How To End Racial Division - Miles McPherson

you know one of the privileges that I have of being here being founding pastor and well I can invite my friends and introduce you to people who have influenced me and I got a lot of good friends and today I am so excited I I try not to overhype what we were going to do today but I did maybe just a little bit just saying this could be the most important message of the year and I really believe that I believe that it is miles McPherson is several titles a former NFL football player for a fork okay you love football it's good I love that for you it's great former football player for a former NFL team he played for the San Diego Chargers which don't exist anymore yeah they're in Los Angeles now and so miles was it was a player there he also as a pastor of the rock church started it in 2000 Church about 20,000 people in San Diego and he is a father he is an author but most importantly yeah he's my friend and we we've had he's a part of the arc lead team those of you are familiar we have a church planning organization called the arc and we this fall we will have planted our 800th life-giving church in communities in just a couple of weeks I think we're planting 30 some churches in one weekend you know we'll let you know about that and where they're gonna be but mile serves with me on that board and and we've become good friends now have you know that there are some friends that that challenge you to be better anybody have a friend like that to just challenge you to be better and Myles is one of those and we've had some fun conversations over the last few years and also some uncomfortable conversation couple for me because I was awkward in them he loves this kind of stuff and I asked him he told me gonna write a book and here's what I think his book the third option get one of these okay after service they're not even out yet I believe this will be a text book for racial reconciliation in America and how it ought to be done I really do our country is so divided so divided right now racially they talk about football next week is NFL and our church our country will be divided about who kneels down for the national anthem and who doesn't and why all of these and we just have all kinds of things going on and I believe that Myles has a message that is seminal and is is crucial and I told him I said when you write the book I want to be I want to be the first church that you come to so he hadn't even been to his church with the book yet in fact it's not out until September 11th but we got the publisher to get us about 500 of them so get one of these at the end of the service and I want you to listen up I want you to be uncomfortable a little bit and then I want to allow Jesus to comfort you how does that set you know sometimes I say to you guys that my job is to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable so we're gonna do the second part of that for a few minutes and then we'll do the first part it's okay everybody all right with that would you welcome stand and welcome my friend miles McPherson as you come [Applause] come on now you have to go out your hand come on you may be seated I tell Gregg I have a man crush on him because I love hugging him cuz he's so cuddly so cuddly it's just like my muffin right there right there and I saw him last night so you lost weight maybe losing my grip my gal you lose my grip so thank you very much for being courageous and having me and having this conversation because you called us together a few months ago and said let's have a hard conversation and so I want to give you a round of applause for just being courageous and having this conversation it is a pleasure to be here I'm from New York so this is like my second time in South Carolina and I'm getting accustomed to your accent because I know I have accent right I'm from New York I live in San Diego now because in 1982 I was drafted the Los Angeles Rams I got cut which means I got fired which means I didn't get paid unlike other major sports football is starting to get guaranteed contracts partially guaranteed but when I played nobody got a guaranteed contract you got fired cut you didn't get paid yesterday every team cut about 35 guys they lost their jobs and they will not get paid and that happened yesterday I was a cut day I have a younger brother who's also an NFL he was the Heisman runner-up in 1987 I was another brother who's the 8th ranked boxer in the world at one time and then I have two sisters they ain't do anything they they were really wonderful people they just weren't athletes so I got drafted and once an NFL and started she got saved in 1984 I was doing cocaine every day regularly I should say smoking weed everyday got saved in 1984 stop doing cocaine in one day stop smoking marijuana in one day got back up my girlfriend who's now my wife 34 years the same day a man come on now hi [Applause] sodded the church in the year 2000 18 years ago we have five campuses and 18 micro campuses around San Diego in the prisons and all kind of stuff and loving what God is doing a very honor to write this book and I want to say hello to all the campuses out there I know that we don't have books taya but I want you to go to Amazon and get this book we didn't write this book to sell books we want to change the country I believe the devil is over playing his hand and people are getting tired of being divided and so I believe that God is gonna use this message to unite us but we have to be willing to be united and so my prayer is that the Holy Spirit would prepare your heart for what he's gonna say to you you were only responsible for you and you are responsible for you when you stand before God when I stand before God he's gonna ask me what I did with me they asked me what I did with his church but he's asking what I did with me so for the next few minutes I pray you allow