DIVIDING THE CHURCH BY BASHING WHITE EVANGELICALS (WEs)

I am not white. Instead, I had hated white “Christians” so much that I felt that they had a repugnant odor. My school experience taught me that they all hated me. They called me “Jew bastard” among other things. My understanding of Jewish history convinced me that, if they could not change me, they’d kill me. This led me to move to Israel as a Zionist, and I was determined to never return.

However, I did return three years later with a wife and child. We decided we’d live apart from society and survive by living in harmony with nature. However, I had a horrible chainsaw injury. During this, I had an encounter with Jesus, which reversed my life.

My only desire now is to serve my Savior faithfully. One thing this means is preserving the unity of the Body of Christ (Ephesians 4:1-5), but there are so many forces trying to divide us. Many of my own Jewish brethren will not call themselves “Christians.” because they do not want to be affiliated with the Church and its anti-Semitic “history.” I therefore challenge them. Others have chosen not to  call themselves “evangelicals” (believers in the Gospel as presented by the Bible), because of all the bad press we have endured. By doing so, they have promoted another division in opposition to Jesus’ prayer:

·       “I do not ask for these only, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. The glory that you have given me I have given to them, that they may be one even as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me.” (John 17:20-23)

It is hard not to notice the unrelenting assaults against WEs by the secular media, accusing WEs of not caring about black, even accusing them of “racism” and not being followers of Jesus, as strange as this charge might seem. They are quick to highlight any story by a black leaving a WE Church because of alleged racism. Evidence? Simply this – they voted for an alleged racist.

Well, why aren’t WEs true followers of Jesus? There are many charges, like being in favor of building a wall to keep out illegals. However, evangelicals recognize the right of any government to decide who enters, who can vote, and who is eligible for government benefits. Nevertheless, on a personal level, evangelicals are also quick to help their neighbors who might have entered illegally.

WEs are also charged with a “lack of concern for the poor.” Why? The WE Church has been reluctant to support more give-away programs. However, there are good and Biblical reasons for this. For one thing – the obvious. Rather than helping the recipients, these programs have hurt them, making the provider irrelevant, destroying the family, and de-motivating.  Laziness is bad enough, however when it is institutionalized by the government, which rewards laziness, it is even worse. The Bible speaks a lot against laziness. Scripture, therefore, has warned us:

·       …to work with your hands, as we instructed you, so that you may walk properly before outsiders and be dependent on no one. (1 Thessalonians 4:11-12)

However, our give-away programs have made dependency a way of life. Scripture even warns us about how to give within the family of Christ.

·       But refuse to enroll younger widows [for church support], for when their passions draw them away from Christ, they desire to marry and so incur condemnation for having abandoned their former faith [vows]. Besides that, they learn to be idlers, going about from house to house, and not only idlers, but also gossips and busybodies, saying what they should not. (1 Timothy 5:11-13)

It is not only destructive for a government to enable “idlers, but also gossips and busybodies,” it is also destructive to the Church. Therefore, the Scriptures have imposed sanctions against “idleness”:

·       Now we command you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you keep away from any brother who is walking in idleness and not in accord with the tradition that you received from us. (2 Thessalonians 3:6)

However, this does not pertain to those who cannot work but to those who will not work:

·       …If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. For we hear that some among you walk in idleness, not busy at work, but busybodies. Now such persons we command and encourage in the Lord Jesus Christ to do their work quietly and to earn their own living. (2 Thessalonians 3:10-12)

However, WEs are accused of “racism,” if we take a stance against give-away programs, but this is only because we are trying to live in harmony with the Words of our Lord. However, there is a growing number of black conservatives who promote this perspective, but the secular media continues to ignore and reject their voice. In, “Shame: How America’s Past Sins have Polarized Our Country,” Shelby Steele argued that White guilt, the terror that whites experience of being labeled a “racist,” has harmed the Black community:

·       It has spawned a new white paternalism toward minorities since the 1960s that, among other things, has damaged the black family more profoundly than segregation ever did.

·       Post-1960s welfare policies, the proliferation of “identity politics” and group preferences, and all the grandiose social interventions of the War on Poverty and the Great Society—all this was meant to redeem the nation from its bigoted past, but paradoxically, it also invited minorities to make an identity and a politics out of grievance and inferiority.

Walter E. Williams, professor of economics, George Mason University, does not think that the problems that the Black community are now experiencing are a product of slavery, Jim Crow, or even systemic racism, but of welfare programs, white guilt, and “political correctness”:

·       A major part of the solution should be the elimination of public and private policy that rewards inferiority and irresponsibility. Chief among the policies that reward inferiority and irresponsibility is the welfare state. When some people know that they can have children out of wedlock, drop out of school and refuse employment and suffer little consequence, one should not be surprised to see the growth of such behavior. The poverty rate among blacks is about 30 percent. It’s seen as politically correct to blame today’s poverty on racial discrimination, but that’s nonsense. Why? The poverty rate among black intact husband-and-wife families has been in the single digits for more than two decades.

Those who love our Savior and His Word, embrace the entirety of the Body of Christ and to fulfill the prayer of Jesus. Do not be taken-in by slick slogans like “No justice, no reconciliation.” Let not our political differences separate us, as many hope. Instead, at any cost, walk in love, first within your immediate family:

·       “A new commandment I [Jesus] give to you, that you love one another: just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34-35)