A Glimpse of Heaven (Revelation 7:9-10)

Sunday, April 28, 2013

A version of this sermon was originally preached at HillSong on April 28, 2013 under the title “God in New Faces.”

            It was my third year, time for my classmates and I to think about life after seminary.  We were training to be pastors, chaplains, missionaries.  Where would we end up?

            I was sheltered, a suburban kid who grew up watching MTV and going to hang out at the Mall. For me, a night on the town meant driving to the Roanoke Civic Center to see professional wrestling.  Ric Flair was in his heyday.  In seminary, as I read the Bible, God shredded my sheltered, play-it-safe life. 

I knew God wanted me to preach and a lead church.  But what kind of church (beyond just whatever church would hire someone really young with limited experience) would call me?  Pastors find their calling in different ways.  For me, it was a direct, uncomfortable encounter with scripture.  The words of Revelation 7:9 burrowed into me.

“There was a great multitude that no one could count from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands.  They cried out in a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!” 

Every tribe and people and language; it was fall 1995.  Almost everyone I knew was just like me - white, American, middle class, suburban.  That was my entire world. 

Imprisoned for his faith in Jesus, John was carried to Heaven in a vision.  There he saw people from every language, tribe, and nation, all together, praising Jesus.  I only knew one small subset of one tribe speaking one language in one nation.  My knowledge of the people of God was pathetically small.  That meant my knowledge of God was woefully impoverished.  How could I be a pastor and lead a church, knowing so little?  How could I even follow Jesus?

I had to serve a church where there were more than just white people.  I needed diversity.  God led me to Greenbrier Baptist in Arlington, Virginia.  There’s not a more diverse community anywhere than what you’ll find in Arlington.

I had been at that church about 1 month, when the Promise Keepers rally came to the national mall.  The ministry attracted 100’s of thousands of men to our nation’s capital for worship.  Our church took a couple of refugees from Sudan.  They had been persecuted and forced to flee their country because they were Christians.  Like me, they had only been in DC about a month. Here they were, free to worship God with thousands of others.  We also had about 10 guys from the Spanish congregation at Greenbrier.  Two Africans, ten Hispanics and two whites guys – my Dad and me.   

Over and over, for 9 years pastoring in Arlington, I had experiences like that.  I met God in the faces of white American, black Americans, Asian Americans, and Hispanic Americans.  I met God in Gypsies, Romany people.  I met God in a community of Sudanese refugees, and the young Ethiopian woman who attended our church.  I met God in the Pakistani man who gave me a copy of the Qur’an.   Each new encounter was like seeing another side of God’s indescribable beauty.  I realized I personally would never enjoy God in this way if I had met God in just one culture.  I needed that diversity of people to expand my appreciation of who God is. 

All those experiences came after I sat in my seminary classroom a few minutes before class and happened to read Revelation 7:9.   Every tribe and people and language.  The arc of my life changed by the reading the Bible that day and then reacting to what I read.  I have gotten many things wrong over my life and career in ministry.  I have made my share of mistakes.  But one thing I did right was listen to God that day as I read Revelation 7 and waited for class to start.  God told me to seek out people from tribes different than my own.  I am so thankful I did that.

Seeing more of God is one of two primary reasons I press for the church to be racially and ethnically diverse.  Most churches are mono-culture.  Many of these mono-culture churches are great churches.  But I believe God is calling our church to be so diverse that no single culture is the dominant one.  God is calling us to be a church that embodies the vision cast in Revelation 7.  We want people to meet God in God’s fullness here, among us.  That can only happen if we are fully committed to diversity.

We have to celebrate numerous cultures.  We have traditionally been a church of white people.  I say that without any criticism.  It’s not a negative thing.  It just is.  However, going forward, to see God, know God, and celebrate God, we have to understand the way Chinese culture works and Mexican culture, and the numerous expressions of African American culture; we have to allow these various cultural expressions of faith sometimes be the ones guiding how we come together.  If you find us worshiping God or fellowshipping in a way that feels strange to you, step into it.  Embrace it.  What feels odd to you might feel comfortable to your black sister in Christ or your Mexican brother in Christ. 

