Us Vs. Them, Heavyweight Title of the World Match

One of the things I took solace in early on in my faith was that I knew I was included because I had accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior. I remember looking at others that I thought were lost and seeing hollowed out skeletons with a flickering flame deep within the empty sockets of their eyes. I remember being fearful for others, angry that they just wouldn’t accept Jesus. Probably not unlike John Calvin when he came up with his theology of double predestination. I won’t get deep in the weeds with Calvin, because I believe he was a good boy trapped in a wicked theology.

So to establish one of the greatest things that changed for me when I met Jesus in August of 2017, I began to see Jesus even in the most despicable of people. I know this is a radical thought, but I genuinely began seeing Jesus in other people and realizing that Jesus sold everything to obtain them… too.

I began sondering and placing myself into the lives of others, I can see why they made certain moves, why they chose certain things, what was their driving force in decisions. I began to see Jesus on the Cross crying out to Papa, “Forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.” and then hearing Father say, “I did.”

Knowing that we are all doing the absolute best we know to do, and even in that knowledge we still fall short of His everlasting Glory. We fall short in our own understanding and our own actions daily. There are no evil people, just people who do evil. That evil does not define them, Jesus and Him crucified does. Now I know that is a spin on the classic verse that evangelicals like to throw around that none are good, but just like there none that are good there are none that are evil. We exist completely outside of that dualism, but we can choose actions that fall in line with that dualism.

I can choose to do good, or I can choose to do evil, or I can choose to rest and trust in God’s goodness.

Evangelicalism has been a poison to the faith of Christianity, inasmuch as Liberalism is a poison as well. They both teach an us versus them narrative that is hard for us to escape. On one side the evangelicals choose the titles lost and saved. The liberal folks just choose to overlook aspects of the faith they deem uncomfortable and act like it doesn’t exist all while shaming those people who believe the aspects they choose to overlook.

None are lost, at least in the perspective of the cross, because Jesus would leave the 99 to find the 1. I once was the one, and that parable has been a life sustaining word for me. There are a lot of 1’s out there, and Jesus regularly slips away from the crowd to bring them home. Not to the same ideology, although some do fall prey to that line of thinking.

It is interesting that Evangelicals can generally be lumped in with Republicans and the Liberal side of theology can be lumped in with the Progressive side of the political narrative. They both argue that Jesus is “on their side,” but there are no sides with Jesus. He is one with every single member of humanity, whether we realize it or not. Both sides seek to shame the other side, all while Jesus says quietly, “come, there is no shame in me.”

Us versus them seeks to shame the other side by hurling ridiculous claims at the other, it shames people for their choices in political candidate, it shames them for their choices in the people they choose to hang around. This is the battle that has been waged since the beginning of time, who is in and who is out. We pretend to know God’s mind about who or what is acceptable all while behind closed doors we are the same thing we shame.

There is no us versus them, we are one.

We are one with the Father of Jesus in Jesus forever and ever, and we don’t have a choice in the matter. But we do have a choice in how we respond. Do we cautiously let people in not knowing their allegiances, or do we simply look at them knowing we are all on the same team?

These are the kinds of things that knock around in my head, and I am fully aware that my views are certainly in the minority… but what if they weren’t?

People Sondering Will Blow Your Mind

Have you ever people watched?

This is something I do very often when I am in public. Places like malls, main street, even places like a Walmart can be a great source of people watching. One of the things I like to do is to put myself in the mind and body of the subject that I watch. I ask myself questions like that which I would ask myself normally. Watching someone shopping is always an interesting activity, not trying to be creepy or anything but to simply put myself in their shoes.

“Work was stressful today. I need a beer.”

“I have an interview tomorrow, need to make a good impression. “

“I need to remember to call my wife before I leave to make sure she doesn’t need anything.”

“I can’t wait to see my daughter’s face when she sees this.”

Knowing that every single person on this planet currently, the people that have lived and passed on, or yet to be born are all unique and completely original. Every single person has seen different things, even while looking at the same things. Fifty people could look at Niagara Falls and have a million different thoughts buzzing around in their heads.

Every single person is just as complex, varied, beautiful, complicated, as you are.

So what if we all participated in this? What if we all looked at everyone through different eyes. If we saw each other as complicated and complex, good but flawed, loved but longing for affection. If we truly could see other through eyes of curiosity and exploration we could then see people for who they really are.

We are all doing the best we can, with so little knowledge about the implications of it all.

I am brought to the thought of Jesus on the cross, as he looked at all the soldiers, Jewish religious leaders. normal people gathered around the cross he saw himself through their eyes. As he saw them for who they truly are, he called out,

“Father, forgive them.”

