- Hi everybody thanks
for joining us. Today we've hit pause
on our regular format in light of the tragic events
that have engulfed our nation. If you grew up in church
you may remember the story. One of the most
perplexing narratives from the life of Jesus
was his late arrival to the village of Bethany
after hearing about the death of his friend Lazarus
you remember this. And John tells us that
when Jesus finally arrived he asked to be taken
to Lazarus tomb which was a cave and when
he got there, he paused, and he wept. He stood in the pain
of those around him before providing a solution. In fact it was so emotional
that the men and women who had come to mourn
with Mary and Martha actually remarked on it. Here's what they said, they
said "see how he loved him!" Now, in some ways that's
what this moment is for us. This is the moment
to pause in the pain the pain of the black community,
the pain of the families directly impacted. George Floyd's family,
Ahmaud Arbery's family, Breonna Taylor's family
the list goes on and on. The families whose lives have
been upended by the looting. This is the moment to pause
in the pain of our nation and to connect these current
losses to the current of racism that has plagued our
nation for so long. To pause and to feel it and
before we offer our solutions to weep with those who weep and to mourn with
those who mourn. That's where empathy
is born and on occasion that's actually where
solutions are discovered. Now I've heard people
talk about how sad all of this makes them feel
but come on sad is how we feel when something happens
that doesn't really affect us personally, something
that's far away. Sad is about somebody else
and I hope we can all agree that this is bigger
than sadness. This affects all of us
and consequently all of us have a role to play. Now I know that some people
are sometimes uncomfortable with people like me leveraging
the words of Doctor King but come on he said so
much and he said it so well and he goes right to the
epicenter of our point. The reason this has to
become personal for me and the reason this has to
become personal for us, is this injustice anywhere you'll
remember this quote "injustice anywhere is a
threat to justice everywhere." So for us to move past what
we're experiencing as a nation with nothing more
than a bad case of sad is to miss the
significance of this moment and it's to miss the opportunity
of this moment as well. He goes on and he
writes this he says "we are caught in an inescapable
network of mutuality, tied in a single
garment of destiny." Now, this is true
now more than ever. It's true now more than
ever because what happened in South Georgia was seen
by people in North Dakota and what happened in Minneapolis
has been seen by people well people all over the world. And then he concludes with this "whatever affects one directly,
affects all indirectly." In other words, there's
no them, there's just us. So sad isn't enough and I
certainly don't have to tell my black brothers and
sisters that right? You aren't sad, you're
mad and understandably so you're scared,
you're scared because well you didn't see a
46 year-old stranger with a knee on his neck. You saw you, you saw your
father, your brother. I have two
African-American friends who recently became
fathers for the first time. They saw their sons, they
saw the death of progress. They saw the death of
hope, they saw the death of well maybe my kids will
grow up in a different kind of America,
a better America and if that doesn't
affect me personally if that doesn't make me
more than a little sad, then I'm the hypocrite to
even call them friends. Now this topic is
a minefield for me. It's a minefield for us
but that's not the case for every pastor or every
church and you know that. If we leaned far right
or if we leaned far left this way you would be the choir and I would be
preaching to the choir I would be preaching to the
choir to a chorus of Amens and applause but we're
not that kind of church I've been to my share of you
know far right-leaning churches and churches that lean far left and it's so much easier
for those pastors. I mean everybody pretty
much agrees on everything and everybody else well
everybody else is just going to hell, right? But that's not who you are
and that's not who we are besides come on the truth is
rarely found in the extremes you know that. It's found where the circles
overlap in the middle the messy middle. Doctor King told us that as
well in fact he modeled that. He died in part because of that. The messy, the messy,
messy middle that's where the brutal uncomfortable
facts all come together but it's also where
problems can be solved. But it is so uncomfortable
it's so much easier to retreat to the echo-chamber of
extremes where everybody agrees but nothing is
ever accomplished. In the messy middle we're
confronted with uncomfortable facts and by the way
facts aren't fair
but facts don't care. Here's an uncomfortable fact;
white people fear black men that's not fair, but it's true. What makes it even more unfair
is that in the vast majority of cases our fear of black
men is in no way connected to our personal experience. And if that wasn't unfair enough
study after study has shown you know this, that fear
of black men doesn't even spring primarily from
racism it's deeper than that and that's not fair to black
people or white people. Most black men have experienced
what some people refer to as the fearful gaze, the
fearful gaze of white men and women, then on the other
side of the equation is this the majority of
African-Americans in our country they don't trust the criminal
justice system, do you? I mean you fear the
police that's not fair facts don't care. It's not fair to police
officers with spotless records who risk their lives
every day for people they don't even know, for
people who in some instances don't even like them. I was a journalism major in
college and during the murdered and missing children chapter
of our city's history some of you remember that. As part of an assignment
I had an opportunity to ride along with a black
city of Atlanta police officer on the 11:00 p.m.
