It’s late and I’m tired, but I want to commit to blogging during this consultation. There were some good things happening today, and I really look forward to tomorrow… but here was a nugget that I pulled out for our purposes on this blog. At first, I was hesitant to post this, because I am not really into speaking back into my old situations for fear that I might be speaking where I’m not welcomed to speak, but then I got over it because I still deeply love my friends and want to continue walking into their growth as well. Here’s me getting over it…
I sat in a breakout session with Pastor Trevor (who God used in calling us into South Africa… I haven’t told him yet, but hope to). His session was on reconciliation (this seems to be a theme in our work so far huh?). In the talk, he began discussing Matthew 5:23-24. The breakdown as he saw it was that Jesus was more concerned about our reconciliation with our brothers than with our worship. Going deeper, he suggested that reconciliation is a heart condition that many of us still haven’t dealt with deeply. We may attend “integrated” churches, but integration is not reconciliation. The comment that helped me understand this was as follows…
“we all sitting in this little room for the next hour are integrated. We have our American friend (me), some (white) Afrikaaners, some Zulu, some Sotho, etc… We can get along great for this hour, and maybe even become friends, but what if we stay here for a month! THEN it would get interesting!!!” That struck so many chords for me. I think I discovered racism deeply rooted within me in that moment. Not as much against a particular race, but against people in general! How willing am I to truly engage in community and be reconciled to those who have hurt me?
Now for you, dear Huntington. This was a casual conversation I brought up with a few during my time in Huntington… the idea that there were maybe 20 people of ethnicities different than white. I suggested we talk about racial reconciliation, but that never got anywhere simply because there was no one to reconcile with!!! BUT, the Huntington history with the Klan DEMANDS that we sort out reconciliation and invitations back towards whole communities. Many who read this will think it’s a waste of time, that Huntington has other issues to address… but I’m afraid that our worship services are not as important as our reconciliation services. This is a massive piece of the gospel that I feel in many contexts gets left out. How do we embrace all of humanity and welcome into our midst those who are different then us? It IS an issue in the States still. We integrated our schools without reconciliation practices, and we had a rough go of things. etc… let’s move on, this isn’t a preaching forum…
Back to SA. Trevor and others made a comment about the efforts of the black community during Apartheid. The efforts were towards equality and reconciliation, but in 1994, all those efforts seemed to stop. What Trevor was saying, which I credit as coming from the Lord, is that the role of the church is not to just win souls back from the grip of the enemy, it’s to restore communities and usher in the kingdom NOW. And reconciliation plays a massive role in that.
reconciliation… ubuntu… the gospel of Jesus
