Color-Blind

Recently, I saw a video of a color-blind teacher being honored by his students with a pair of glasses that would allow him to see colors. He was overwhelmed with the gift and the honor. His response to seeing the colors in the room where he donned his glasses for the first time, was heart-warming and exciting. One couldn’t help but feel some of the joy he was feeling as he expressed his delight at seeing the colors before him.

While I was growing up, I had friends who were black, white, and brown. I had friends who were rich, poor, and in between. As a teenager, I worshiped with teens who were not white. Some of them were way smarter than I would ever be. Some of them weren’t. All of us had the usual teenage struggles and all of us enjoyed skating in the winter and going to youth camp together in the summer. We never talked about the color of our skin. We did talk about schoolwork, church stuff, and dating. I grew up not knowing that skin color was a “thing.” You could say I was color-blind. I’m very glad I was.

I’ve been trying to learn something about our current woke culture and how it is apparently, subtly but surely, permeating every area of our lives including, and perhaps especially, churches. So far, I have learned a very basic history of Wokeness which is a real eye-opener, and I am currently reading a book called, “Christianity and Wokeness” by Owen Strachan where the opening chapters have taught me what wokeness is not, and what it is. Also, both eye-openers. What has been impressed upon me so far is the reality that woke ideology and its side-kick, CRT, or Critical Race Theory, is not about unity or harmony among races. It’s not even about social justice. It’s about the problem with being white. In short, if you are white, regardless of who you may be as a person, you are the problem. White people have to learn to be “less white.”

Here’s the deal. I can no more learn to be “less white,” than you can learn to be less black or less indigenous. We can, however, learn to be color-blind.

I can no more be less of a Christian with Jesus, than you can be more of a Christian without Jesus. We can, however, learn to love our neighbors as ourselves.

And that is my point, with Jesus, there is neither black nor white, Russian or American, male and female. Without Jesus, we will continue to see, and be encouraged by Woke to see things that simply are not there. It’s called blindness. But it has nothing to do with the privilege it can be to be color-blind while wearing the glasses that allow us to see clearly the colors before us.

Prayer:

Father, thank you for my brothers and sisters who look and act differently than I. Please help us to be awake to the lies that are driving our culture. Help us to actively engage our culture in a way that brings the truth of Jesus to a world that is walking in darkness. In Jesus name and for your glory, I pray. Amen.