God to do something for you can I get any men amen there was a Japanese art form called kisugi kisugi is an art form where they take broken pottery and they glue it back together with gold and they believe that the repaired pottery is more valuable than the original the devil has done an amazing job and is doing an amazing job to divide us by racism God made us to be together God made us for relationship in His image and the devil has done an amazing job the devil is very smart believe that you may say well he's dumb he's going to hell yeah but before he gets that he's taking a whole lot of us with him he is extremely smart and he has convinced us that some people should avoid other people and then some people are better or worse than other people but there is a God who has a knack for bringing things together and when he brings things together somehow they are so much more beautiful than they and then the original I don't know if that's really true but when he brings people who are formerly separated to be United and loving each other there's something amazing about that can I get amen I want to talk today about how God how the devil divided us and how we are divided but more importantly how God can bring us together I'm gonna give you six things for them in your notes - or not because we got them late and so God just spoke later so that means it's really fresh amen it doesn't mean organize it means it's really fresh the guy look at the deposit and so I want you to get ready and I want you to prepare your heart so let's go to the screen this is I'm working this touch screen kind of new BAM okay BAM there we go oh that's me okay there's my handles get on Instagram by the way on Instagram we were telling stories and getting confident information out encouraging people and in reconciliation so you could subscribe to that and also get the book let me do that again September 15 you have an assignment cast hopefully you guys know about the simulcast that's in two weeks it's a two-hour event on a Saturday morning we're going to talk about the book and get people and groups so you can talk and have conversation I'm going to teach you how to do that okay BAM okay three kinds of racism let's do a little very high-level institutional racism there are systems and rules and guidelines governmental and under governmental systems that separate people my sister was gonna buy a house in Maryland and when she got a real estate agent the real estate she said I want to buy a house for my family got you two kids my husband and a real estate agent said we have to find an appropriate neighborhood for you she's what does that mean well she eventually divulged that there are certain neighborhoods we don't sell to black people and that we don't we guide you away from and she said well I want to go to see those neighborhoods and they ended up moving into one of those neighborhoods and because her husband is a police officer and brought his cop car home when they moved in they had nine cop cars moved their furniture out of the truck and all of a sudden they were a very very good neighbors everybody loved them and had a great time there was a system of separating people the people in neighborhood weren't aware of it and the people in neighborhood didn't care when my sister God they didn't love them but there was a system there's also internalized racism where people start to internalize the negative message they hear from other people their people have been here in all their life from generation to generation and generation that they're less than and they start to believe it because that's all they experience it's like having a fish tank you have a fish tank with a piece of glass in the middle and this fish on one side of the fish tank but no fish on the other side and the fish keep hitting the glass they can't see it they just keep hitting it and believe it's they can't go past that point the owner of the fish tank removed to the glass and the fish never went past that point they just believe we don't belong over there internalized racism this is very destructive where people just believe what they've been told now you'd live it out personally mediated racism which we're gonna talk more about today is how one person expresses discrimination against another person if there was anything you learned today this is worth the price of admission when I'm getting ready to tell you please listen to this and I pray the Holy Spirit allow you to receive this one lesson you can be racially offensive and not be a racist I will tell you every human I know is racially offensive including myself at least racially offensive some are racist some people say that racist but we're all racially offensive and not necessarily a racist in other words you could be racially offensive and it has nothing to do it you have to do with the person receiving what you say or do or you can do it out of ignorance it doesn't matter the reason if it happens we have to deal with it and so on my encouragement to you is to accept that maybe I am racially offensive and I don't even know it I want to know we owe God better we did God deserves more from us can I get amen so if you can accept one thing if you can get past that hurdle where you could say listen I want to be better I want to learn how maybe I am offending my brothers and sisters then you can learn I have talked to thousands of people in my life who can't get past that point they'll say I didn't offend you because I'm not a racist those two things I'm you doubt me say excuse them you can be a racist absolutely but you most people I believe are biased and they don't even know it they have blind spots we're gonna talk about in a minute I want you to ask the Holy Spirit to reveal to you how you could be more honoring which is what we're gonna talk about my grandmother I have one bow all my grandparents grew up in