White Christians Need, Among Other Things, Generous Doses of Self-Respect and Confidence

Race Relations Will Improve Greatly if White Christians Will Stop Apologizing For Sins They Did Not Commit

[Critical race theory provides] no way out for whites when it comes to race. Critical race theory assumes that racism is permanent and affects every aspect of society, including political, economic, social and religious institutions. The theory further advances the belief that being born with white skin, in itself, confers unearned privileges.…The message is clear: If you are unfortunate enough to be born with black skin, you are forever a second-class citizen who pays a race penalty. Under this rationale, the most affluent blacks rank below the poorest whites when it comes to privilege and opportunities. We are asked to believe that more than 50 years of affirmative action programs and race consciousness have done nothing to change the trajectory or opportunities of people born without white skin.…That’s the theory. But what critical race theory actually “accomplishes” is to create anger, frustration, and despondency among persons in the victim categories, who internalize this destructive message.
—Carol M. Swain—

Key point: Can whites be guilty of racism? Yes, of course—but not merely because they are white.

In a recent series of articles, we highlighted 17 reasons why the social justice “gospel” isn’t really good news at all and is contrary to the gospel of Christ. We began that series in part 1 with some very wise words from black Christian leader Virgil Walker. Here is Walker’s warning:

Dear Liberal White People and Duped Evangelicals:

Bowing in front of statues and to Black People does nothing to atone for sin, helps no one, and only shows your complete ignorance of the gospel.

Stop asking what you can do for “race relations”. You are unable to atone for the sins of a “race”. You are not God. Christ has already done what’s necessary to reconcile mankind to God and neighbors to One Another.

For those Pastors claiming the Gospel is not enough, apart from the Blasphemy of such a statement, you should RUN from them. They are adding to the Gospel a WORK which will never adequately atone for your sins (or your ancestor’s sins). These false teachers are advocating a form of PENANCE that will never end. STOP!!!

The Gospel changes hearts. As a result of a changed heart toward God, you will do works in keeping with repentance. They will be works aimed at your neighbor (of all ethnicities–which includes (but is not limited) to blacks). Trust the Gospel of Jesus Christ and STOP with this silliness.

Biblical Teachings that Liberate

Why are white Christians doing this? I believe they have been misled because they aren’t sufficiently grounded in biblical truth. White Christians who feel compelled to apologize for their “whiteness” need to understand and appropriate several important biblical truths in their own thinking and in their own lives. Black believers also need to hear and heed these tenets. These ideals are liberating for all believers.

First, the adequacy of Christ’s death to atone for sins and the affirmation provided by His resurrection that God had accepted His Son’s death as payment for human offenses. When we come to God on His conditions, He forgives all our sins.

Second, the unity the authentic gospel generates among the members of God’s family.

Third, the supremacy of Christ.

Fourth, the difference between another’s sins and one’s own. While the sins of one’s ancestors can and do impact members of future generations, God does not hold a person’s descendants responsible for their forebears’ transgressions. Nor should we.

Fifth, the dangers of legalism. To the Christians in Galatia, the apostle Paul wrote,

Before you Gentiles knew God you were slaves to so-called gods that did not even exist. And now that you have found God (or I should say, now that God has found you), how can it be that you want to go back again and become slaves once more to another poor, weak, useless religion of trying to get to heaven by obeying God’s laws? (Gal. 4:8-9, TLB).

Sixth, the nature of forgiveness among God’s people, according to Scripture. Do not be misled. Being “woke” means continually being penitent and never finding rest. By contrast, when one is in Christ and is a member of God’s family, forgiveness for sins committed is real and complete. Repentance for sins not committed is unnecessary.

Seventh, white Christians need confidence and a sense of healthy self-respect. Jesus said that the greatest commands are the divine commands to love God with all one’s being and to love one’s neighbor as oneself. This last command assumes a healthy self-love, which involves self-respect. Self-respect is desperately needed among Christians today.

It Isn’t Sinful to Be White

Miriam Weaver, co-founder of the website Chicks on the Right, wrote an article titled “I Am White. I Refuse To Feel Guilt About That.” In it, she explicitly denounces racism. She doesn’t mention Christianity or the Bible in her article, but her piece showcases a confidence and a sense of self-respect that is woefully lacking among Christians who are following the social justice movement today.

After drawing attention to this video and to a description of it on social media as “beautiful,” Weaver writes,

That’s one of the most cringe-worthy things I’ve ever seen. It’s not “beautiful” to pander in this way, to prostrate yourself in this way. It’s degrading. It’s grotesque. It’s likely that none of the sheep kneeling before their black neighbors ever did anything WRONG to their black neighbors. But they’ve been conditioned, particularly by recent media coverage of what’s happening in our country right now, to feel guilt about their own skin color. This is lunacy.…

If you’re white, and you’re feeling guilty? You need to do some serious soul-searching, because you’re being played. You are being used as a pawn in an artificial race war that is being perpetuated by radical activists who want to tear down what this country is about. YES OF COURSE racism is wrong, and we need to do everything we can to call it out when we see it, and dole out the appropriate consequences for those who are guilty of it, and listen to our friends and colleagues who want to talk about their experiences of it. But unless you’ve owned a slave, or personally mistreated a person of color, or denied a black person an opportunity because of their skin color, YOU DO NOT NEED TO FEEL GUILT about anything. Least of all something you cannot control – like the shade of your skin.