Understand that Mexican, Chinese, black, and other people of color have adjusted their expectations to white cultural practices for a long time.  For us to be a truly diverse community, we white people have to be just as willing to give up our expectations sometimes.  It can’t be everyone is welcome to come do things the way we white Christians have always done them.  It has to be we all come together in humility, friendship, love, and faith in Jesus.  We all get our turn planning and leading.  This might be applied in the style of music or preaching, the kinds of food at our meals, or the pace of our social gathering.  Each culture present gets an equal voice in how we do ministry and how we live together as a family of God.  We become something new, something different from any earthly entity. 

Seeing more of God is one reason for making diversity a priority in the church.  The church’s witness is a second reason we promote diversity so that we are all empowered participants in church life.  When we talk about our witness, we literally mean what we have seen and experienced.  We have seen that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life.  We have experienced salvation, rescue from sin and death.  Because of Jesus, we are not alienated from God by our sins, but rather, with our sins washed away, we are adopted as sons and daughters of God.  As Psalm 34:8 says, we have tasted and seen that the Lord is good.

Our testimony is the word we speak based on what we have witnessed.  We testify that the world is fallen, dying in sin.  Racism and institutions perpetuating a white, male hierarchy are societal manifestations of sin.  Sin brings death and eternal alienation from God. Our church testifies to the specific ways the Gospel offers an alternative to the dark-realities of sin where we live. 

When we talk about diversity and racial unity, we’re speaking out of our God-inspired Gospel witness.  We should not seek diversity for diversity’s sake.  Plenty of secular organizations do that. We seek diversity because the Kingdom of heaven, as seen in Revelation 7:9; is the most diverse place in the universe. We want people to find rescue from sin and to get a glimpse of the goodness of Heaven. As Revelation shows, diversity is one indicator of heaven’s goodness.

What we offer is a radical alternative to the violence and hatred produced by prejudice and racism.  Recall the events in Charlottesville two years ago.  Neo-Nazis paraded around protesting the removal of a statue of Civil War general Robert E. Lee.  Counter protestors confronted the New-Nazis.  The result was the death of a young woman.

Recall the incidents right here in our own town.  In protests around the University of North Carolina’s removal the Civil War statue “Silent Sam,” there have been minor acts of violence though nothing as dramatic as in Charlottesville.  In both places, whether the violence was a car ramming a crowd, or a fist in the face, one fact cannot be avoided.  In the American Civil War, the slaves were black and plantation owners were white.  Many black people still feel they have to carry the shame of that heritage and it hurts to hear white people today defend it.  We can’t escape the racial nature of this conflict which so often turns violent.

The last examples are Dayton, Ohio and El Paso, Texas.  In Texas, the killer, an American terrorist, targets Hispanics, ranting about an invasion.  That includes our brothers and sisters in Christ who are Mexican.  That includes people whose families go back several generations living in America.  They are targeted because they aren’t white enough to be true Americans in the mind of this evil killer. 

Charlottesville, El Paso, Texas, the killing of members of a black church in a prayer meeting in Charleston, South Carolina several years ago – these a few of the way too many examples of brokenness in our land.  In every case, the sin is based in racism, fear, and hatred.  To respond to such evil, the church has to offer good news about racial diversity based in welcome, hope, and love.

Our testimony as followers of Jesus has to be based on what we’ve witnessed.  There is something better – a kingdom in which people from every nation, tribe, and language are joined together in love for each other and desire to praise Jesus.  By developing a multiethnic church that’s more concerned about the eternal Kingdom of God than any earthly nation, we point to something better.  We create an environment in which we celebrate one another uniqueness and learn about the love of God in the ways we love one another.  We help others who visit our church see the way out of the brokenness around us and the way into the beloved Kingdom of God.  We say to the world, “this is what God’s kingdom is like.” 

We exist as a church to help people find their way to God – all people.  One of the many ways we do that is to intentionally celebrate our diversity and to work to make sure diversity is a core principle in our congregation.

Diversity helps us see more of God.  I believe God has given me this vision for a diverse church.  I pray you will embrace this vision too and we as a church will work to make our church a place where people come and get a glimpse of the Heavenly gathering of God’s family. 

