My Racist Life

I was born and raised in the United States Army.  According to 2012 statistics, 40.1% of Active Duty personnel identify as racial or ethnic minorities (Black or African American, Hispanic, Asian, American Indian or Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander, multi-racial, or other/unknown).  My dad is a physical therapist, and so I spent a lot of time around other MEDDAC staff of a variety of races and ethnicities – officers and enlisted, those with high levels of education and those with less.  
 

My earliest memories are of living in Bremerhaven, Germany, where one of my closest preschool friends was a black boy named Teddy.  His dad was either a surgeon or an anesthesiologist (I can’t quite remember which), and he and my dad were friends.  Often, when Teddy’s dad had to be in the OR, he would invite my dad to come along to watch and learn.  At the time, the base housing complex we lived in had a lot of older kids, and far fewer younger ones.  I was about 4 years old, and Teddy must have been the same.  We stuck together on the playground, against those mean 5^th graders who spun the merry-go-round too fast so we would fall off.  

Later, when my sister was born, our Hispanic Latino neighbors who lived across the hall would cheerfully send their small dog over after dinner each night to clean up under her high chair.

My dad played on various softball and volleyball teams growing up, filled with a variety of races and ethnicities – again, representing the broader culture of the U.S. military.  

This was the world I lived in.

At the end of 4^th grade, I was diagnosed with bone cancer, and my dad was transferred to a post in Maryland, so that I could be treated at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.  You meet a lot of people when you spend that much time in the hospital.  The first night we spent there (having been medevac’d in on a cargo plane), we met Jennifer – a six year old black girl who had the same diagnosis as me, and her mother, who was an Army cook.  

In the ensuing weeks, months, and years, I met, interacted with, and was cared for by people of a variety of races and ethnicities.  Black, Asian, Hispanic – doctors, nurses, nurses assistants, orderlies, cleaning staff, cafeteria cooks and cashiers, radiology techs, gift shop and bookmobile volunteers.  Fellow travelers at the hospital and local Ronald McDonald House.  

In 5^th grade, I had my first real crush on a boy.  His name was Bryan, and he was an African American kid in my class.  I found him cute and kind, a little more thoughtful than the rest of our male classmates who were, age-appropriately, mostly rather obnoxious.  

As I grew, these sorts of interactions continued.  Even as I finished treatment and my family moved on, I found myself engaging with people of diverse racial backgrounds because of where we lived, where I went to school, and who my dad worked with.  When my parents hosted the occasional party, men and women of all ethnicities hung out at my house – some even spent time with us during the holidays, when they couldn’t take the leave to go home to their families.  

This was all perfectly normal to me.  The only reason that I can now recall these interactions as having any relation at all to race is because I’ve been culling my memories for months.  

All of this is not to suggest by virtue of personal anecdote that I am not racist because I “have black friends” or whatever.  

No.  The point I want to make is that, from early childhood, I interacted with and was comfortable around people of all races and ethnicities.  And now I'm not.

I will freely admit that I am no longer comfortable around blacks, Native Americans, Asians, and other people of color.  Does this make me a racist?  Probably, but then, from what I’ve learned over the last few years in “anti-racism training” and “diversity awareness workshops”, I always was racist, and I always will be.  According to reigning social theory, it is impossible for white people to not be racist, and is impossible for any non-whites to be racist.  Ever.  Anywhere.  In any culture.  Or any location.  I’m not sure if there’s some sort of “racist gene” that is coded into my DNA, that individuals of color lack, but somehow or another, I’ve been educated to understand that I cannot not be a racist.  

Which is bad.  I mean, you’re not supposed to be a racist, right?  But if you’re white (like me), you can’t help it.  So naturally I feel guilty about this.  Now, the guilt is not the biggest issue.  I’ll deal with that, I guess. (Although, for the record, I have yet to hear anyone suggest that the sin of racism is in any way forgiveable by a Holy God. So maybe I won’t deal with it.)

What I can’t avoid is the discomfort, the self-consciousness, the self-focus, the incurvatus se - oh look, there's another sin - that now hallmarks all my interactions with people of color.  

If I see someone on the street or in a store, do I look at them (or is that staring? Judging?  Wondering why they are here – in this store, on this planet?)  Do I not look at them (or is that avoiding them? Rejecting? Dehumanizing?)