Jamaica West Indies I have one grandmother who's white one grandmother who was Chinese and black her father was from China he came to Jamaica and got jungle fever is anybody not know a jungle fever jungle fever is when someone who is not black likes black people so they get jungle fever it's a turban colloquialism whatever but you know you know something you didn't know and this Chinese man from China mr. Wong had babies from all these black women and one of those women was my grandma my white grandmother was sent out of Jamaica West Indies to Jamaica Queens New York because the parents did not want her to marry a black Jamaican so why did they send her to another Jamaica anyway they send it to Jamaica Queens and in Jamaica Queens said she met a black Jamaica from Jamaica who went to Jamaica Queens she started dating that man and they saw and when he came to her house he had to go to the back door he couldn't go in the front door she had to marrying him when she married him they cut her off they live 15 minutes from us and I never knew that they existed they cut her off so I'm in my house all of us brown people all of us grandkids grandkids and one white lady I was like where I come from nobody we didn't know we never knew she was his grandma I grew up in a black neighborhood a mile from my house I went to a Catholic school for years was a white neighborhood all white you could not live there if you were black I got called names in the white neighborhood because I wasn't wide enough I got called names in a black neighborhood cuz I wasn't black enough I got it from both Amen you know I'm say it's a football girl amen amen come on out I got a from both sides but I knew people in both neighborhoods who were wonderful people who talked about each other and said things about each other that was not true because they did not know each other I had guys with my football team one kid on my football team whose parents died before he was well I met him at 10 they were already dead he had no parents he was raised by his brother how he had no start he had no chance to make it these were my brothers so I was in both worlds experiencing this so I want to talk today about how the devil has divided us and more importantly how we can become together stuff you could do today not only get the book but stuff you could do to day before you even leave this room okay let me let me see if I can do this BAM one more Joshua turn to Joshua chapter five real quick in every race conversation it is about us verse them everyone say us and he's trying to turn to Joshua Joshua is the fifth book in the Bible us first them Joshua chapter 5 Joshua is leading the Israelites into the Promised Land and as you leave the interrelation to the promised land he's going to be confronted by the commander of the Lord's army now remember Joshua has the Israelites they are going to take possession of the promise God has given in the promised land and they're gonna fight the Canaanites the Hittites the Jebusites to amortize the up types and Atta sites and as he's leading the Israelites into the Promised Land he's confronted by the command of the Lord's army dude about my height my build my complexion had a sword and commanded Lord's army and he's standing there and Joshua says are you for us or you're our side or you on their side if you watch television listen to talk radio our culture is telling you you have to choose you either have to be for them or you have to be for them whether its political whether it's racial whether it's the police against the police you have to choose one of the other those are the two options that devil gives you there's a third which is want me to tell you about so Joshua says the same thing to the angel he's just angel you gotta be either on outside or those that's all because those are only two sides and the angels gonna say something there's a third option now in fact the angel got his message from my book he read my book and he got this from Joshua 5:13 it says it came to pass when Joshua was by Jericho that he lifted up his eyes and looked and behold a man stood opposite him with a sword drawn in his hand and Joshua went to him and said are you for us and we'll say us or adversary say adversaries I'm gonna talk later about I'm gonna talk later about I'm gonna talk later about the name or label you put on those people are you for us those people are adversaries and the commander the lord's army says no Chung ha ha ha ha that's that's in the Hebrew that's Hebrew ha ha hello he says are you for us or adversary do you want hamburger hotdog no that's not an answer he says no but his command of the Lord's army I've now come he said Joshua I'm not for neither one of you I'm not for you and I'm not for them Joshua says would God's chosen people yes right Joshua this is my plan unity is my idea it's not your idea it's my idea you bow down to me and then we'll get it done I'm not here to defend you you were here to serve me Lucas says he says command of the Lord's army I've come and Joshua fell on his face to the earth worship and said what does my Lord say to his servant what do you want me to do and the commands of the Lord's army said take your sandal off your foot for where you stand is holy ground he said Joshua the angel said to Joshua Joshua if you bow down to me then we can get this done the world says you have to pick one side against the other I want to tell you there's a third option and that's that we honor what we have in common which is the image of God in which we were made every single person on this planet every single human on this planet was made in the image of God with the ability to honor and worship God with the ability to have relationship with God with the ability to walk in relationship with God and with each other with the ability to love and forgive and have empathy and encouragement with the ability