AMEN

After Charlottesville: Monday Work

My brother is a pastor of a church in Charlottesville.  My best friend from seminary is a pastor of another church in Charlottesville, VA.  I texted them both this morning to make sure they’re OK after the white supremacy fiasco in their town yesterday.  I didn’t want to call because it was Sunday morning and they are pastors getting ready to lead the church in worship.  So I texted. Both texted to assure me they are fine.

I am a pastor too, but on Sabbatical.  In fact this morning, our family did not even attend church, but instead spent time at Smith Mountain Lake with my aunt and uncle.  However, sabbatical or not, I feel the need to share some of my thoughts in the aftermath of the nefarious, evil “Unite-the-Right” rally in Charlottesville. 

I approach this as a pastor, but more importantly as a follower of Jesus, a 1^st century Palestinian Jew, and the incarnation of the Second Person of the Trinity.  I follow and worship Jesus, the Savior of the world and Lord of all.  I pray that my comments are inspired by Him.

Two quotes come to mind.  The first is from a fiery African American female preacher, Traci Blackmon.  I heard her last year in Atlanta, GA, and she blew my socks off.  Her sermon at the convening of the New Baptist Covenant last September helped me understand the importance of #blacklivesmatter.  Her sermon woke me up and fired me up to work for a better America, one in which all people are given equal rights and equal opportunities. 

Rev. Blackmon was in Charlottesville yesterday, up close to the tear gas, violence, and chaos.  A frequent Facebook commenter, she wrote, “I SURE DO PRAY THAT THE SERMON YOU WROTE EARLIER THIS WEEK IS NOT THE SERMON YOU ARE PREACHING TOMORROW” (https://www.facebook.com/traci.blackmon).

Her words are characteristic of her confrontational approach.  And, she wrote this fresh off her own up close and personal harrowing experience in Charlottesville.  Her words make sense to me.  As it is, I wasn’t preaching today.  But if I was, I hope I would not, in a gut reaction, scrap the sermon I had written earlier and start over.  I’ve done that very thing before.  I have scrapped sermons om Saturday nights, and started over.  I have scrapped sermons with just an hour to go before the start of worship.  But it is not always the right move. 

Contrasted with Rev. Blackmon are the words of African American author Deidra Riggs.  She writes,

Hey, white evangelical friends. Don't go to church today to hold your preacher's feet to the fire. Either they'll say it or they won't. Go to church to be lit on fire by the Holy Spirit. Don't lose your focus. There is work to do on Monday.

Besides, even if they say it, it won't be the way you want them to say it. This is not about them. It's about you. What are YOU going to say? What are YOU going to do? This is an all hands on deck moment and there are TONS of resources for you (https://www.facebook.com/deidra.riggs.3?hc_ref=ARSVkD-HQYK7zDF1g096ffTNB4cHpHu7G3Vf59BCtHY4HTmA2jk_uVqrtMBTnoyqaEg&fref=nf).

My favorite line from Mrs. Riggs’ quote is one that drives me now. “There’s work to do on Monday.”  That Monday Work is the work of combatting racism under the direction of the Holy Spirit.  Whether the pastor deals directly with what happened in Charlottesville or sticks with the sermon he or she originally planned is not the bigger point.  The bigger point is all churches, all followers of Jesus, are called to live out the values of the Kingdom of God and the greatest value is love. 

One of the cornerstones of my Sabbatical is the quest to discover how church – the local church – can embody the heavenly vision cast in Revelation 7:9-10.

⁹ After this I saw a vast crowd, too great to count, from every nation and tribe and people and language, standing in front of the throne and before the Lamb. They were clothed in white robes and held palm branches in their hands. ¹⁰ And they were shouting with a great roar,

“Salvation comes from our God who sits on the throne
            and from the Lamb!”

I believe the church is called to be a living witness to this Heavenly vision. The church in America is to testify to our country, divided as it is, that God’s vision and God’s future is a picture of people, resplendent in their cultural uniqueness joined together with other people, also with their uniqueness on display.  Note, when John looked into Heaven in Revelation 7, he could clearly see people from all cultures and all tribes all across the world.  Their distinctiveness stood out as much as their unity did.  And their unity was in Christ.