Do I say hello? If I say hello will it sound sincere?  Will it be interpreted as sincere? Will it look like I’m “trying to not be racist”?  Oh, who am I kidding?  I’m an introvert.  I really don’t say hello to random strangers on the street, ever.  But this person doesn’t know that.  If I don’t say hello, will they think it’s because they are [fill in race here]?  

What about something as complicated as counting the change I receive, rather than tossing it into my wallet?  Or checking over a restaurant bill twice?  If I do that to a clerk or waitress, will they think it’s because I don’t trust them, rather than because that’s just what I do?  God forgive I have to ask a person of color for help – in a classroom, in a store, on the side of the road if my car has broken down.  What if it looks like I think they are all “the help” and exist on this planet to serve me?  If I don’t ask, when I clearly am in need, does the person notice and assume that I don’t want their help? 

And when a person of color initiates a conversation with me – what happens if I, as an introvert, am annoyed by unnecessary small talk?  What if they ask for help that I’m simply unable or unqualified to give? Will they interpret that as animus?  

The list goes on. 

And it makes me sad.  It makes me sad that if I ran into my friend Teddy, who taught me to dip my French fries in mayo, I wouldn’t know how to interact with him.  It makes me sad that the gynecologist can’t send their dog over to vacuum up baby food in my house anymore – because isn’t that just an extension of the Hispanics-as-cleaners stereotype?  It makes me sad that Jennifer, who once displeased her mother and amused all the rest of us when she got so frustrated with her prosthesis that she threw it in a lake, sees me as an oppressor rather than a friend and fellow cancer survivor.  It makes me sad that all those doctors and nurses and other people who cared for me did it not because they enjoyed their careers, but because of some institutionalized power structure that requires people of color to serve whites.  It makes me sad that all those people my parents welcomed into their home over the years apparently viewed my family as patronizing rather than loving. 

It makes me sad that “anti-racism” efforts have made me more racist than I ever was.  

Congrats to those who feel better by this state of affairs.  

Count this unforgiven, unforgiveable racist out. 

Dear Millennials

Dear Millennials,

Let me start by telling you something: I am one of you.  My birth year puts me on the earliest edge of our generation.  I am not an old person from a different era, I don’t “not understand” the things that are important to most of us, the culture that we have grown up in, and now live in.  I get the desire for authenticity and community.  I know that we live in a vastly different environment than our parents.  (Mine are still vaguely offended that they have to pay more than 10¢ for a hamburger at McDonalds.) I know that the things that were taken for granted 50 or 100 years ago are now all up for grabs, and we get to (have to?) navigate our lives in a world where every choice is up to us. 

But let me tell you something else: I am the Church.  Yeah, you read that right.  An ordained pastor, called to the ministry of God’s Word and Sacraments.  I got this gig because God dragged me into it, kicking and screaming at times.  And there are days and nights, hours and minutes, weeks and months when I hate it.  

I hate when there are mean people at my church, people who stare too long at crying children, or who criticize volunteers for “doing it wrong.”  I hate that I often have to choose between vapid, shallow 7/11 Jesus-is-my-boyfriend music and Biblically, theologically rich hymns full of words that no one understands.  I hate that many people would rather complain in the parking lot than give 2 hours/month to helping our community function better.  I hate that meetings that should take 45 minutes often take 3 hours.  I hate that sometimes outreach into the community gets questioned because “those people will never come back to church”, and I hate that sometimes we do community outreach that doesn’t seem to bring anyone closer to God.  I hate that sometimes I have to tell people that things they’re doing are wrong, and that at times I have to fundraise for my own salary.  I hate that my congregants are rockstars at saying hi to visitors in worship, but terrible at inviting them to stay for coffee.  I hate that I can’t always see God working.  I hate that I have to work weekends, and that I never ever get to go to church, only to work.  I hate the sheer amount of sin and brokenness and death and destruction in this world, that lands on my doorstep every day.

And I hate that I hate these things.  I hate that I hate these things, because they are all a part of my job, and a part of the call that God has placed on me in this moment, in this time and place. 

