A couple of years ago, I was inspired to try to understand the experience of my African American friends.  I heard example after example of personal experiences of their human dignity being affronted, their safety being challenged and sometimes their lives being threatened!  I was stunned.

At about the same time, the phrase “Black Lives Matter” began to be a rallying cry.  A common response to that was “all lives matter.”  What makes this something of an offensive response?

I want justice for all humans.  I believe all human lives are sacred because all humans are created in the image of God and are treasure to Him.  If all humans are sacred, then why would anyone proclaim “Black Lives Matter!” ?

Ok, sometimes when I talk about being “pro-life”, a liberal friend will sometimes say “Oh?  Are you really pro-life or just anti-abortion?”

“Of course, I am pro-life!  Of course, I want everyone to have a great life – but you know who isn’t having a great life?  The unborn who are being killed!  Where is their protection of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?”

Sigh

If the knee-jerk response to “black lives matter” is “all lives matter,” you are making the same mistake that my liberal debaters make.

So, of course all lives matter…  but there are times and ways in this culture that it seems like maybe black ones don’t matter as much as everyone else’s lives.

Even with all of the amazing advances made in the last 400 years.  Of course, I disagree with the solutions to this injustice with secularists, but I can see it when I talk with godly, mature, brothers and sisters whose skin is black.

But under too many situations and for too many years and in too many ways, it has felt like the “all lives matter” principle HAS NOT been afforded to the African American population in particular.  For far too long – several dozen generations – this population has NOT received justice far too often.  Justice HAS NOT been blind in regard to their color.  What we call that is “Injustice.” 

I talked about this in a recent sermon as well – a larger scale conversation about “race” overall.

Christian hate injustice because God hates injustice.  Read Isaiah chapter 1 if you doubt it.

As a Christian, I am determined that the ONLY social movement that I am actually part of is The Way of The Kingdom of Christ.  Only the aspects of any other movement that fit with The Kingdom can be embraced by the Christian.  I can voice a message (black lives matter) without necessarily agreeing with everything claimed in the movement.

So, to my African American friends, as I am learning to see your color as you see it, I accept your anger and pain.  I am angry too. This was the most amazing thing for me personally as I have gotten to hear the accounts of several African American friends about their experiences with racism in various forms.  Though we can marvel at how far our nation has come in just a few decades (“my grandfather would have had very few positive interactions with police or authorities and all the rest would have been abusive and racist – for me it is the reverse, most have been positive but still a few have been abusive and racist.”), I found myself extremely angry at the examples of times when there has been abuse.

I was/am angry that a friend of mine, a pillar in the community, a man’s man who I respect was treated with such disrespect.  Who, before God, did that officer think he was?!  It still makes me angry.

I was angry as a white man who felt and feels often misrepresented by other white men.  Any of us (any human) can say and do something that, even if correct sometimes, can be unnecessarily offensive.

If something is necessarily offensive (that exists too), then stand by it.  To walk back something that is necessarily offensive is cowardly.

If it is unnecessarily offensive, it is right to apologize.  To be gentle is Godly.  To walk back something foolish or even merely unintentional can be courageous!

I was suddenly angry at a system in which worked for me but not for him.

I, when facing merely rudeness from a police officer once, demanded his name and badge number.  But, one of my friends referred to that as a “white boy question” when I asked if he had gotten the name and badge of the abusive trooper.  He said he just kept quiet in an effort to stay healthy and alive (and his son was with him too).  That requires courage, maturity and wisdom.

I was angry for my friends who are police officers who I suspect would’ve wanted to badly beat the officer who misrepresented them so flagrantly.

I was angry for even this – that I get treated with respect that is absolutely appropriate for me to receive from people in authority, but that these men, who are my peers or betters in every way imaginable, would ever be treated with disrespect by someone in authority.  I haven’t earned it and if those authorities weren’t cowards, they would treat me with the same disrespect they treat my friends with.

I am pretty much always angry at injustice, as is everyone else.  Injustice is a human tendency.  Wanting justice is also a human tendency – put into us by God.

I am angry at revenge.  I am angry when someone’s life work is destroyed in the name of revenge.

I am even angry at people trying to take advantage of these kind of situations for their own political gain or to further their own agenda.

Again, I want to say again how proud I am of the distance we have traveled all together.  I am glad most of my African American friends have only ever experienced one or two events of racist abuse of authority versus what their father and grandfathers experienced… but I am still infuriated that they face any at all!

Anger is not very trustworthy, but there is such a thing as appropriate anger.  Paul, in Ephesians, reminds us to “be angry and do not sin…” (Eph 4:26).  The brilliant thinker, Voddie Baucham, talks well about what does motivate “racial reconciliation.” 

And finally, Part V