Where is that seen today?  I pray that Heavenly vision can be seen in the church.  Forming our churches as families and as communities is our work.  Our families and communities have to be so graciously welcoming and hospitable that all people – black, Asian, white, Hispanic, Arab, and Native American – can feel at home in the church. 

In other words, our Monday work is to tell a different story, the anti-story of Charlottesville and of hate groups like American Nazis and the KKK.  That story generates a lot of noise.  Our story, the story of people loving God and loving each other in Jesus’ name is a much better story.  CNN & Fox News are not going to tell our story.  We shouldn’t expect them to.  God has called the church to go into all the world and make disciples of Jesus.

Part of the work of doing this is to name evil – in this case the extreme evil of racism, the demonic force known as white supremacy.  Part of the work of giving witness to the Kingdom of God is renouncing evil and standing with those who have been victims.  It’s easy to look at the hooded, goose-stepping fools and say they’re evil.  It is much harder to name, define, and combat structural evils like the so-called “war on drugs,” the resulting mass-incarceration of brown and black peoples, and institutional racism that plagues our justice system.  Those evils are more far-reaching than the show that went on in UVA’s town yesterday.  We who follow Jesus have to name the deeper evils and stand up to them.

But even that is only part of the greater work, which is telling the story of Jesus and inviting the world around us to enter that story.  Evangelical pastors have no excuse for ignoring the evils of racism in our country.  We have to decry this evil.  Neither can we allow ourselves to get sucked in to causes to the point that those causes become our central, defining call.  Fighting white supremacy is a part of denouncing evil and denouncing evil is a part of our Monday Work – the work of telling the Good News of Jesus Christ. 

Our best strategy is to offer the world a competing narrative.  In our story, the oldest, truest story, the only forever story, God is love, loves all people, and all who come to him through Jesus are saved.  Blacks and whites can stand together as saved persons, brothers and sisters in the name of Christ. 

I know this isn’t much of a social commentary on the horrors of white nationalism, the impotence of the President’s statements, or the next steps to be taken by equality-minded groups like #blacklivesmatter.  I’m not social commentator.  I am a disciple of Jesus.  The best thing I can share is that Jesus’ heart is with those who have suffered from the evils of racism and Jesus is the savior for the poor and disadvantaged.  I hope my life and my church lives out that truth and draws people to Christ.  I hope this is my story the rest of my life.

Racial Justice: Coming Together

            A play date!  That’s what Deidra Riggs said fixed things.  She was talking about a when her husband Harry was 4 years old.  At a birthday party, he and another 4-year-old almost came to blows over a helium balloon.  His mother decided the way to solve this pre-k feud was to call the other boy’s mom and schedule a play date.  The boys became good friends and stayed that way for over 50 years.[i] 

            Oh that we could settle things with playdates. 

Oh that we could all see as 4-year-olds see. 

“Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”  Jesus said that (Matthew 18:4). 

I know the issues that divide people are complicated.   As a white, educated, middle class, American male, I am acutely aware of particular divisions between people perpetrated by individuals like me.  White males of means displaced, killed, and emasculated the indigenous people in the Americas.  We (white males) enslaved Africans, hauled them to the Americas in the horrific middle passage, and then tried to strip their humanity in ‘the peculiar institution.’  We replaced slavery with Jim Crow, and Jim Crow with mass incarcerations.  We put American citizens of Japanese descent in internment camps.  And today millions of white Americans, blissfully ignorant of any of this history, profess their innocence and their disinterest. 

Understanding our own collective racism is too complicated.  We just want to be happy and go to Heaven when we die.  Dealing with the complexities of generational, systemic, institutional racism is too messy.  To get into discussions about privilege threatens us with guilt.  We came after slavery and Jim Crowe, we say.  Those things aren’t my fault.  We want to claim we are “colorblind” and then spend our energy and resources pursuing our own happiness. 

It’s not that simple.  But it is.  Riggs’ book is not about playdates.  But it is.  She knows how complicated and how simple human relationships are.  Her book is about loving God and loving neighbor and doing the work to overcome divisions that separate people. That I am reading her book as I enter a Sabbatical from pastoral ministry is providential.  Matthew 10:39 (‘those who lose their life for Jesus’ sake will find it) is the theme verse of my Sabbatical.  I am learning what it means for me as a disciple, as a dad, as a husband, and as a pastor to ‘die to self.’  Deidra Riggs’ book One is one of my primary non-Biblical texts.