Because really, I love my job.  I love that it’s my job to say, “At the command of Christ, I forgive you all your sins.”  I love that it is my job to literally put Jesus into people’s hands.  I love that it’s my job to encourage people in their crazy outside-the-box ideas for how to bring the Word of God to others, and for how to care for the people in our community who are most in need.  I love splashing babies and adults with water, and reading the Christmas proclamation, and being in my office when the quilters come over to drop off more fabric and they stop to chat and catch me up on their grandkids’ lives. I love being with the kids in confirmation class when they tell me about a break up, or why they are on the track team even though they hate running  or they suddenly get that the Holy Spirit’s job is to bring them to Jesus.  I love anointing a sick baby and seeing God work powerfully to heal that little one and to strengthen the faith of her parents.  I love draping a funeral pall over a casket and beseeching God to accept this sheep of his own flock, this sinner of his own redeeming.

So despite all of the things that I hate about the Church – the fact that the people don’t always do what I think they should, the Bible doesn’t always say what I wish it would, the words don’t always come out of my mouth the way I intended, our worship services aren’t always as awesome as I want them to be, it’s so easy to get hung up on “how to live” and “what to believe” that we sometimes forget that Jesus is bigger than that, and conversely, it’s so easy to talk about God’s love and grace that we sometimes forget that the only reason we need God’s love and grace is because we are, in fact, sinners – despite all of that, I hang in there with the Church, the body of believers across time and space, and my church, the unique little outpost of the Church that God has called me to at this moment. 

I hang in there because I genuinely believe that Jesus has the power to save.  He has the power to forgive my sins, and the sins of everyone I know, and everyone I don’t know.  He died, and was made alive again, and because he connected me to that when I was baptized, someday I will see him face to face, and all the sadness and junk and imperfection and awfulness of this world will fade away in the light of his glory.  I hang in there because I believe it, even though I emphatically do not understand it, even though sometimes belief feels more like “really flipping hope so” than “staid unshakeable confidence.”  I hang in there because if I don’t, I’m totally out of options.  Nothing else even pretends to offer what Jesus actually does. 

And so I hope that you’ll hang in there too, Millennial.  But I want you to hang in there for the right reasons. 

See, it’s fashionable these days for all the “church people” to freak out about no one coming to church anymore and we’re all dying and no one is in Sunday School and oh no what are we going to do?  And it’s become equally fashionable for us Millennials to assert our specialness and write articles and publish them on the internet about what the Church should do to get us to “come back.”  Pew Research recently released some survey showing that “more people than ever” aren’t Christian and aren’t going to church.  Apparently I’m supposed to be very worked up about this. 

But the thing is, I kind of don’t care if you come back to church.  I kind of don’t care if you’re a Christian.  I’ve belonged to a congregation that had over 12,000 people in worship each weekend. For realz.  And I have belonged to a congregation that had 12 people in worship on Easter Sunday.  Literally.  I’m really not concerned about the survival of the Church – Jesus has promised to protect it – and so I’m really not concerned about the survival of any one congregation.  Whether you come to church or not has very little impact on my ego, or that of my parishioners.  What I care about – what they care about – is that you hear the Word of Jesus, that you join his family in the Sacrament of Baptism, and you come to his dinner table at Holy Communion.  I care that you know God loves you, and forgives you, and is preparing a place for you.  I care that the Holy Spirit opens up a sliver of faith in your soul, faith that changes the way you see yourself, and other people, and the whole world.  I care that you have a place to express joy in the greatest, most amazing moments, and a Person – and people – who will carry your burdens in the saddest, toughest, hardest times.  I care that you know that while you will have troubles in this world, Jesus has overcome the world, and when you’re connected to him, you also overcome the world. 

But if you don’t, it’s no skin off my nose.  If Jesus isn’t really what you want or need right now, then church isn’t for you.  If you’re looking for a place where you can help people or feel connected or get a little dose of inspiration for your week, then you should definitely join the Kiwanis Club or volunteer at Habitat for Humanity or watch more TED talks online.  In that case, church probably is not what you’re looking for, and you shouldn’t feel any obligation to go.  You’re free to stop obsessing about what the Church needs to do to get you to come back, and you don’t need to tell us all what we’re doing wrong.  You do your thing, and we’ll do ours.  This pastor said so, and when my congregation wonders why you’re not here, I’ll tell them the same thing.  We’re Millennials, so let’s be genuine and authentic about what we really want, right? 