to speak life into each other and by the way our image has the ability and responsibility to live up to that standard not below it when we live below it when we are racist or bias or discriminatory we live below the standard with which God gave us to live and it has the ability and responsibility and ability to see itself in other people the image of God in me is not inferior or superior to the image you got on anybody else so we have we have to honor place a priceless value on the potential God has given us to walk in relationship with each other nothing lower than that is acceptable to God and if we're in church today as believers and by the way the government's are gonna do this the church has to do this this is our responsibility God gave this to us and if we can't do it as God's people then God help God can there's no hope there's no hope so let's talk about how we got divided social sociologists call it BAM in-group out-group everyone say in-group and we take a deep breath in watch this saying group take a deep breath in say our group very good every single one of us are members of many groups for example all you ladies are a group you're a female all the ladies in the house say hey there's a group ok that's a group all you who are mothers say hey now if you notice when the lady says hey when you say are you a mother hey because mom's are tired I'm saying dads are group men are group single men are group single men who girlfriend just broke their heart to a group single women whose boyfriends just did some what is a group we got another hit boyfriend's a group mechanics our group athletes our group football players girl group defensive backs as football players our group Group group Group group Group group group while you found them saying we all have groups the groups are in or you're in group the groups you're not in or you're out group so any group you're not in female I'm an out group into a female I'm never gonna be in that group I want to be but I'm not in a group ok yeah it was that mean that means that girls are nice ok once you identify the groups you're in you exhibit exercise in-group bias if you ask some of their racists they'll say either no which most people will say some will say yes but the reality is the third option is true that will bias gobias bias is lack of a neutral point of view we all have been taught certain information from our family our neighborhood our school the media and the view that we have our social narrative the story that creates the lens through which we see the world is flawed but we all have one you can't not have one and when you are in a group you learn to be comfortable with that group and you give preferential treatment to that group you are more comfortable in that group matter of fact here's a list of 9 ways you give in-group bias oops I really messed up on that one damn hey I figured it out oh this is the wrong one give me angry bias I am more comfortable with those like me your in-group are those like you and whatever like me means all the ladies are like me all the moms etc I am more inclined to spend time socially with those like me I am more patient with those like me I give the benefit of the doubt quicker to those like me I express more Grace when mistakes are made by those like me it is easier to communicate with those like me I assume that I will get along easier with those like me I am more willing to go out of my way to help those like me I possess more positive assumptions about those like me so when you walk into a room and people who are like you whether it be they look like you or they're in your group football players hockey players I was at a hotel and I met a hockey player from the NHL if I walked into room they were a group of NHL guys over there and NFL guys over there what do you think I'm going NFL that's what I know I'm gonna be more patient more kind it's just natural I feel more comfortable because that's what I'm used to say a minute this is making sense to you it doesn't matter the reason you do this it says I make you racist doesn't make you a mean person it makes you human next slide the opposite of this is out-group discrimination I am less comfortable with those not like me I am less inclined to spend time socially with those not like me I'm less patient with those not like me I give the benefit of the doubt slower to those not like me I expressed less Grace when Miss fakes are made by those not like me it is more difficult to communicate with those not like me I don't assume I will get along with those not like me I am less willing to go out of my way to help those not like me I possess less positive assumptions about those not like me I think it's very obvious if you walk into a room and you're treating you're given in-group bias to people who are like you and you are given out discrimination to those not like you you can call it whatever you want but this feels like the racism I felt does it make you a racist no but this is what it feels like when people give you the cold shoulder same minutes if you know I'm talking about say minute this making sense to you every single one of us if you thought about this when you around people who are like you and not like you you can change the way you love you know the Bible says to love your neighbor as yourself and we think that means all I want to feel good about you no it does not it means this it means practically go out of your way to make sure that someone is getting in-group love when they're in your outgrew so what are six things we can do really simple number one acknowledge your blind spots someone gave me a stat the other day and I'm gonna get this wrong but it was like 90% of whites and 80% of blacks have never had someone in their house that didn't look like them a blind spot is the difference between your intent and your impact in other words you may intend to be