming over with a great message. Here I am trying to find a new little message each Sunday.
"If I really had great convictions, I suppose they would struggle for birth each week. As the matter stands, I struggle to find an idea worth presenting, and I dread the approach of each Sabbath.
"I don't know if I can ever accustom myself to the task of bringing light and inspiration in regular, weekly installments.
"How in the world can you reconcile the inevitability of Sunday and its task with the moods and caprices of the soul? The prophet only speaks when he is inspired. The parish preacher must speak whether he is inspired or not. I wonder if it is possible to live on a high enough plane to do that without sinning against the Holy Spirit?" (p. 12)
Niebuhr speaks my mind ... living in a cautious balance between "willingness to be God's mouthpiece" and a severe case of the "yikes!"
God, give me the discernment I need to obey you without being afraid. And give me the courage I need to follow through on what You ask me to -- regardless of whether it's opening my mouth or keeping it shut. Godspeed.
read.think.pray.live.
Gregg Lamm
www.stayingthecourse.blogspot.com
Interesting. Knowing this history becomes even more important was the world quickly becomes less white. Our future nation will be heavily populated and multi-cultural. Learning to live, and love in that environment will be key to or cultural and economic success.
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