to 7:00 a.m. shift so we were together
all night and honestly I was pretty much
scared the entire night not of him but we went from
one domestic violence case to another all night
long and I saw firsthand just a little bit
I saw firsthand the challenge of trying
to play by the rules when confronting people who
don't even know there are rules. So white people fear black men the majority of black people
don't trust the police most police handle
themselves professionally and then there's this,
whereas our fear of black men is rarely if ever connected
a personal experience if you're an African-American
you know this your mistrust of the
criminal justice system is connected to
personal experience. Us white folks we fear
what might happen. You fear what has happened and
then as bad as all of that is that's not even the worst of it. The really bad news is this
statistics, data, sermons, protests none of that will
ever change any of those cultural realities to
telling the black community how many times the
criminal justice system has worked in their favor,
has worked in your favor that does nothing to diminish
your of mistrust, does it? Underscoring how quickly
a police officer was fired and then arrested that
doesn't address your fear. For the same reason that
reminding white folks how many more times they've
been hurt by, ripped off by deceived by white
people than black people that doesn't erase
our fear of black men. If you're afraid of
flying you get this come on data, statistics,
lectures, none of that helps does it? I mean being told
that statistically you are safer in the
air than you are on 285 that doesn't erase
your fear of flying and here's why, because facts
and data rarely replaces fear and facts don't build trust. The only thing that
has the potential to replace deep-seated fear
and distrust, is experience. We can't talk our way,
we can't law our way we can't talk our way or
law our way out of this mess we can't pie chart and graph
you know bar chart our way out of this the only way forward is we have to experience
something different we have to experience
our way forward. My friend John Blake who
is a journalist in Atlanta recently wrote an article
and this is the title of the article. The title was "There's one
epidemic we may never find a vaccine for: fear of
black men in public spaces." Now that's not a
sentence in the article that's actually the
title of the article. But in the article he
writes this he says "I believe another way to
fight fear of black men is through exposure"
or our word experience then he says this
"until more white people actually live among and
befriend black people this fear will persist." So, you know this maybe
from personal experience the white people who have
all but silenced their fear of black men, are the white
people who have befriended black men or have been
befriended by black men and their families. Sure enough in communities
where police departments create opportunities for
people to interact with and to come to see police
officers as fathers and mothers and
neighbors, trust is built, fear is diminished. I mean come on
watching the police and the National Guard
lock arms with protesters this week was
powerful, wasn't it? It was their way of
saying we agree that a grave injustice has been done we failed to police ourselves we have more in common than not. They were saying that
what breaks your heart, has broken ours. We are more than sad,
your anger is justified your voice has been heard. So, with all of
that as a backdrop I wanna ask you a question. Here's the question I
want us to wrestle with and here's the question that
I want us to wrestle with not just today but every day. If experience, if experience
if our personal experience is the way forward as it
relates to the variables that you have control
over, how do people who don't look like
you experienced you? If experience is the way
and it is how do people when it comes to the
things that you can control how do people who don't look
like you experience you? Not what do you think about
people who don't look like you not how do you feel about
people who don't look like you and not what do you
believe about people who don't look like you again
when it comes to the variables that you have control
over, how do people who don't look like
you experience you? And then more to the point
of what I wanna talk about for the next few minutes. How should people who don't
look like you experience you? Now, if you're not
a Jesus follower that's about as far
as I can take you but that's a lot to chew
on because you do have some control over how people
who don't look like you experience you. But if you are a Jesus
follower there's a lot more because Jesus told us how
people who don't look like us should experience us
and this is not new we talk about this all
the time around here. This is core to who we
are this is core in terms of what we teach and how
we wanna be experienced individually and as
a group of churches. As Jesus followers
we are accountable as Jesus followers we are
accountable to the law of Christ not the 10 Commandments
or what most Christians refer to as the 10
Commandments come on you can keep all 10 of the
10 Commandments all day and still be the chief
among racist it's true. If you don't believe
me ask the Apostle Paul who kept the law perfectly
while despising Gentiles and torturing Christians
and then he met Jesus and everything changed. And Paul went from a
violence leveraging law keeping Pharisee to the
greatest of these is love Jesus followers in a day
because he better than anyone understood the stark contrast
between what had come before and the kingdom Jesus
came to introduce. Jesus, who on his final
pre-crucifixion night replaced all 10 commandments
with one commandment a better commandment,
a new commandment. He reduced all of life
this isn't an exaggeration he reduced all of life to
one transgenerationally relevant unchangeable command
that has the potential to change everything in
spite of how things change. A new commandment he said "a