nice to everybody but the impact of what you do is different than your intent one of the ways you can find out if you have a blind spot and everywhere you may be offending people or being racially offensive and not even know it and because you're blind to it you can't know it you're not accountable until you can see it if you don't accept that you have blind spots you won't try to give sight to something you don't know you can't see but if you were to go up to somebody who different than you and say look am i at all ever racially offensive is anything I say or do I think you might learn something about yourself and learn how to love better acknowledge that maybe you have a blind spot and by the way the blind spot means that you're blind to it you don't even realize it so so and that's why it's so hard to accept you have it because you live with it all your life does everybody have a blind spot as we say in New York her body you don't say everybody down here in this out everybody next one number to rename me as your brother or your sister can you put it the next slide real quick as this this slide is like very powerful no more those people don't say that why look the next verse the Bible says you shall love your neighbor look loves your God with all your heart with all your mind this is the first come out of all your soul and all your mind this is the first and Great Commandment and the second is like it you shall love your neighbor everyone say neighbor as yourself now what if you renamed somebody other than your neighbor you just gave yourself biblical permission to not love them because they're not your neighbor give me the next verse if someone says I love God which I assume all of you would say and hates his brother discriminates his brother knowingly gives out group discrimination to his brother he is a liar he says he loves God but really he's a liar for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen or a sister whom he has seen how could he love God whom he has not seen this is the Bible this is not mildly fierce and this is the Bible if you rename somebody say well he's not my brother he is a this or that a white there's a black dad a Mexican this all-american or whatever it is and you put a name there that dehumanizes them or puts them below you all of a sudden you don't need to do this anymore you give yourself biblical permission to mistreat them did you give them a cold shoulder or to be okay with them being mistreated by someone else because they are no longer your brother not your a-level anymore when I used to watch the cowboys and Indians the kids I used to love the cowboys and Indians shows I wanted to know about the Indians they rode on horses with no saddles the ladies had long black hair like our mom and I want to know but you know what they were called savages they weren't even humans they were savages no they were people they were people just like the Cowboys but as a kid you're told they're animals they're savages put neighbor back in on their title brother and sister when you label somebody with something that's subhuman I call it subhuman intentionally when you give someone a derogatory name you attribute to them all the attributes of that label if they're stupid or if the ignorant everything you know about ignorant people is on that person and you can no longer relate to them as an equal because you just demoted them you can't love them like you would love your brother because you just demoted them rename people see them as your brother look them in the eye and see the struggle in your heart from what has been taught you say no no I'm gonna undo that God changed my heart can I get any men next one next one give in group love to your out group ooh okay one late when there's a young lady she's my age which is I mean she's very young in San Diego she's a white lady she's a dear friend of mine and we were talking about all this and she says to me one day you need to just get over it and I said hmm I said you know what I think you have spent too much time surrounded by your racial in-group you don't know how true bias they say there's a guy in San Diego he's a leadership coach and he wrote an article called the right hand of privilege and he basically said America was designed for right-handed people right hand how many other right-handed raise your hand with your elbows above you ear so I can see all your homes I'm getting very good very good there we go here we go look keep your hands I'm sorry I mean to make your work this morning okay and we look around the room look around the room look at all the right handed people okay put your hands tell me you're left-handed I'm left-handed look at all the hay people yeah yeah rebellious yes right we don't care one to a hundred yeah the Bible says we heard one to a hundred that's right culture was made for right-handed people remember the desk in school right-handed oh you are you right-handed people go I wasn't that normal not for me ups left-handers we're right now here in space we just got a elbow guts kind of can I get any man left-handed people a man it's like that was frustrating y'all just like yeah you know whatever doing them just just relaxing it was like yeah okay whatever and if you want to get a baseball mitt all you right-handed people go to any store you want they got your grits they were designed to give you a minute let's hand it they might not have my mitt I might have to go to five stores if you want to get golf clubs you go to any golf shop and get right head of clothes you cannot always get a left-handed Club I left-handed putter left hand the driver you haven't you might have this special order you shake hands right-handed people right-handed shake hand do your oath right hand everything's right hand right hand right I'm left-handed all of us left-handed so when you're right-handed you're like what's the problem