My church has sent me away for four months of rest, renewal, and new focus.  One of the things driving me on this Sabbatical and, I believe, in the future of my ministry life is the call of God on the church to bring people together in Jesus’ name.  Uniting diverse people is a direct effect of the Gospel of the salvation we have in Jesus Christ. Look at Ephesians 2:11-21.  Look at Revelation 7:9-10.  Read the entire book of Acts.  Crossing cultural lines and breaking down racial barriers in order to unite divergent groups in Christ is rooted in the Gospel.  All who are a part of Christ hold in their hearts a deeps concern for crossing racial barriers for the sake of loving the neighbor and bringing people together in Jesus’ name.  Let me restate that for the sake of emphasis and clarity.  To love and follow Jesus is to actively oppose racism and to actively advocate for justice and the coming together of all people in Jesus’ name.  The Christian cannot be indifferent concerning racism and still be a Christian.

This, by the way, is a blanket condemnation of Christians who supported Jim Crowe and segregation (not to mention slavery).  There can be no lionizing of our predecessors in Christianity in America or anywhere else where our forbearers tolerated and even promoted the degradation of one racial group while simultaneously exalting another.  Such blatant racism is foreign to the Gospel and that was as clear in 1865 as it is today.[ii] 

Unity, equality, diversity – these words have a Gospel aroma when they are understood in light of the passages I mentioned above as well as John 17 and other New Testament passages.   The yearning for these things is a yearning for the Kingdom of God, where people of all shades and backgrounds joyously come together as one family in Christ.  I believe the church in North America is positioned to sound a clarion call for unity and togetherness.  I especially believe those with privilege (middle class educated whites) are called to sacrifice our own tastes and preferences and to willingly give up power so that minorities who have been held down by systemic racism can have a seat at the table of leadership.  The church is called to set the pace as this generation moves toward equality for all people.  If we, church leaders, can do this, we will help the church show the world the goodness of the Kingdom of God. And that’s our mission, to help people enter the kingdom of God as Jesus’ disciples.

With this sense of calling in mind, Riggs’ observation about how we (“we” humans) approach conversation and interaction is a guide for the Christ-follower.  First, she quotes U.S. ambassador Samantha Power who says, “Some people put themselves at stake when they get involved in a cause.”  My opposition to abortion is as much about my ability to defend pre-birth life as it is about the pre-birth life itself.  I find myself more concerned about how I advocate for the Ethiopian orphan than I am worried about any particular orphan.  No matter what the cause is, when I become strident (for or against it), I am more worried about my own image, which I happen to have attached to said cause.  Ambassador Power’s point is well made.  Whether or not I ever prevent an abortion or a child from starving, I want to make sure my identity and ego are preserved in how I represent myself.

Opposite this self-aggrandizing approach, Riggs makes this salient point.  “Our identity is not impacted by whether or not others agree with us, or even by what others think about us.  Instead, finding the right perspective on who we are is based on understanding whose we are.”[iii]  Hear this.  We are God’s possessions, God’s children, people made new in Christ.  He is master, we are disciples.  He is Lord, we are servants.  Advocating for the unborn and the orphan and the victim of racism and injustice – these are all stances we take and works in which we invest ourselves as a part of our discipleship. 

I don’t fight racism for the sake of fighting racism.  I fight it because that’s what a Christ follower does.  I fight it because in Ephesians 2, we read that Jesus has broken down the dividing wall.  This is true for any cause or in any decision or interaction.  I try to act and think and speak in ways that align me with Jesus.  When I do that, I find myself forcefully rejecting racism.  I find myself exhausted by the yearning for diversity, the longing to see the church today stand as a living embodiment of Revelation 7:9-10.

Riggs shows just how difficult this step into the work of reconciliation is.  She shares a litany of people represented by actions you may support or decry:

-      Women who have had abortions.

-      Men who dress in drag.

-      White people who shoot unarmed black men.

-      People who shoot up crowded movie theaters and elementary schools with automatic rifles.

-      Adulterers.

