“… If I can’t learn to lament and repent, I will never be able to envision a world where resurrection is truly possible”-DL Mayfield, The Myth of the American Dream
“American Christians have never had trouble celebrating their victories, but honestly recognizing their failures and inconsistencies, especially when it comes to racism, remains an issue- jumping ahead to the victories means skipping the hard but necessary work of examining what went wrong with race in the church. That can lead to simplistic understandings of the past and superficial solutions to racial issues in the present.”- The Color of Comprise, Jemar Tisby
We need to care less about having multi ethnic churches and more about
There are 4 parts to trauma informed approaches that Dr. Anita Philips outlines:
1. Trauma informed care means we approach people from the perspective of their wound.
2. Trust and empower the voice of the wounded.
3. Create safe spaces.
4. Practice trauma informed humility.
As Ava famously said: “The system isn’t broken, it was built to be this way.”
1. American Christianity’s Racist Roots: The Perspective of Their Wound
This nation claiming Christian from the beginning of its founding has a long history of involvement with racism. If we looked back on this, we would clearly see how it does no good for us to be “color blind”. Quite opposite: this work begins with acknowledgment.
We think of the history of slavery and segregation as so far behind, but it is all so much closer than we think. And its shifts, molds, and moves as time passes. It’s hard to see it until you choose to. And if you don’t run in circles apart from your own, you’ll easily miss it or ignore it or overlook it.
Injustice for people of color in this day and age takes place, in large part, in the justice system. If you are black or brown, you are the first suspect and quickest to be charged, even without guilt. We see this in various movements and calls for justice, we see it in the record-breaking mainstream with series’ like When They See Us. But if you pay attention to the news, the statistics, the voices that are pushed aside, you see it stained all over our nation’s history.
Generational trauma was created in the minority culture, and generational mindsets of superiority were embedded in white culture. Changed laws do not mean changed hearts.
Believers are at risk of throwing our hands up and just getting used to the fact that police brutality, a wrecked justice system, and white supremacy (just to name a few) is how things always have been, and how they will always be. We did it when Christians owned slaves because it was just a normal part of their culture, and we can do it now by accepting what is.
The problem is, our ears are not open. We are not willing to study, to sit down and listen, to do the grueling work of educating ourselves on just how close the past is, and just how closely the past has followed us into today. It makes us uncomfortable. We’d rather leave it in the past than allow it to inform our future. And it is especially hard for the American church to face their past.
But if the church won’t face it’s past, it will catch up to us- it already has. And we will give an account for how we lived in light of the injustices of others. We can’t hide in the sin of passivity any longer.
2. Trust and empower the voice of the wounded: Believers, Let’s Learn to Lament
“Lament seeks God as comforter, healer, restorer, and redeemer.”- Latasha Morrison
Many white Christians don’t understand the practical concept of lament, but this is something we can learn from our black brothers and sisters in Christ. Just as we do in patriotism and American politics, white American Christians take on triumphalism instead of lament.
It is our duty to memorialize the past of this nation for the subjugated.
To look forward, we must first look back. The truth from God’s point of view sets us free to love, care for, and advocate for our bothers and sisters of every tribe, tongue, and nation, as well as every single person made in the imago Dei. Being well informed and educated is a start, but it’s not enough. We must learn to lament (express sorrow or regret).
As believers, we must be burdened by injustice. If we are asking for God’s heart, this is where our prayers will lead. When we take on the grief of those who have long been oppressed in the American church, we are walking in empathy, which leads to healing.
Lament does not end when we become aware and then go to seek God. Instead, it brings us into partnership with him to bring restoration. Lament is seeing the injustice and grieving it, then going forward in action.
Lament acknowledges the past and makes way for a new future.
We are not called to race past the deep grief of the past in the same way America has tried to. As believers, we are called to remember the injustice that does not match God’s Kingdom. And as we lament, God stands with everything we need to move forward in hope, not negating the past, but not grieving without hope.