go get your clubs I can't I gotta go to five stores you understand because everything's made for you now does that make the right-handed people bias against left-handed people they don't even know the advantage they have that's called privilege it is a privilege to walk in your in-group and always have in-group bias and you don't know any different and you have the choice to always stay within your in-group and always have that privilege but they're left-handed people who always in the out-group constantly so I told this lady she said this to me I said you you need to experience be here in your out-group being an algorithm so what am i is go someplace for you the only white person in Matt found give you some questions to fill in I put it in the book it's a form in the book where you you can actually copy and do it yourself and I said I want you to answer these questions I asked six white people to do this as an experiment I called it my walk in my shoes field trip and I put field trip because I wanted to be kind of hey this is gonna be fun two of them didn't buy it and didn't do it but anyways for for him did it and she went and it's like what did you feel like when I asked you to go what did you what did you feel like when you were going to this place where you be the only white person now some of you may be thinking right now well that means I got to go to a dangerous neighborhood why is that the first thought why can't you go to a church one of the guys who I asked said even if I went to a black church I would want to leave right away I would feel uncomfortable like everybody's looking at me I don't know how you're gonna know what everybody's thinking but he somehow knew and I would have to leave right away that's sad that's really sad I want you to imagine in the room I'm in just for the record of the people watching is mostly white I want you to imagine if all the white people in this room were black and all the black people or not white people were white and all you that are white were those few white people that you're the minority would you even come and why not or would you feel scared how would you feel in-group out-group when you were in your in-group which you are will be for the most of your life you self segregate when you see someone from your house group your racial out group make sure you give them as a believer in Jesus as an as an expression of the love of God make sure you give them in group love make sure you don't walk in and let them be feel like they're in an out group this is what diversity and the unity that God wants really looks like when you intentionally acknowledge there is something going on and I want to be part of the problem the solution and I'm going to express love to that person to make sure that person does not feel like an outsider in this environment and if I really really want to know and learn about what this means go someplace for you the only white person it doesn't have to be to be all black could be all Spanish could be whatever but when you are part of the out-group and then you begin to process mentally what other people process every day then you will be able to understand what it means to be left-handed a little bit and then you will come back to your neighborhood and you will sense a difference and then you begin to understand what you don't understand about other people next one acknowledge your brothers and sisters color I was 27 26 these people came to me said we don't see your color we don't see color and I said oh that's messed up y'all like you never see reds blues like never you never seen colors they said no no we see reds blues and yellows we just don't see your color I was like how did you know I had a color that you didn't see don't say that I know it's your me I know if you oh I don't see Carla I got a black friend the intent the intent is to say I treat you the same then just do that the intent is I have a black friend which means I want you to think mr. black man that I know everything about black people and I'm cool that's not true either it means the brother move next to you had no cause of your own and you had to know him God made this God made what you are I was in an airport going to LA the first time I got drafted the Rams and there was a guy at the airport he was my I was flying airport the airport to get to LA and he was sitting at the gate he was my height my complexion 100 pounds heavier than me I was like huh black dude I was trying to figure it out and I went over to him say yo man what's your names and yo my name is junior he was like 6 foot 6 1 2 80 to 90 straight hair Hispanic he's not Puerto Rican cuz where I'm from in New York you light-skinned people a Latino or they're mixed and he wasn't mixed and he wasn't Latinos I was confused I said brother I got to know where you from what are you is yo man I'm Samoan I had never met him Samoan I had never met him but you know what I saw what he was God made this God made what you are you know when you get a tan in Hawaii it's celebrated right you want everybody see it but when you get a tan in the womb its invalidated ourselves not important anymore God made him beautiful I was watching Sanford and Son day and and and Freddie Sanford yeah the great philosopher Fred G Sanford he got robbed and you know I had the white cop in a black cop come over to his house and the black cop always had to interpret for the white cop Banga for what do you say so it was so great he talked about racial that's Joe boy let me say back Archie Bunker than Jeffersons I mean they just like Wow but he said mr. Sanford was the perpetrator colored and he said yeah he was colored white culture says that people are white and people of color those are your two choices the third option is God has made a bunch of colors did you know if you go to the dictionary why does it color its other W you you are you guys