-      Cheaters.

-      Gay teens from Fundamentalist Christian families.

You may go through her list and wonder how she compiled it.  Maybe you sympathetically identify with some on her list and angrily despise others.  Maybe it is offensive that some on this list would be cited along with others.  I know Deidra Riggs could make a list 2 or 3 times longer than this as could you or I, with people much more divergent than those listed here.  There is but one thing that unites everyone on this list, and this is the author’s point. God loves everyone on this list.[iv] 

Christ followers have two assignments, straight from Jesus.  First, we are two love these people just as God does.  Love your neighbor as yourself.  It’s easier to draw a line in the sand and determine who’s on our side,[v] but God wants us to see it his way.  So, we have to die to our own sense of injustice, to our self-perceptions and self-righteousness.  We have to die to self and see as Jesus sees and love everyone as Jesus loves them; even those we would hate.  Second, we have to help people who don’t know Jesus come to know Him and become his followers. 

That second assignment comes later and in most cases what we actually do through words and actions is witness.  We testify to God’s goodness.  Whether or not people become Christians after hearing our testimony is between them and God.  But whether they ever do or not, our call is to love and to be God’s agents of reconciliation.

            “Reconciliation invites everyone to the table, the wraparound porch, the picnic on a summer afternoon.  All of us, even those we wouldn’t have necessarily chosen to invite.  And isn’t that the point?  We are not in charge of the guest list.  We are guests along with everyone else.”[vi]  Remember, it’s not about who we are, but about whose we are.  Meeting for coffee or talking over beers is the way adults have playdates. 

            I went to a playdate like this a month ago at a Durham (NC) mosque.  There were Jews there, Muslims of course, and Christians.  The food was delicious.  As a “faith leader,” I was, at the last minute, added to the program.  I knew that might happen and had a few remarks prepared.  But when my time to speak came, I shoved my notes in my pocket and ignored them. 

Instead, I began my speech by thanking our Muslim hosts for their generous hospitality.  Then, I repented of the ways Christians have demonized and “hated on” Muslims.  I didn’t affirm Islam.  I didn’t deny the evil done by extremists.  I just stood up, and with a voice that surprised me by its cracking said, “I am sorry.  On behalf of Christians who have been hateful, I am truly sorry.”  Why did I do that?  Because on a playdate, you have to say sorry if you hit your friend.  Also, I did it because when the Holy Spirit prompts us, we need to follow that lead.  

            I believe the Holy Spirit prompted me to go on Sabbatical and prompted my church to celebrate this decision.  I believe the Holy Spirit prompted me to study racial reconciliation as an act of discipleship and to read One as a part of my study.  I now proceed seeking to learn, to love my neighbor, and to follow the next prompting of the Spirit as it comes. 

---

[i] D. Riggs (2017), One: Unity in Divided World, Baker Books (Grand Rapids), p.24.

[ii] In this paragraph, I am not suggesting that specific individuals who claimed faith in Jesus but also supported racist systems and held racist thoughts in their own hearts are condemned to Hell.  Eternal destiny and eternal condition are God’s to determine and I make no effort to say who’s going where after death.  What I am saying is white people who grew up in the Jim Crowe south knew it was wrong at the time.  Failure to stand up to racism is a sin of omission.  To stand idly by and watch as black people are lynched and degraded is as bad as participating in the lynching and degradation.  

[iii] Riggs, p.26.

[iv] Riggs. p.33.

[v] Riggs, p.34.

[vi] Riggs, p.41.

Joining the March

Joining the March

            A few weeks ago, women who have suffered the worst heartache imaginable – the death of their children got together in Washington DC (http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/05/09/million-moms-march-demands-end-to-police-brutality-and-racial-injustice/27038289/).  These are African-American women whose sons have been killed by the police.  The trend is terrible and obvious – unarmed young black males are killed by law enforcement when the situation could have been deescalated without injury or loss of life.  This is systemic racism. 

            These moms, wrapped in grief, gathered to lean on each other’s shoulder, to cry and pray together, and to march up Pennsylvania Avenue to the department of justice (http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/million-mom-march-in-dc-draws-hundreds-demanding-police-reforms/2015/05/09/4f5fa952-f501-11e4-bcc4-e8141e5eb0c9_story.html).