“As it is, I rejoice, not because you were grieved, because you were grieved into repenting”
-2 Corinthians 7:9 ESV
3.Create safe spaces: Believers, Let’s Memorialize History
“Do not be daunted by the enormity of the world’s grief.
Do justly, now.
Love mercy, now.
Walk humbly, now.
You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it”
-The Talmud
So what do we do, you ask? Well in a sense, the church needs to learn how to make reparations.
A formal apology memorializes the past instead of sweeping it under the rug.
It is the church’s job to memorialize the past. Memorial is remembering. The jews have entire celebrations, whole holidays to remember the exodus from slavery and into the promised land. To remember what was done to their people. To mourn tragedy and celebrate freedom. We still remember things, we read all about them in the Old Testament and we tell tales about them.
So what does this look like in the body, memorial? Preserving history? Remembrance? Saying “we know this was unjust, we know it lives on in many ways, and we stand with you?”
From the time I’ve spent listening, it means not sweeping it under the rug simply because it’s uncomfortable. This means we, for the love of God, stop using the puritans who were slave owners in our sermon analogies, and instead use the incredible and immovable TRUE faith of the subjected at that time, such as freedom songs. This means when injustice takes place in the nation we call home, we talk about it. From the pulpit, from our social media platforms, and with each other. That we call our leadership to lead their congregations in being the change. It means we grieve with those who grieve and mourn with those who mourn.
Addressing racial injustice from the pulpit is uncomfortable, but it is Jesus to do so.
4. Practicing Trauma Informed Humility: May the Body’s Heart Break
“Empathy is the first step to racial solidarity”- Latasha Morrison
Our hearts must break for the things that break God’s own.
The voices speaking about these injustices are primarily those whose people it belongs to, but this should not be for believers, because for us, these are our brothers and sisters. Our neighbors and coheirs with Christ.
The reason it is easy to call speaking up about racial injustices present in our nation and the world “decisive” is this- we, the people who don’t think about the implications of our skin color every day, believe the issue can get secondary treatment.
When we call issues divisive, it is because they CAN be put to rest. They are unimportant to be front and center. They are secondary.
No Christian would call, say, abortion a secondary issue. This is because it needs immediate attention. It is happening all around us. It outrages us. Many would fight to the death on the issue in debate (many frequently do).
The reason we can’t “just stop with the race stuff” for the sake of peace is because we are called to flip the cultural climate on its head, just like Jesus flipped tables when he saw injustice taking place. Jesus did not remain neutral or silent about racial and cultural injustices in his day (think of the Samaritans). Neither did he commend the religious people who pushed aside those who were being discriminated against. Instead, he condemned this behavior. He came to restore what was broken for the subjugated through the healing power of the gospel. And before he left, he told us, his people, to bring the kingdom of heaven to earth.
Putting turn our orthodoxy into orthopraxy: Practical steps the body can take to racially concile
“Much of the American church has not yet considered racism to be a serious enough sin to interrupt their regularly scheduled worship, at least not much beyond conversations and symbolic gestures, to repair the relationship“
Awareness, relationships, commitment. This is the “ARC” Jemar Tisby lays out for us in his book The Color of Compromise. It gives us practical insight as to what it looks like for our churches and Christians to take up the cause of racial restoration.
Awareness: “I think knowing one’s history leaves one to act in a more enlightened fashion. I cannot imagine how not knowing one’s history would not urge one to be an activist.“ knowing history gives context for the present. There is no way to grasp the racial divide without understanding its construction.
Relationships: awareness should lead us to care about individuals. we can’t stop with being aware, we must work to intentionally build relationships with those whose lived experiences are different from our own. Making black friends isn’t a project we undertake. Rather, it’s a lifestyle to diversify our inner and outer circles in order to have a gospel centric community.
Commitment: “ The injustices of the past continue to affect the present and it is up to the current generation to interrupt the cycle of racial compromise and confront it with courage.” being aware and being in a relationship should always lead us to act. Pursuing racial justice is a lifelong journey of antiracist action. In the way we vote, the topics we talk about, the things we create, the ways we use our platforms, and the organizations we give our money to, action needs to take place.
Courage, Dear Heart 