The state of the world today has me
adrift at sea, in a boat without an anchor, afloat in a thick fog. I don’t know if I am miles from land, or if I
am about to run onto rocks that will rip through the hull and send me to the
depths. I am frustrated, sad, uncertain,
and exhausted.
Yet, there is another a deeper
feeling, and my brokenness cannot silence.
There is a low hum that never quiets, never quits, that is always there
reverberating in my soul. It began at
the cross and grew in tone and texture on Easter morning. I am an Easter Christian following the
resurrected Christ.
We are an Easter congregation that
has hope even on the darkest day. On
Friday, we know that Sunday’s coming. It
doesn’t mean we’re happy all the time.
And we do get broken. Right now,
I feel broken. But the light emanating
from the empty tomb is there. The hum of
the Holy Spirit is there.
A few weeks ago there was a pipe
bomb in Manhattan. And a man associated
with ISIS stabbed nine people at a Minnesota shopping mall. These are reminders. Violence is always possible, in any
community. It is hard to have hope that
this era of terrorism will pass. A broad
historical perspective suggests it will pass and be replaced by deadlier
evils. But standing in the thick of it,
it feels like we’re just waiting, wondering if the next attack or mass shooting
will happen in our town. We must
pray. But sometimes even with prayer, it
is hard to see hope from here.
The pipe bomb incident and the mall
stabbing were not actually what pushed me to depression. It’s what came next. First, I experienced something quite
hopeful. Heather, Angel Lee, Carlin and
Enam, Beth Roberts, and I were in Atlanta two weeks ago for the New Baptist
Covenant Summit of 2016. Did you know
there are over 60 different kinds of Baptists in America? In 2008, former president Jimmy Carter tried
bringing Baptists together. He thought
if he could promote unity among Baptists, then we Baptists could be agents of
unity in America.
Many of the Baptist denominations are
primarily African American. So, bringing
Baptists together is also bringing black and white people together. In Atlanta we heard from many Christians, our
brothers and sisters from across America who are black. They told of the pain they have experienced
living in America. Some shares stories that
are pretty intense, testimonies of blatant discrimination. It was hard to hear, but all of us joined
together to walk in these stories.
Then, this past week, I traveled to Campbell
Divinity School where our own Beth Roberts is alum and Heather Folliard is a
current student. Campbell is having a
series of discussions this semester on race relations within the body of
Christ. How can Christians who are
black, white, Arabic, Cherokee, Chinese, Mexican, Korean, Ethiopian – how can
we all join together in showing the world what the love of God looks like by
the way we love one another? Students
and professors at Campbell are discussing this all semester and they invited me
to the join the conversation. That’s
hopeful.
However, as we met in Buies Creek, North
Carolina, at Campbell, Charlotte was burning because another African American
man had been shot by police. This was a
few days after what happened in Tulsa.
Make no mistake: sometimes white suspects get
shot by police officers. Sometime black
suspects survive these encounters. That
is so. But, the running narrative in
America is a black person, especially a male, is more likely to be considered
suspicious just because he’s black. And public
consciousness is less likely to be upset when an officer kills a black suspect. It is as if the death of black men just isn’t
big of a deal.
Black men are afraid that a simple traffic stop
might lead to death. Black men have to
live with a constant fear white men don’t have.
Before I was married, I was stopped by police quite often. I had a lot of tickets. Never, when I saw those blue lights in my rear
view mirror did I think I might die.
Never! Every time black men are
pulled over they have to be hypervigilant and they fear that one wrong move
could get them killed. It is not fair
that I am treated on way by the police, and a black man is treated another.
When I go to Campbell or to Atlanta and the
New Baptist Covenant, I am filled with hope.
When I think about Terrence Crutcher dead in Tulsa, and Keith Scott dead
in Charlotte, I struggle. I want to
inherit the dream cast by Dr. King. I
want an America free of racial hatred.
Right now, that seems light years away.
Right now, it is hard to see hope from here.
Someone
I talked with this past week asked some powerful questions.
·
Why aren't we all grieving for two men whose
lives were cut short?
·
Why are we spending so much time pointing out
how one "should" act instead of recognizing the loss of human beings
created in God's image?
·
What does the Church look like when tragedy
strikes and the church is broken open and poured out for the kingdom?
In the New Testament, more commentaries have
been written on Romans than any other book.
The Apostle Paul says in Romans 12:15, “Weep with those who weep.” Weeping in solidarity with one who is wounded
is an act of discipleship. At Lazarus’
funeral, Jesus wept for the pain of those he loved. He knew he would raise Lazarus, but he wept
out of his compassion for Mary as she wept.
As he rode into Jerusalem, he wept for the city lost in sin (Luke
19:41-44). Weeping as an expression of
God’s love is the right thing to in America right now.