I don’t feel guilty. I won’t kneel. I won’t post a stupid pointless black square on my social media. I will never respect sham organizations like the BLM who want to dismantle capitalism or demand reparations. But to my black fellow American citizens, please know I am happy to walk side by side with you, hand in hand, to speak out against racism in all its forms.

Leftists Have an Agenda

Shelby Steele is a black conservative who apparently would affirm Miriam Weaver’s perspective. An article published by The Western Journal highlights his take on how whites are being manipulated with the idea of “white guilt.” Said Steele on Laura Ingraham’s television program, “[P]recisely because they’re against America” and are speaking in the wake of the horrific death of George Floyd, leftists come across as having “the moral authority to come in and take America over.” Generally speaking, Americans readily acknowledge their nation’s failures in the past to live up to its founding ideals; yet they also applaud the progress made in recent decades to uphold, as the Pledge of Allegiance to the American flag puts it, “liberty and justice for all.”

Steele observed that leftists have

worked it very well. They breed doubt in straight-shooting Americans, in good decent Americans, who really want to move forward in race relations and other things.…They have this power to stigmatize.

Yet by capitulating, Steele said, well-meaning whites enable the leftists and energize them further. In a 2018 interview conducted by Peter Robinson of the Hoover Institution (the same organization with which Dr. Steele is associated), Dr. Steele described why the tactic the extreme liberals use is so effective.

White guilt is a very specific thing. It is the terror, the literal terror of being seen as a racist. Everybody knows in America that’s the bottom line. If you are seen as a racist, openly in public, you are ruined.

White people need to “become morally confident in themselves.”
—Dr. Shelby Steele—

And the situation, Steele commented to Ingraham, “will never change until white Americans, and whites generally, become morally confident in themselves.”

Hillsdale College Refuses to Capitulate

As an increasing number of individuals and institutions fall all over themselves to join the politically correct chorus decrying racism, one institution that has denounced it all along but refuses to join the PC choir is Hillsdale College. The college “was founded by abolitionists in 1844 and has, since its inception, pledged to educate all students, ‘irrespective of nation, color, or sex.'” It has remained committed to this ideal throughout its history. It does not accept a dime of financial assistance from the federal government. You can read a brief history of the school here.

Recently, Hillsdale released a letter that is self-explanatory. It says in part.

Amidst the events of recent weeks, a number of alumni and others have taken up formal and public means to insist that Hillsdale College issue statements concerning these events. The College is charged with negligence — or worse.

It is not the practice of the College to respond to petitions or other instruments meant to gain an object by pressure. The College operates by reasoned deliberation, study, and thought. The following observations, however, may be helpful and pertinent.

The College is pressed to speak. It is told that saying what it always has said is insufficient. Instead, it must decry racism and the mistreatment of Black Americans in particular. This, however, is precisely what the College has always said.…

There is a kind of virtue that is cheap. It consists of jumping on cost-free bandwagons of public feeling — perhaps even deeply justified public feeling — and winning approval by espousing the right opinion. No one who wishes the College to issue statements is assumed to be a party to such behavior. But the fact that very real racial problems are now being cynically exploited for profit, gain, and public favor by some organizations and people is impossible to overlook. It is a scandal and a shame that compounds our ills and impedes their correction. Hillsdale College, though far from perfect, will continue to do the work of education in the great principles that are, second only to divine grace, the solution to the grave ills that beset our times.

[T]he fact that very real racial problems are now being cynically exploited for profit, gain, and public favor by some organizations and people is impossible to overlook.
—Hillsdale College—

Miriam Weaver, Shelby Steele, and Hillsdale College have provided examples that white Christians who feel pressured to apologize for their “whiteness” need to heed and emulate.

The Bottom Line

Racism, of course, should be condemned and opposed whenever and wherever it rears its ugly head. Moreover, white Christians need to be sensitive to their black brothers and sisters and the impact of racism on them whenever they experience it.

At the same time, denying the progress that has been made in race relations in America in recent decades is in itself oppressive. It isn’t fair to blacks or whites. Racism is a lot harder to find in the United States than it used to be. In fact, it is quite rare.*

Denying the progress that has been made in race relations in America in recent decades is in itself oppressive.

Blacks are not victims. They are men and women, boys and girls, made in God’s image. Each individual, no matter what the color of his or her skin, is of infinite worth—to God and to the body of Christ.

All the members of Christ’s body—blacks and whites alike—need to

- - love God supremely,
  - respect one another, and
  - respect themselves.

None of these is sinful. In fact, each one is a virtue.

Let’s practice all three.

Note:

*In addition, an honest look at history tells us that America’s anti-slavery leanings were far greater than currently is assumed or taught.

top image credit: Photo by Felix Koutchinski on Unsplash

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