The Sept 22 The Atlantic has an excellent article on Charlotte, its slave history, its present segregation, its police violence. The Queen City that is bursting with big banks isn't what it is cracked up to be.
White oppressors have not repented of their centuries of ethnocentrism and oppression; white oppressors have not yet released their black oppressed; white oppressors have continued their prized superiority and privilege at all costs. After all, white is right.
Some puzzled white Christian college professors, 50 years after the civil rights movement, are still asking the stupid question, "What do they want?" They are not asking, "What must we do?"
What do blacks want? Freedom and justice. What must whites do? Give both freedom and justice; give up white superiority and white privilege.
In the midst of nationwide racial conflict and tension, some well-meaning whites are calling for dialogue. Not good enough. FIRST, must come white repentance, restitution and release of the oppressed. Blacks are legitimately anger against unending injustice publicly highlighted in Ferguson, Baltimore, Chicago, Charleston, Charlotte, Tulsa, New York, etc.
White churches need to lead the way in repentance and justice---incarnating the kingdom of God, not maintaining the American trinity. They will need to dig deeply into the following Scriptures; there are no easy shortcuts: Isa. 58; Mark 1:15; Mt. 3 and 4; Luke 4:18-30; Mt. 6:33; Acts 1:1-8; 8:12; 28:23, 31; Isa. 9:7; 11:1-4; 16:5; 28:16-17; 42:1-4; 61:1-2.
If white churches don't become more biblical, they will continue to use middle class, conventional halfway efforts to deal with radical social evil. Radical social evil demands radical biblical justice, Jubilee justice radicality.
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