To say things are tense, heavy and divisive in our world right now is an understatement. The hurt and the brokenness happening all around us is palpable. The murders of Black men and women being caught on video and taking place during a worldwide pandemic, has made it impossible for anyone to ignore the racial injustices and unrest in the United States. Racial injustices that have always been part of the Black narrative in the United States. Racial injustices without reparations. With leaders in our nation both Black and white insisting that racism does not exist in America, needless to say, not everyone is in agreement which is where the division begins.
As a white woman alive in this space, place and time and who is certain that racism DOES in fact exist in America, I have had a constant feeling of being kicked in the gut. I feel this because I KNOW FOR A FACT my whiteness is responsible for the suffering and injustices my Black brothers and sisters experience daily. And I hate that this is a reality. And the knowing this and the undoing of white supremacy in my own life while living in a society built upon white supremacy makes me cringe…punch to the gut. I hear the voices and the cries of my Black friends. My in real life (not token Black person in the media) Black friends who have held my babies and put their feet under my table and worshiped by my side in church and I want to crumble under the weight of their pain. And I feel so angry about the state of our nation for so many reasons but especially because the conversation about Black men and women seeking justice and equality and safety is a conversation and reality that can cause division.
How can we hear the cries of the hurting and answer them with arrogant justifications?
Lord, have mercy!
Dear Black people, I am so deeply sorry.
Life is strange, and 2020 is the strangest. So, it’s not surprising that in the midst of all of this. All the conversations I am having on social media with both strangers and friends. The hundreds of DMs and upsetting comments. The heavy conversations with family members and friends, in the midst of all of it, I found myself at the filming of a Christmas concert.
Christmas.
It is months away. And the months between now and Christmas are primed to be harder, heavier, and even more divisive #election. And there I was, listening to one of my favorite artists singing Christmas carols. And when she sang the song “Oh, Holy Night” I began to weep. The gut punch feeling I’ve been holding for months released in a moment through tears.
The lyrics of the song hit me hard because something I’ve been wrestling with these past months is I believe navigating the circumstances in our world should look radically different for those of us who love Jesus. At the risk of simplifying something layered with complexity, I can’t wrap my mind around how “The Church” – the collective whole of those who love Jesus – is not doing everything possible to listen to the cries of the hurting and help to build bridges of love, peace, and hope.
The Church knows that the world was holding its breath, waiting for a savior, then Jesus was born.
Jesus was born and lived and changed it all!
Have we forgotten this?
Have we become so fixated on safety, power, nation, comfort, being right, and religion that we have forgotten how to care for the broken hearted, the poor in spirit, those seeking after justice, righteousness and peace for all? Have we forgotten everything Jesus taught us about loving and caring for our neighbor? Have we become so fixated on the return of a savior that we have forgotten about our savior here on earth who brought with him a radical way of living and loving?
Oh, friends! What am I missing? Is my lack of theological studies blinding me here or giving me clearer sight? How are the people who love Jesus and believe him to be the savior on such opposite sides of the issues?
Look, I know I am getting a lot of it wrong. A lot! But I also know, as a woman who loves Jesus fiercely, whose life has been radically changed because of the hope and love and peace which IS Jesus, that without that hope, love and peace we have it wrong. The message of The Church, of Jesus loving people is flat out wrong when it reflects fear over hope, power over love and division over peace.
Leave it to a good and gracious God to take my breath away and bring me to my knees with a simple Christmas song at a production being filmed in the middle of the summer. An unexpected time and place to bring me back to what it is Jesus is all about and what my response to a broken world should be.
As I heard the words to the song, words reminding us of a weary world waiting for a savior, I thought of my Black friends. I thought of all the Black strangers in the room at the concert with me, of the men and women I have been listening to and learning from in books and documentaries and news articles and on social media. I heard the words and felt a pull to write them down and send them along. A reminder of hope for their weary souls.
And I wanted to take the words of the song and remind so many in the white community who are not seeing the hurt and brokenness of those in the Black community but rather focusing on and fearing the brokenness of their world. Remember dear ones, a savior came to the earth to break chains and end oppression. A savior whose law is love and gospel is peace.
We don’t have to wait for Christmas to live out and live in these truths.
Oh Holy Night (a portion of the song)
Oh Holy night! The Stars are brightly shining.
It is the night of our dear Savior’s birth.
Long lay the world in sin and error pining.
Till he appeared and the soul felt it worth.
A thill of hope – a weary world rejoices,
For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn.
Fall on your knees!
Truly he taught us love for one another,
His law is love and His gospel is peace.
Chains he shall break, for the slave is our brother.
And in His name all oppression shall cease.
Sweet hymns of joy in grateful chorus raise we,
With all our hearts we praise his holy name.
Christ is the Lord! Then ever, ever praise we,
His power and glory ever more proclaim!