I don’t know if the deaths of Terrence
Crutcher or Keith Scott happened because these men were black. I don’t know.
But I know they are dead and they leave behind people who loved
them. I know God weeps when one of his
children – one made in his image – is hurt.
If God is weeping, then I should too.
To align myself with God, I weep for these guys.
I also promote the expression
#blacklivesmatter, and I do so because so many people in America act like black
lives don’t matter. Black people tend to
get multiple year prison sentences for drug possession and drug sales. White commit the same crimes at the same rate
and end up getting 6 months and probation.
And there’s a ripple effect. Many
years in prison takes years from your life and no one seems to care. And you
can’t get a job when you get out.
In Atlanta, we were told about Dallas
community where all the services – gas stations, grocery stories, banks – were gone
from a certain low-income, black community.
Whites from a church in North Dallas in a wealthy community came to
visit the poor community. Churches from
each community were in partnership. The
whites from the wealthy community were shocked that the only institutions open
in the economically ravaged black community were payday lending
institutions.
And what about convictions. In the cases of black young men killed by the
police – Eric Garner, Freddie Gray, Michael Brown, Tamir Rice – there have been
acquittals; no convictions. . A lot of black people feel like the system is
stacked against them and they live in fear.
It shouldn’t be that way.
#blacklivesmatter is not saying all police
officers are racist or are bad or are out to get black people. Most are honest, public servants. All the police officers I know want to protect and service. The stories of the many good things police
officers do are never reported in the media.
We have to tell those stories. #bluelivesmatter. We must appreciate, support, and love police
officers. Please hear me that.
#blacklivesmatter is not saying all lives
don’t matter. Of course God loves all
people. The picture in heaven, which we
as church hope to reflect, is a gathering of people from every race, tribe,
language, and nation. That
multi-colored, multi-cultured image is found in Revelation 5 and then again in
Revelation 7:9-10. We don’t want HillSong
to be a white church. We don’t want
HillSong to be a black church. We want
to be a Revelation 7 church. And we’re
on the way to that.
We have people from many cultures right here
in our church family. We are in
relationship with two congregations that speak other languages, Karen and
Spanish. We reach for this diversity not
for diversity’s sake but because we want our church to have fuller expression
of who God is. When we expand our vision
of the body of Christ, we see more of God.
We now have a lot of black people at
HillSong. We say #blacklivesmatter because
we want to stand with our members who are hurting. When one of is injured all of us hurt. This is us.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, knowing the cross was coming, Jesus wept
because sin leads to death. We join him there and with him, our Savior, weep over sin and death.
One more way to explain why it is so
important for Christians to focus our love by standing in solidarity and saying
#blacklivesmatter is the analogy of the house on fire. At the fire station, the call comes in. “We’ve got a house burning down on Elm
Street.” The firefighters DO NOT shrug
their shoulders and say, “All houses matter.”
We know all houses matter. They give their attention to the one
that’s on fire. In our church, we know
all lives matter. But right now, our
black brothers and sisters feel like their house is on fire. We – followers of Jesus of all races and
colors (what a privilege we have to be in a diverse church) – we lead the call
to wake America up and say that Jesus cares about people and because of that we
love people who feel unloved right now. #blacklivesmatter.
I look at my friends – my brothers and
sisters in Christ; I say that; and I am filled with hope. But, then, I talk to other Christians who don’t
feel the same way. I go on Facebook, I
talk to people in person, and I hear many white Christian friends rail against the
idea of #blacklivesmatter. They gripe
that all people who say that phrase are thugs and looters and criminals. I hear Christians speaking damning words
against the victims and against communities that are in pain. Instead of the compassion of Christ, I hear
judgment.
Why would anyone oppose expressing love and
offering help to hurting people? And yet
I hear Christians deny systemic racism.
I don’t know how it could be denied, but compassion gets kicked out of
the conversation and is replaced with argument and anger and more pain. In the midst of that, it’s hard. It’s hard to see hope from here.
This is where Jeremiah has something
beautiful to offer because he found himself about as far away from hope as you
could imagine. He didn’t want to be a
prophet, but God tells him that God had planned his life even before he was
born (Jeremiah 1:5). On career day Jeremiah’s
classmates had their pick – Shepherd, Merchant, Torah Scholar, Farmer,
Soldier. They could fill out the career
day form with their first, second, and third choice. Jeremiah got a different form. Jeremiah, you can be a prophet, a prophet, or
a prophet.
He hated it.