            Joining this effort was a first of a kind experience for me.  Part of white privilege is the reality that when you live in the middle class, you have education and a good job, and you have no need to fear how the police will treat you, you can just ignore the systemic racism in America.  You don’t feel it.  So, I have spent time turning a blind eye.  But the increase of violence and the climbing number of unarmed black kids killed by police is something I can no longer avoid.  I never should have in the first place.  I have an adopted son who is black and it horrifies me that I will have to teach him how to act around cops in a way my dad never had to teach me.

            I want my son to know I care.  I thank God that my boy has awakened me to something I should have cared about all along.  I went on May 9, and I marched.  I intend to do more.  And as a pastor, I intend to bring my church along.  But for me, May 9 was to time to add my own feet to the walk and it was a time to observe and learn.  I saw a lot.

            First, I saw what happens when an event is not well organized.  One of my friends who is black and who usually informs me about protest movements did not even know this was happening.  Nor did most of Washington DC know.  If you were not on Pennsylvania Avenue between 4^th and 9^th streets, you would have missed this entirely.  As we walked by the Newseum, I saw far more people on the streets as tourists doing what they might do any Saturday in DC.  That this event was happening and that Michael Brown and Tamir Rice and the rest have died appeared to mean nothing.  People of all races went about their normal lives, mildly inconvenienced by the commotion on Pennsylvania Ave. 

            Second, I looked around the crowd of marchers (a few thousand people, not a million), and I saw a group of people whose lives are in many ways unlike mine.  Obviously I am not a woman, I am not black, I am not the mother of young black men, and my children are all alive.  I lacked shared life experiences with those leading the march. I felt like the outlier in the crowd.  There were people from the Nation of Islam.  I don’t fit that group and they wouldn’t want me.  There was a group of Episcopalian clergy.  I most closely identified with them, but they are DC Episcopalians.  I am a Baptist from North Carolina.  One of the speakers was a woman from the Green Party.

            I have no affiliation with any of these groups.  There were groups holding up banners for the Unitarian Church.  I am neither Unitarian nor Universalist.  There were groups of Lesbians.  I am straight and male.  There were people filtering through the crowd selling Socialist newspapers.  I did not bump into any Southern Evangelicals.

            In a crowd where I was in the extreme minority, I had the opportunity to experience up close how others experience and think about the world.    I did not mind being unlike those around me.  What bothered me is that no one like me cared enough to come.  Where were my peers?  Where are the white, evangelical Christians?  Our cause is Christ and He identifies with the ‘least’ in society.  In the word ‘least’ think least advantaged or least recognized.  The ‘least’ are not lower in value than anyone else, but they have been devalued by those in society who hold power.  Jesus locates himself with those at the bottom of society’s ladder. 

If we evangelicals want to see where God is at work and join Him then we need to go where the hurt is greatest.  Is any hurt greater than losing a child and knowing it is the police who took the child’s life?  This ought to matter to people who do what I do, who live where I live, and whose lives look like mine.  Why did my peers, people like me, completely ignore this event?  That really bothered me and continues to bother me.  Evangelicals want to follow in Jesus’ footsteps, but we stop short if it feels different from what we think we know.  That is not good.

            After my observation about the lack of organization and my observation about how most people did not care about this event, a third observation is about myself.  As the crowd marched along, they shouted over and over “I believe that we will win.”  And they chanted other slogans.  I figured out that I am not a stand-in-the-crowd-and-chant type of guy.  I half-heatedly tried to join the chanting, but I found it weird.  I began analyzing the slogan.  Who is “we?”  And what does it mean to “win?”  I found it noisy and unproductive. 

I allow that I could be way off base.  But I just do not see what it accomplished by walking and chanting.  I don’t want to be a voice in the crowd mindlessly repeating a slogan.  My position on this may be critiqued and I invite that.  Here I am simply sharing an observation about my own make-up as a person.

            I learned and observed other things that Saturday, but here I describe a moment in the walk that I think epitomized this particular problem as it exists in America.  The marchers walked to the department of justice at the corner of Pennsylvania and 9^th and began shouting demands for justice.  I supported this.  It is why I walked.