are with me right now if you go W is a letter in the Bible in the dictionary right in the alphabet do you know the word the letter W I'm not this is not a joke I'm not trying to trick you say yes if you go under W in the dictionary there is a word named white it's a color God says all the other color you just call it different and he's he's how cool God is God says I'm gonna make your color we can change go to white I'll change your color then come back to South Carolina I'll change you back be comfortable with what people are and the next one is gonna be so key view every conversation as a race conversation what I mean by that is that every time you see somebody you acknowledge what they are that's why sometimes you go to the street and sometimes you don't that's why sometimes you say hello and sometimes you don't and when you see someone who looks like you you process sub consciously and unconsciously what they are and your assumptions about who they are and you have this assumption that you'll get along and have a great conversation why it's in-group bias it just happens and then when you see people who are different depending on what that different looks like with how they dress may is gonna impact how you engage them because you are noticing it why because God gave you a brain we're 100 billion cells he gave you eyes I can see in the brain that can think in information to process and through which the process that what you see in what you experience and what you hear so when you see someone be acknowledged the fact that you automatically assume things about them which you happen so quick you probably can't stop it but what you can do is is respond and allow those assumptions to be challenged so when you meet somebody allow them to self-disclose you may have your assumption but allow them to self-disclose listen to their story ask them about their pain understand why they do what they do before you assume and place a judgment on them and by the way not only a judgment a label on them here their burden the guy who I play football with he had no parents I just want you to imagine you growing up and your brothers taking care of you and your parents are dead and you grow how do you go to school how do you live I never figured that out still to this day did he did he get in trouble growing up absolutely did he have a heart this big oh yes he did yes he did have a race consultation teach me talk to me help me understand your plight what is it like to be who you are tell me about your pain tell me about your family tell me about the stories you heard growing up and number five now in with this number six I'm with this give your heart to those who are not like you Rod Carew was a baseball player major league baseball player and he was a Hall of famous Amen if you heard the name Rod Carew Rock Carew was a Panamanian and he was a little darker to me as a black Panamanian and he had a 300 something banning hours played 18 years in the major leagues and he had a heart condition several years ago like four or five years ago and he needed a heart transplant and a kidney transplant at the same time Conrad ruling a white NFL tight end from Stanford had a brain aneurysm went into a coma his mother came to the hospital started listen to his heart and said you were going to get out of this call I'm gonna hear your heart again Conrad died Conrad signed his organs over to be donated his heart and kidney went to Rod Carew hoorah amen write this story always gives me chills Rod Carew I mean Conrad's mother calls that rock cruising mr. Carew you have my son's heart and kidney he says would you like to come listen to your son's heart when Conrad was 11 years old he met Rod Carew and he came home when he was 11 years old he said I met to his mother I met my hero Rock crew I am gonna be a pro athlete like him and he did she comes over she listens to his heart if we are so different and we were made to be so separate how could a white guy give his heart and kidney to a black panamanian the devil is duped us we need each other and until we are willing to put our heart into the well being of each other we will always be divided but the third option says I'm gonna honor you and you and you and you I'm gonna place a priceless value on every single one of y'all as made in the image of God is loved by God and if we do that to each other from this world will never ever be the same Lord Jesus thank you so much for your faithfulness thank you so much for your goodness Lord there's somebody here who needs to give their heart to you they have pain they have fear that scared their mind is being blown right now but jesus loves you he died he rose from the dead if you would like to give your heart to him just pray this prayer with me in the privacy of your heart pray dear God take out my hardest stone put in a heart of flesh forgive me of my sin I want to love like you if you prayed that prayer just slip your hand up really high so I could see you God bless you God bless you God bless you God bless you God bless you God bless you God bless you dozens of you all over God bless you Lord thank you for those people you can put your hands down thank you God for being good and his name Amen

Channel: Seacoast Church

Views: 5,957

Rating: 4.9466667 out of 5

Keywords: seacoast, church, miles mcpherson, miles mcpherson the third option, the third option, racial reconciliation and the church, race reconciliation, racism, racism in football, nfl national anthem protest, black lives matter, a race for unity, race for unity, of race and reconciliation, white privilage, race for unity simulcast, a race for unity simulcast, miles mcpherson sermon, seacoast church sermon, miles mcpherson 2018, how to end racial division, racial division in the church

Id: qilYYugDE3s

Length: 44min 39sec (2679 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 03 2018