MLK Sunday Message (1/14/18 Standalone)

ATTN: Tomorrow is MLK Day and today is designated as the Racial Reconciliation Sunday. Let me confess to you that I’ve been in angst all this week. I didn’t know what it was. I’ve just been feeling this dread, anxiety, and even anger all this week as I’ve been giving myself into studies to prepare for this message. And I realized finally on Friday that I’ve been in a spiritual battle – I’m very slow. The dark forces do not want me to preach this message and I’ve been feeling like the prophet Jeremiah who was given a message to preach to God, but he didn’t want to because of the gravity of his message and how it will come across. I thought about not preaching this message and just going on with the book of John series but I had to finally come to terms that this dread is there really because of the spiritual warfare that I’ve been engaged in. I’ve been praying all week for God to strengthen me and give me wisdom on how to preach this message. And I do believe that wisdom that God gave me is that since the children will be joining us for the family service, I’m going to speak in a way that will be understable for children as well as adults. So, this sermon will be like many of modern cartoon movies, such as the LEGO Batman movie that the children can identify but also for adults to get something out of as well.

Let me give you an outline: Racial Integration is the church is 1) Imperative rather than optional, 2) Base on trust God rather than what is expedient, 3) Inclusive rather than exclusive. Children, I know those are some big words, but I’m going to explain them, so don’t tune me out yet, Okay?

 

1. Racial Integration is imperative rather than optional

In other words, “Separate but equal” has no place in the church. Most of us who took U.S. History are familiar with this phrase. But for the children and those who didn’t grow up in this country, let me explain briefly. About 130 years ago, the US Supreme Court decided that it’s a good idea to let light skinned people and dark skinned people to use separate public facilities. So, for example, there was a restroom only the  light skinned people could use and a restroom only a dark skinned people could use. Light skinned children and dark skinned children could not even go to the same school and had separate schools! Now, I know that the people who made this decision, called the Supreme Court Justices were supposed to be really smart and went to really good colleges, but this proves that just because you are smart doesn’t mean that you are not going to do dumb things. Because this was a really dumb law. We can all see now how silly this is. Why should the light skinned people and dark skinned people be separated? They are all beautiful in their own way as God made them. So, thankfully, years later, they came to their senses and said this law is really dumb. We should get rid of it. And they did! So, in America today, there is not separate schools for light skinned and dark skinned people, or restrooms or anything else. They all can use whatever facility they like. And this is good and right in the sight of God because again, God made all people beautiful in His image to display how awesome and great He is.

But this similar thing happened much longer ago in a slightly different setting. And we read about it today in the Bible. It happened 2000 years ago in a church. You see, this church in a city called Antioch, had both the Jewish people (they were the people from Israel) and the non-Jewish people (probably people from Greece). The Jewish people probably back then had darker skin and the Greek people back then had lighter skin. And this time, it was the darker skinned people who wanted to separate from the light skinned people. Peter, one of the disciples of Jesus, was at that church and he only hung out with the Jewish people because he was Jewish. And since he was a leader, when the church people saw him do that, they also separated themselves from those who looked different. Now, there was another church leader named Paul who didn’t like this at all. Yeah, Paul is our man! And he says to Peter, “Peter, you are a liar! You say you believe that God is for everyone, but then why are you only hanging out with people who look like you – the darker skinned people? God is going to punish you!” I know those are some really strong words. But that is what we adults call “righteous anger”. In other words, it was good that he got angry because Paul really cared about Peter and also about the people of God. But what he cared most about was God’s reputation. He knew that God was for all people. And people, especially God’s people, should not separate from each other depending on how they look or where they grew up. They should all be one, loving each other in unity and harmony so that God will be pleased.

So, when you grow up and you can look for your own church, look for a church that has all sorts of people in it and not just one kind. It should have young people, and old people. It should have light skinned  people and dark skinned. It should have rich people and poor people. If it doesn’t, go up to the leaders of that church and ask nicely why they don’t and how you can help change it just like Paul did!

Racial integration in church is imperative and not optional. Paul could not have put it any more emphatically.

 

2. Racial integration is based on trusting God rather than expediency.

But here’s my question: Why did Peter decide that it was a good idea that church people should be separated depending on how they look and where they are from? I mean Peter was a good man. He wasn’t a racist. He followed Jesus and loved Jesus. He even got a special revelation from Jesus to reach out to the non-Jews. But why would he only hang out with his kind and not the other? Well, in verse 12, “ He used to eat with the Gentiles. But certain men came from a group sent by James. When they arrived, Peter began to draw back. He separated himself from the Gentiles. That’s because he was afraid of the circumcision group sent by James.