            Across Pennsylvania Avenue and back toward the Capital there was an outdoor ceremony going on.  There were probably as many people involved with it as there were involved with the march.  I think it was a navy retirement ceremony.  A lot of naval officers were there in their dress uniforms and the chairs in rows were filled.  I stepped out of the march and sat on a wall to take it all in. 

I thought, is this happening?  Over one shoulder, sailors were seated in uniform in orderly fashion to honor someone who had given a life of service.  Across the way, another group of people, a riotous crowd, shouted because young men have lost their lives, killed by people in uniform.  Pennsylvania Avenue is wide enough that the two events could happen simultaneously in view of each other without disrupting either. 

            However, after a while, the marchers decided it was time to head back down Pennsylvania to the starting point, John Marshal Place Park at Pennsylvania and 4^th Street.  As wide as Pennsylvania Avenue is it is not wide enough for marchers to walk down the middle of the street yelling without attracting the attention of those on the sidewalks.  One the walk resumed, the retirement ceremony would be affected.  I rejoined the crowd and walked and saw something I could not believe.

            As we walked by the ceremony, a small, gray-haired white woman ran into the crowd of marchers.  She had on a lanyard.  I believe she was one of the organizers of the retirement ceremony.  She started running up to people in crowd who were shouting through bullhorns.  She was shushing them.  She pointed toward the dais where the ceremony was happening and pleaded with the protestors to be quiet.  I have never seen anything so absurd.  These people were protesting because men in uniform had killed their kids.  She was asking them to stop their protesting and quietly respect men in uniform (albeit different uniforms).  A group of angry marchers being chastised and shushed by a little old lady; you cannot make this up.

            As an aside, I want to at least offer a best guess as to the perspective of this woman.  From her point of view, I believe she (and so many I know who share her mindset) loves America.  How does she show this love?  She weeps when she hears the Star - Spangled Banner.  She respects the flag.   And she honors soldiers and sailors, men and women in the armed forces.  I am sure it was an offense to her that these marchers would interrupt something as solemn as a military ceremony.

            But this is the point of disconnect in our country.  That woman cannot connect at a head or heart level to the moms who sons have died in Baltimore, Ferguson, Milwaukee, Cleveland, and other places.  That navy-loving woman thinks she is America, but this crowd of marchers is an America she does not know.  She is completely out of touch with them and does not want to learn.  She does not think this crowd has anything to offer. 

            For their part, those in the crowd are as a distant from her as she is from them.  She cannot understand their pain.  They don’t understand her love of military (which she would call love of country).  Neither group – protestors or the military retirement ceremony – gets the other group.  And neither comes close to representing the majority.  Who are the majority?  It is the crowds of people walking the streets of DC trying to decide if they should visit the Capital or the Lincoln Memorial or if they have time, both. 

            The majority are the tourists and the DC residents who say, “Oh, a navy retirement ceremony.”  And they shrug their shoulders.  “Oh, a protest of some kind.”  And they shrug their shoulders.  The majority of Americans do not want to get their hands dirty or have their lives inconvenienced in the work of fighting for justice and brotherhood and peace. 

            I hope a prophet will arise.  My prayer is someone will stand up, someone who speaks with the power and authority of Moses, of Paul, of Luther, of King.  A lot of people admire Mother Theresa.  Few join her.  Many speak glowingly of Martin Luther King Jr.  Few recognize that he is gone and we need someone who will champion the cause of the marginalized people in society as effectively as he did. 

            The only person I can imagine who might call the world’s attention to the need for justice (and the need for change) is Pope Francis.  I don’t know if he is the prophet God is raising for our day.  I don’t know if God is raising anyone to speak with such authority that people will hear and listen and heed.  I pray that person will arise.  Humanity needs it. 

            For my part, I will preach to the 115 or so people who come to my church each week.  I will announce the gospel and include themes of justice.  I will name society’s evils and call upon the church to pray.  I will continue to march and invite my church to join me.  And I will pray.  I don’t want there to be any more Michael Browns or Freddie Grays.  I pray America will enter a new season, one of uplift, one in which poverty declines dramatically.  I pray this will come about.  I pray God will show me my part in bringing this about.