new commandment I give you love one another." Of course that wasn't new but
of course he wasn't through. He defined it for us
"as I have loved you" This is his definition
"as I have loved you so you must love one another." This was a new command,
Jesus followers this was not a new suggestion. But it was so central he
said this you remember this by this one thing not 10
things, not 600 things by this one thing
thing you will know people will know that
you are my disciples if you love one another
as I have loved you. So, how should people
who don't look like you experience you? Like that. How should people who don't
look like me experience me? Like that. Then the Apostle Paul comes
along and he elaborates on the one another part of this he says do you wanna
know what it looks like to love people who
don't look like you? Do you wanna know what it
looks like to take Jesus new covenant command seriously? He says here's
what it looks like here's a good place to begin "carry, carry one
another's burdens." That's what Christ did for you. That's what the Jesus
brand of love looks like when you do this Paul
says "when you do this in this way you will
actually fulfill the law of Christ." When we choose to
carry someone's burdens think about this when we
choose to carry another person's burdens what
divides us diminishes and what unites us surfaces. Because when you choose
to carry my burden you'll have a better
understanding of where I sit and consequently why
I stand where I do and I'll gain a better
understanding of you as well. Carry someone's burdens
and you will fear less you'll understand more,
you'll mistrust less you'll trust more and when
the concerns of others concern you and you act,
you are fulfilling the law of Christ. When the concerns of
others become my concerns and I act on those concerns
I am fulfilling the law of Christ. And when the law of
Christ informs our
collective conscience or imagine this when the
law of Christ informs our national conscience,
we will find common ground even when we don't
share common culture or a common experience. And here's the thing, you'll
know you're getting this right when white culture and black
culture becomes secondary to the one another culture
introduced by Jesus. See here's the thing,
when a slice of my culture gets in the way of loving and
valuing another human being that slice of my culture
must be temporarily or even perhaps
permanently retired otherwise I'll just
be content with sad. Otherwise I'll never
step over the line to carry your burden. So, I wanna get awkwardly
practical for just a minute because in the messy middle,
when the circles come together when the facts come together
it's always gonna be a little bit awkward. So what does the Jesus
brand of love look like in our current context? How should it shape how
people who don't look like you experience you? How should it shape how
people who don't look like us experience us? Two things, first
and this is certainly not original with me. It is not enough, it is not
enough not to be a racist. It is not enough
not to be a racist. Non-racist is not the goal. Being non-racist does
nothing to address racism. Practically speaking it
amounts to indifference toward racism. If you're a Jesus
follower you must be we must be anti-racism, just
like you're anti child abuse. Think about it you wouldn't
walk by somebody abusing a child and think to yourself
I'm not a child abuser. You wouldn't walk by
and think yourself I'm not a child abuser and
say nothing or do nothing. We must be anti-racism
like we're anti-bullying like we're anti voter fraud
like we're anti whatever it is that gets you worked up. I mean think about it this
way if you're a parent as a parent I wasn't content
to simply be non-liar. I was anti-liar. I did not put up with
it and my children and our family right? I wasn't content with being
non-disrespectful to Sandra I was anti disrespect to
Sandra there was zero tolerance for disrespecting
Sandra in our household. When you are anti something
you address it when you see it you speak up when you hear it and to carry somebody's
burdens come on to carry somebody's burdens
is to get up underneath the weight of their burden
and when we decide to carry the burden of anyone who has
been discriminated against for any reason, we
won't be silent. Because now it's our burden
but, I gotta warn you. Speaking from personal
experience I'll own this whether you're white
or brown or black when you shift from
non-racist to anti-racist you may discover something
disturbing about you. You may discover a
racist in the mirror. You may discover subtle
versions of racism that have been hiding even
masquerading as virtues buried in the recesses
of your heart. Racism you were completely
unaware of until you decided to say something, correct
something or apologize for something. For some of us, the truth is,
when it comes to our hearts racism will never be rooted
out until we are willing to speak out. And honestly there's probably
a little bit of racism in all of us and who knows
perhaps it will never be completely erased
from our hearts but it must certainly be erased
from how people experience us so that's the first thing. Number two, proximity
is not friendship. Proximity is not friendship
knowing the names of people who don't look like you
is not the same as having a friend who doesn't
look like you. This is a big part of a
solution author James Clear who's written several
really amazing books he says this he says "facts
don't change our minds. Friendship does." Isn't this true? Facts it's what we said earlier facts don't change our minds
friendships change our mind. So as I've urged you in the
past pursue relationships pursue friendships with people
who don't look like you. Engage in their reality perhaps
this isn't so overlooked. Perhaps nothing characterized
the life of Jesus more than his intentional
pursuit of people whose lives and lifestyles were
nothing like his. Jesus gets a lot of press for
being a friend to the poor and the downtrodden but
that is not the whole story. The men he invited to be
his closest companions were from a variety