So, Peter separated himself because he was worried about what people thought of him. You see, he loved the church just like Paul. And he wanted to keep the church together. And the Jewish people – the group he belonged to – they were the people in power and Peter thought that these people would like it more if he gave them a special treatment over people who were not Jewish. So, to please these people, Peter separated himself from the Greek people. But you see that was wrong. You cannot use a wrong method to do right. Just because the end goal is good doesn’t mean that you can use any means to achieve it. That is what Paul meant when he said, “you conduct is not in line with the truth of the gospel.” As believers, not only our end goal has to be right – which is to glorify God – but also our method has to be right.

But at this point, you have to ask, “But wouldn’t it just have been easier to just separate the church according to where they are from rather than trying to keep it together?” You see, Peter and Paul could have thought, “Hmm… our church has two different people. Jewish people. And Greek people. And Jewish people naturally feel more comfortable with Jewish people. And the Greek people naturally feel more comfortable with Greek people. So, why not just split our church and make one church be a Jewish church and the other a Greek church? That way we have two churches instead of one. And each church can reach out to its own people. Wouldn’t that be easier? Wouldn’t that be better to reach more people? But Paul said “no!” Again why? Because when Jesus came to die for us, not only did He come to save us from our sins, but also He came to make different people come together. Eph 2:15, “Through his body on the cross, Christ set aside the law with all its commands and rules. He planned to create one new people out of Jews and Gentiles. He wanted to make peace between them.”

So, we have to trust God and do things His way rather than what is comfortable and easy for us. And the reward for that is God is pleased and we are also happy in Him. Just look around you. Would you like it if your iPad only displayed gray color? Everything was only in gray! All the candies in Candy Crush are gray… yuck! We love color. Don’t we? So we love to have different people in the same church. That is more beautiful. And that pleases God more and we are also happier.

 

3. Racial Integration is Inclusive rather than exclusive.

So, far, I have been preaching to the choir – that means I’ve saying what we’ve been practicing already. So, we don’t have to change anything. Let’s keep going! But here’s where we have to be careful and this we have to remember to do. And that is: we have to be inclusive and not be exclusive. That means we try our hardest not to leave anyone out or make someone feel like they don’t belong, especially because of what they look like or where they are from. So, we don’t say things like, “Yeah, they are from Japan. They are weird. I don’t want to play with them.” That’s called excluding. You see, leaving them out because of how they look or where they are from. The Bible teaches us that we should be inclusive rather than exclusive.

Now, I do believe in having people who are especially close to you. Jesus had 12 people called the disciples, who were especially close to Him. So, it’s good to have friends who are close. But the danger is to think, “Since it feels so good to be with these people and I get along so well with them, I’m only to going hang out with these people and I don’t want anyone else to come in our group because that will change our group. And I don’t want my group to change because I like it just how it is!” That is what’s called being exclusive. That is what Peter was doing and Paul was correcting.

So, instead, imagine if we said, “I love my group of friends so much. But I see that girl who is always by herself. How nice would it be if that girl came into our group so that we will have more people to enjoy? Yeah, I’m going to go talk to her and ask her to play with us!”

ADULTS: We have cliques at our church. That is not a bad thing. Jesus had his own clique of 12 people. And another clique within that clique with Peter, james and John – the three. But that clique was the seed money. It was not to remain a small clique, but to expand and so it will include a diversity of people that will form a mosaic that will display the beauty, harmony and glory of God. That is why I believe God created so many different types of people. We are the image bearers of God. But one ethnicity or one group of people cannot sufficiently display the grandness and beauty of God. But all these different people with different cultures and languages and combined together just begins to reflect the true beauty of God – like a stained glass window at Sistine Chapel are made up of millions of different shapes and colors but they all come together to display one grand and marvelous picture….

CONC: We have something special here at our church. It’s not natural. It’s not comfortable. Many eyes are watching to see how we would do. Could unity in diversity really work? We are pioneers in this. I dare you to find another church or institution where blacks, whites and asians work together as closely as we do. But it’s also fragile. We must trust God and must be at work in sustaining, promoting, and expanding the work that God has started. And we have the mandate from God to keep it this way and be inclusive of others so that there would be more of us like this for the glory of God. You are and I am a piece of glass in that sistine chapel window. Would you pray for yourselves as you take a part in this? Would you strive together for the gospel to attract more of diversity of people for God?