In anguish, he cried out not with the thought of himself, but with their thoughts flooding him like a massive river.

“Father, forgive them. They don’t know what they are doing. “

The thoughts in his head filled with images of all of us in that very instant, everyone who ever lived, even as far ahead as the last man to ever live. In an instant, instead of pleading for his own life, he plead for the lives of every single person who had ever lived. and would ever live. In that moment, he became us, and we became him. He is our vicarious man, vicariously living as us so we can live as him.

Sure, the people who had nailed Jesus to the cross, left their homes that morning. Kissing their wives, hugging their kids, they walked to work with their friends they probably joked a crude joke or two. They probably laughed as their children cried seeing them disappear over the horizon. The religious leaders thought they were doing the right thing, they probably did the same thing, maybe they passionately prayed to God that they were doing the right thing. Maybe one of them bought a loaf of bread and some wine on their journey into work that day.

They though it was just another normal day, that tomorrow would be a normal day. They thought they knew what they were doing… but they really hadn’t a clue.

We think we know what we are doing, but in reality we are just kids playing in a sandbox, playing with LEGOs, drinking Capri Suns. We may do horrible things thinking we know better, but the truth is we don’t.

No one you see when you people watch truly know what they are doing, we are all just going through the motions of day to day life. We are all complex, unique, beautiful, and different.

So as you look at others in their day to day routines, picture Jesus on the cross. Who lived their life in that very instant. Picture Jesus crying out to Father to forgive them for they don’t know what they are doing when you face someone radically different then yourself. Don’t think of things they need to do, think of Jesus on the cross. The rainbow haired, gender confused person… think of Jesus on the cross. The people that are protesting injustice, think of Jesus on the cross. The police officers, think of Jesus on the cross. The homeless person, think of Jesus on the cross. The white person, black person, Indian person, Asian person… think of Jesus on the cross.

Think of Jesus on the cross in every instance you experience. Not only will your mind be blown at the information that will flood you, but you will be overwhelmed by a love for all mankind. No matter who they are, or who you are, Sonder with me, and love others as Jesus passionately loves us.

A Gospel Perspective of Black Lives Matter

When faced with the death of Freddie Gray and Trayvon Martin in 2013-14 certain members of the black community decided to organize a movement to polarize a nation. More than just a political polarization, but a movement that divided us by the color of our skin, something we are born with that we cannot change. Even though there are folks who try, I believe just like gender it is not a spectrum that can simply be changed. That doesn’t change how I feel about people who think they can, it is okay because we are all simply trying to figure out how to live in our own skin.

I make no bones about it, I am white, I do not know what it means to be black. I don’t pretend to. What I do know is what it feels like to be marginalized and pushed aside either because of something you cannot change or by a dumb decision we make. I know it isn’t easy to try and find acceptance with people who may not want to accept us as we are. I have never been in a position where I was in the accepted crowd, most of the time I am in the fringe. I am guilty of calling people foolish or dumb, but I have also been on the receiving end of this criticism as well. I know it hurts to not feel equal.

This battle has gone back to the beginning of time, and it will honestly go until the end. Because as humans we are tribal, we congregate in groups we are most comfortable with. When we aren’t comfortable we tend to pull away or show out. I am going through this season right now, I see things creeping back up that I thought I had escaped from years ago.

The group I had felt most comfortable with all of a sudden became very critical of each other, I kept seeing posts from people I would trust with my life and experience calling others foolish or dumb, and the ones on the receiving end echoing the same comments. My heart broke as people I was close to would tell me privately they agreed with my fears or concerns, but then publicly saying the opposite. I did not see my tribe any longer, but felt like I was on the outskirts of the tribe I loved.

I say all this to say that Black Lives Matter has done more to divide us than to unite us.

Those who know me and know my heart know that for decades I have cried for unity in the church, it wasn’t until recently though that I realized that before the church can be unified that we must find unity with who we truly are, in doing so we can see others as they truly are. I found that when I focused on Jesus inside of me that I could see Jesus inside of others, I wasn’t concerned with the affairs of the world. But, then the world decided to tell people that their hearts, their words and actions didn’t matter because of the color of their skin. I was told to let members of the black community grieve, to offer my shoulder in solidarity. Then I saw people in the Black Lives Matter organization demand white folks to kneel and apologize for their white privilege. In fear these people kneeled. Not because they wanted to but because an army marched on them and demanded it.

