In July 2014, I came across a post by blogger Christena Cleveland that triggered something stunning in my spirit. In a way, Christena said the obvious. At the same time, she exposed what I’d been blinded to, and desperately needed to see.
Every time I read the piece, I thought, at once, “Of course!” – and “Ah ha!”
Christena launched her post with an in-your-face title: “Dismantling the white male industrial complex.” Then she wrote with a draw-you-in tone. Her article affirmed:
WHITE MEN ARE NOT THE SECRET WEAPON (to dismantling racial injustice in the church and beyond) … BUT JESUS IS1
Of course! I knew that. Long before seeing Christena’s post, I would have told you I knew that. But reading her words, I had a profoundly “Ah ha!” moment. Suddenly, I realized:
I had looked to white men
for what Jesus alone can give.
Running into brick walls
In late 2011, I published the book, We Confess! The Civil War, the South, and the Church. It explores white-evangelical-church injustices of the era – what they looked like, what lay behind them, what they produced and are still producing, and also, the way out.2
I wrote in the first-person, acknowledging:
I confess what my ancestors did,
and what I have benefited from and/or participated in, unwittingly or not.
For more than two years, I earnestly, persistently, sought people to join the confession, and ways to broadcast it more widely.
All those months, I continually asked Jesus what to do and how to do it. Yet, again and again, I ran hard into solid brick walls.
What stunned and perplexed me most was that, each time I tried to move forward, I did so thinking, “This time, the way will be open before me.” So again and again, I was moving full-speed-ahead when I hit the wall.
Now I realize: Every time I thought the way forward was finally opening, it was because I had connected with a church leader who had led me to believe he would rally the troops, burst through the gates and lead the charge. Time and again, I’d thought:
This man – this godly man – will see where we have missed and misrepresented Jesus. This man will humble himself to acknowledge the truth and go a different way. This man will courageously call others to do the same.
Time and again, I was wrong. Each one of the church leaders who affirmed the message of We Confess when I approached him with it, soon dropped it like a hot potato, and then disappeared in a puff of smoke – just as I charged ahead, believing he was charging too.
We Confess probes a dark past we have not left behind. It offers detailed, heartfelt confessions. While similar confessions might be offered by other peoples in a variety of situations, the primary call to confess is to the white US evangelical church. So it’s certainly not wrong for me to challenge white church leaders to lead the way. Yet:
I confess my sin of pinning my hopes on white men, instead of Jesus, even when I believed I was trusting Christ alone.
The light-bulb moment
By July 2014, I was battered and depleted from slamming into so many walls. My resources had dwindled. I had lost hope. Then, I read what Christena had written:
The truth is that the battle for justice won’t be won when white men finally join the fight. The battle was already won on the cross.
Jesus said that the Kingdom of God is at hand. It’s here. It’s happening. It’s already been set in motion. We’re inevitably moving toward a world that reflects the prophetic reality of the resurrection.
Justice will be done. All things will be made new. And Jesus graciously invites all of us to partner with him in that movement. We all can play a crucial role. But let’s never forget that Jesus is the secret weapon. Jesus has already determined the outcome of this battle and he will involve whoever is willing to accomplish his plan.
The Kingdom of God is at hand, whether white men participate or not.
Christena described “a different strategy” for seeking racial reconciliation and justice:
- Turn toward the Holy Spirit – wait for, listen to and follow him.
- Turn toward the oppressed – listen to, learn from and follow them.
“Of course!” I thought. And also: “Oh how much I have to learn.”
A new way forward
Ever since We Confess! The Civil War, the South, and the Church was published, people from the white church culture rooted in the Bible Belt have told me (sometimes way more bluntly, sometimes without words): “The church is not ready for this message,” and, “I will not listen to this.” They mean:
Even now, 150 years out, we are still determined not to face our stuff.
What a dangerous place for a church culture to be – “not ready” to face, to admit, to turn from, the ways we have, corporately and individually, mistreated whole groups of people.
I’ve prayed for years for that to change. Instead, I’ve seen just how high and thick and seemingly impenetrable, the walls that stand in the way.
In spite of everyone and everything that says otherwise, I hope and pray that the Lord led me to write a book named We Confess because fellow confessors are out there.
He sees and knows when anyone is willing to see, keeps looking when they begin to see, confesses and turns as they see. He is honored; his kingdom, furthered – and we are encouraged and strengthened – when even a few of us who are on this path connect.
Recognizing how I personally have missed the mark, I’m deeply grateful the Lord is both correcting me and redeeming my sins and mistakes. Regaining my breath, I want to get up and go forward again, but this time, by the Holy Spirit, to discern between the illusion of an open door and the truth.
Lord Jesus, you alone hold the keys to defeating injustice at its root. You alone open hearts that are closed to self-examination, out of pride or fear or both. You open, and no one can shut.
With all my heart, I want to partner with you, and with others who are following you, in the forward movement you initiated through dying and rising again. By the Spirit, for the honor of the Father, show me where you are overcoming fierce opposition and throwing open the way.
This post was updated a bit on November 20, 2023.
Image is of a painting titled, Saint George and the dragon (c. 1470), by Paolo Uccello, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons. What does that image have to do with this post? “The Christians of the antebellum South adopted a beguiling code of ‘chivalry’ drawn from fictional accounts of the Dark Ages. They promoted as biblical a view of women heavily influenced by Arthurian romance novels.” – We Confess
See also
- This girl is a woman now
- Leah no more
- Tell us about past events
- The Civil War, the South and the church