He says to God in Chapter 20, “you enticed me. You overpowered me” (v.7). In the Hebrew way of thinking, the verb used
in Jeremiah 20:7 was the same one used to describe a rape. In calling him to be a prophet, Jeremiah felt
God had overwhelmed him. But God was
dealing with his people when they had sinned against him for generations. God needed a prophet to speak a hard word and
whether he liked it not, Jeremiah was that prophet.
This all happens in the 6th
century BC. Babylon is a major world
power and by the time we come to Jeremiah 32, the capital of Judah, Jerusalem
is surrounded by the Babylonian army. They
will break through soon. Inside the
walled city, Jeremiah, the reluctant prophet is in jail because of his
prophecies. The king has Jeremiah locked
up. The leaders at the palace ask him, “Why
do you say, ‘Thus says the Lord: I am going to give this city into the hands of
Babylon?’” He’s been telling a truth
they haven’t wanted to hear. Their
generations of turning away from God have led to God allowing them to fall into
enemy hands. But they didn’t want to
hear it so they imprisoned Jeremiah when he said it.
For Jeremiah, the situation could
not be worse. The city is surrounded,
and starving. What will happen when the
Babylonians finally break through?
Will the people be massacred?
Will they be enslaved, dragged to exile?
What will happen to the great city of Zion
and to the temple Solomon built, one of the wonders of the ancient world? It’s
hard to see hope from there. Very
hard.
At that moment, in the jail, once again, the
word of the Lord came to him.
“Buy a field at Anathoth from you cousin
Hanamel.” What Lord? Say that again? The great prophetic act you want me to
perform is to buy a farm? Um, hey
God? The Babylonians are all
around. I can’t even get to
Anathoth.
Right then, his cousin Hanamel arrives. He’s a jail visitor’s pass. Baruch, Jeremiah’s right hand man is
there. Baruch and Hanamel have brought
witnesses and legal documents.
Jeremiah just stares at Hanamel. “Let me guess? You want to sell me a
field?”
The description in Jeremiah 32 is unusually
detailed. All documents are officially
signed. All signatures are
notarized. Jeremiah instructs Baruch to
put the parchments – deeds of sale – in a clay pot, the 6th century
BC version of a safety deposit box.
Why does God speak this word to
Jeremiah? Buy a field? Every field in Anathoth is going to belong to
the Babylonians in a week. But God tells
him that what he has done is a sign of what God will do. God says, “Houses and fields and vineyards
shall again be bought in this land. … I
will bring upon them all the good fortune that I now promise. … I will restore [them]” (32:15, 42, 44). God says exile is coming and it will be
bad. But he also promises it will not be
the end. On the other side of the valley
of the shadow of death is new life.
Shalom – the Hebrew idea of peace, wholeness, community, and right
relationships - will come again to people who put their trust in the Lord. In the midst of calamity, God tells Jeremiah
to speak a word of hope.
I take courage from God’s promise to Jeremiah
and the people in that desperate situation.
As I said, with the state of race relations in America, it is hard to
see hope from here. And for HillSong,
that’s devastating because we’re talking about our church family. Yet I see hope, and I think the best hope in
our situation is God’s church. We – the
Body of Christ - weep with those who weep, we stand with those who feel they
have no voice and no power, and we speak peace.
Acting as disciples, we go out of our way to love our neighbors and work
for their flourishing.
We Christ followers who comprise the Body of
Christ work for our society’s good when we see those in pain, sit with them in
their pain, listen to their stories without judgment, and sitting together
recognize that we are all broken. We
help each other. That’s how we see hope from here and help others see it. We love with our presence, our ears, our arms
offering embrace, our actions, and our hearts.
Just as God promised Shalom would return when it seemed impossible, His eternal
Kingdom will one day come in full and all good will be restored. Until that day, we Christian gives signs of
the Kingdom and participate in its coming by being Christ to all people and
especially to those who feel like they are being burned.
It is hard, no question. Jeremiah knew it was hard, but God spoke to the
difficulty direct. “See, I am the Lord,
the God of all flesh; is anything too hard for me” (Jer. 32:27)? Our society’s struggles are so massive and
race relations are so broken, it seems the problems are utterly intractable and
a solution seems impossible. But we
don’t look at the size of the problem.
We look and see God and we know nothing is impossible. Nothing
is too hard for God in Jeremiah’s time or ours.
We see hope because we know who God is.
We – the church – work for shalom in our
community as we stand in a new and lasting covenant of love with each other and
God. We work for this because we know
who God is.
We walk out of church arm-in-arm bonded
together as brothers and sister, sons and daughter of God, determined to
breathe life into our community by loving people and giving extra doses of
blessing to those who hurt the most. We
go out to serve and love knowing God will bless our efforts. We able to do this
because we know who God is.
Yes, hope can be hard to see, but we see it
clearly. We see it because we know who God is and we know we are His.
AMEN