of social context. His circle of friendships
included the rich people. poor people, working
class, religious leaders, a tax gatherer, scribes, women
and ultimately Pharisees. In fact in the same
conversation where he announced his new command, he
looks around the room at this collection of
day laborers, a zealot a tax gatherer
and even a traitor and he says this. He says "I have
called you friends." Imagine this, your savior,
the savior of the world your Lord, your master
calling you friend he's nothing like
you but he likes you and then he said this guy's
"you did not choose me I pursued you I chose you." That's how he loved. That's how Jesus followers
love not from a distance not in our hearts with our
hands and with our feet with invitations,
with time, with meals. Here's the thing if
we don't know people if we fail to listen to people who don't experience the
world the way we do we will never bear their burden. We will not fulfill
the law of Christ we will be content with sad and
we will be content with mad. And we may wear the badge
in the label Christian but we dare not call
ourselves Jesus followers. That's why I'm constantly
urging you to be a student first and save your
criticism for later. The reason you don't
understand come on the reason you don't understand
how white people could I don't understand how black
why black people are always it's because you
don't understand. That's on you, that's
on me, that's on us but that must end. As long as we're content come
on as long as we're content with proximity rather than
friendship we will always we will always discount
everything that doesn't fit perfectly into our
own flawed worldview. So when it comes to the
variables you have control over how do people who don't look
like you experience you? And will you, would
you regardless of the
color of your skin decide not to be content with
merely being a non-racist? Will you decide to make
the shift to anti-racism, anti-discrimination? Will you stop and I'm
sorry to push so hard but would you please
stop with all the but I love everybody and would
you go out and love somebody who doesn't look like you? Who doesn't experience the
world the way that you do? In other words will
you follow Jesus? He was so clear, you
have heard it said and we've all heard
it said, right? You have heard it said
love your neighbor and hate your enemy but I
tell you that's not the way it works in my kingdom. You love your enemy and you
pray for those who persecute you and if you do he says you'll
be children of your father in heaven because
that's what he does. If you love those who love
you what reward will you get for that? Tax collectors do that and if
you only greet your own people everybody does that,
idol worshipers do that and then he said this
"be perfect" because this is what
perfection looks like from the vantage point
of our heavenly father "be perfect as your
heavenly father is perfect." And we're like wait, what? Perfect yeah! Because when you read
the gospels nothing could be clearer than this. Jesus taught that
our love for God is demonstrated and
authenticated. how? By how we treat other
people not how we treat God God's fine but not just
the people that are like us people who are nothing like
us, people who may not even like us. I've told you this before
and maybe this won't be very reassuring
coming from me but I'm like you I don't always
know what to believe. I mean my views on a variety
of topics have morphed and evolved and completely
changed through the years. In fact one of the humbling
things about being a preacher is that my views on
just about everything are documented somewhere
on a hard drive. I mean every preacher I know
wishes they could go back and repreach or unpreach
somethings, delete some old message. I mean we met well
but then life happen. Kids happened, tragedy
struck, we grew we matured. We began to see the
world differently. God didn't change we changed
but those old sermons that are gonna live
on forever somewhere and here's the thing. I certainly hope my views
and beliefs that matured I hope they accurately
reflect the reality of our fathers world. But there's no finish line,
my worldview, my perspective is a working progress
and so is yours. What we believe we believe
but come on our beliefs are limited by what
we know, what we see what we've experienced
but here's the thing while our knowledge
and understanding are
constantly in flux one thing is not. There is one thing
Jesus was so clear about that there is one
thing that transcends our limited knowledge,
our limited insight, our limited experience
and that's love. It fills the gaps. It reduces the friction
created by our limited insight and knowledge and judgment
inhibiting experiences. There's so much I don't know. There are things I'll never
understand but my ignorance, my limited insight does
not impede my ability to put others first, that has
nothing to do with intellect or insight. It has everything
to do with my will. So, like you while I'm not
always sure what to believe I almost always know
what love requires of me and so do you. You, you are
somebody's experience. How do people who don't look
like you experience you? How should they? Jesus made that
uncomfortably clear and then from the pages of
the Gospels he turns and he imagine, he looks
over his shoulder at me and he looks over
his shoulder at you and he looks over his
shoulder at people who don't look anything like
you and he says follow me. Follow me and I'll show you
what love requires of you and if we accept that simple
invitation, perhaps in time we'll all lose our
fear of flying. Perhaps we will silence our
irrational fear of black men. Perhaps we'll see men and
women fathers and mothers instead of just
uniforms and badges. Perhaps in the chaos of the
blue lights and the sirens we'll see somebody's son. We'll see somebody's little girl and perhaps some day it'll
finally dawn on all of us that whatever affects
one of us directly affects all of us indirectly because we are all made
in the image of God and we are all part
of the human race.