The act of kneeling has played a part in the rise and fall of empires. I am reminded of the movie 300, when Leonidas faced the king of the Ottomans, Xerxes, and said that Xerxes was the greatest king to ever live but that he would never kneel because his knees were tired from fighting. I watched the entire series of Game of Thrones, and for the most part I enjoyed it until the last season. But kneeling played a role in showing fealty to a king. Conquering kings would demand it to show they had overcome their enemy. This practice in the fictional show of Game of Thrones was taken from centuries of history. Kneeling showed you were defeated and not equal.

If a white person demanded a black person to kneel the same people that celebrate the kneeling of white people would be outraged and call for equality. It would be considered a racist action, and our very polarized government would probably add that to the growing list of hate speech terms that can be prosecuted. But yet it is okay for the Black Lives Matter activists to demand that of white people.

It is not okay for a white person to chase down a black person and film them because they cut off the white person on the freeway. But recently a black person chased down a white woman, shamed her horribly on camera, she is terrified. Instead of being criticized its celebrated, shared millions of times, and even the company the person worked for would be terrified to fire the person. I reported the tweet because I was terrified for the woman, because her license tag was shown on Twitter, her apartment building was shown, the woman crouched over her tag trying to conceal it but the damage was done. Apparently, he has done similar stuff before specifically with white or Asian women.

Why do I bring all of this up? Because if the person behind this Twitter account saw Jesus in this woman, and saw Jesus in himself and others would he have gone out of his way to shame this woman?

In fact more and more people in the black community are rising up against the partial view of Black Lives Matter, and calling for All Black Lives to Matter. In a recent interview on “The Breakfast Club” a woman by the name of Angela Stanton-King was interviewed, she is also running for congress in Atlanta, GA. She was a lifelong Democrat who was arrested and sentenced due to her role in a car-theft ring, but Donald Trump pardoned her and she has taken to trying to reunite families that are victims of mass incarceration. But she has some words for the black community about abortion, gang violence, and murder in the black community.

In the beginning of this latest series of protests and violence I tried to remain quiet, but then I was told if I stayed quiet that it was violence, then it was racism because I didn’t agree with all of the narratives tossed around. I saw post after post of white people posting memes about white guilt, sharing books about it, talking about unconscious racism, and when I called shenanigans I was accused of outright racism. I interviewed a close friend about all of this on the latest episode of The Warrior’s Cry .

I have had numerous conversations with another member of the black community, her name is Jolene. She is constantly posting about orphan-hood being the cause of all of this, and I completely agree with her. If people saw themselves adopted in Jesus, and saw Jesus in others around them, what would it look like?

What happens when we see Jesus in others?

What is the Gospel? Some have differing perspectives of this and I respect the different viewpoints. But how I see the Gospel is simple. It lies in the choice between Life and Knowledge. I will write more on this topic in the future, but at the root of everything is a choice between Life and Knowledge. Jesus said in John 6:25-70 that He is the Bread of Life, and that we must eat from Him and drink of His Blood to be included in Him. This is the crux of the Gospel, we must eat of Him and Drink of Him to be included, but when we choose to eat from the other we act out of our own understanding and knowledge, rather than make decisions based on Life.

When faced with something that typically triggers you into anger, choose. Eat from Jesus, Drink from Jesus and the decision you make will not cause you to harm another for any reason. Our identities are not tied up in our skin, or even our actions and words. Our identities are totally wrapped up in Jesus, and if we aren’t about reconciliation then nothing else that we do matters.

Reconciliation and equality does not mean diminishing another or their roles in society, it does not mean shaming another or trying to replace them. What it does mean is that we hold out our hands and help those who feel downtrodden and lift them to the same level we are. It means that we care for the brokenhearted, not by diminishing ourselves but by loving them in spite of the political narratives that are flying around. It does not mean burning down the things which have elevated themselves, but rather love the people involved as Jesus loves us.

In short the point of this journal entry is a Gospel perspective of Black Lives Matters. Yes, all of those Black Lives Matter. The black babies in the wombs ripped out because of inconvenience. All of the black kids killed at the hands of other black kids. The 3 year old executed by teenagers, David Dorn murdered for trying to stop the looting of his friend’s pawn shop, Breonna Taylor murdered in her home by police, George Floyd murdered by a Derek Chauvin while other cops stood around and watched it happen. As of Jun 8, 2020, 19 people have been murdered, How many of their lives mattered?

Black Live Matter to me. But so do the lives of every single other person who loses theirs due to no fault of their own, I do not believe in the death penalty, I do not believe in abortion, I do not believe in violence of any kind.

This is the Gospel perspective of Black Lives Matters…

Your life matters to me.