But if you are intrigued by the person of Jesus, if you need a place to hear that the stuff you screw up day in and day out is forgiven and done away with, if you’d like to be able to believe that there’s more to life than just what you can see, if you want to touch the veil between heaven and earth, then come to church. 

It won’t be perfect.  The people there are going to mess up and say the wrong things and do the wrong things and sing dumb songs and use words you don’t understand.  The pastor might say too much about who he or she thinks you should vote for, or might not be as gentle in tackling tough issues as you’d like, or might shy away from saying some hard things.  Someone might look at you like you’re not sure why you’re there, or they might kneel too much or wave their hands in the air too much or the coffee might (probably will) be gross.  The people might ignore you, or they might smother you.  The pastor might have 4 other people tugging on his or her sleeve, and can’t welcome you in quite the way you’d like, or you might have to sit closer to the front than you’d like, or you might feel like you’re dressed wrong. 

And maybe it’s not the right church for you.  Maybe you really can’t handle feeling pushed into politics, or Elizabethan English, or like Jesus is supposed to be your boyfriend.  Maybe you are the only person under the age of 50, or the only one who’s not married, or 8:00 am really is too early for you.  Maybe the pastor honestly is kind of weird, or there are some totally unhealthy dynamics going on that just make that particular congregation not a good place right now.  That’s okay.  Those things happen. So it's a good thing that there's more than one church in most neighborhoods.

But remember that you’re not perfect either.  You’ve messed up and said and done the wrong things and used words other people didn’t understand to make yourself look good.  You’ve said rotten crap online to perfect strangers, and been too quick to judge somebody else’s situation, and not said something when you probably should have.  You’ve danced weirdly in the rain and expected that people just naturally did certain things and then mocked them when they didn’t.  You’ve ignored people who made you uncomfortable and made a fool of yourself with someone who you were sure was going to be your new BFF.  You’ve struggled to manage the expectations of everyone in your life, and other people have had to feel awkward and uncomfortable so you wouldn’t be inconvenienced.  

Being human is hard.  The strange social dances we do as we get to know new people and new situations are always awkward.  When have you ever been in any group setting where everything was 100% exactly what you wanted?  School?  Family? Parties?  Work?  Sports teams?  Of course not. The fact that we’re in church doesn’t make us less human.  But it does mean that God is with us, holding our hands, forgiving us and encouraging us to forgive others, slowly smoothing out the rough edges that each of us has.  

So as you church-shop, if you decide that church is important to you, remember what you’re looking for: Jesus.  Find a place that connects you to Jesus, and where you can be…okay, even if it’s not perfect.  Don’t define yourself by broad generational characteristics, let Jesus define you as a unique person who He loves.  Come hang out with the rest of us sinners, gathered around the Lamb who was slain for the forgiveness of our sins.  When you’re ready, we’ll be here.  Until then –

Peace, Love, and Jesus,

A Millennial Pastor

Rend the Heavens

Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!  Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down, that the mountains would tremble before you!...Since ancient times, no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who acts on behalf of those who wait for him.  You come to the help of those who gladly do right, who remember your ways.  But when we continued to sin against them, you were angry.  How then can we be saved?...Do not be angry beyond measure, Lord, do not remember our sins forever.  Oh, look on us, we pray, for we are all your people.

Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

Does anyone else feel this way?  Like you are just beyond ready for God to rend – tear apart – the heavens, and come down?  Come down, Lord, and be with us.  Come down, Lord, and fix things.  Come down, Lord, and avenge our enemies.  Come down, Lord, and save us.  Come down, Lord, and forgive our sins, and theirs, and just make it…better…right…the way it’s supposed to be. 

All we have to do is flip on the evening news, or look at the morning newspaper, to see what a complete nightmare the world is.  Riots and destruction in Ferguson, Missouri.  Ebola still spreading like wildfire across Africa.  Teenagers who commit suicide.  Moms and dads who can’t get along, and kids who get caught in tangled web of divorce proceedings.  People without a home to live in or food to eat or blankets to keep warm.

Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!

Cold war games stirring up again in Russia and eastern Europe.  And full-fledged hot wars running throughout the Middle East.  ISIS chopping off heads with abandon, Palestine and Israel still duking it out…

Oh, that you would rend the heavens, and come down!

And that’s without Black Friday!  Grown women reduced to brawls over a Barbie doll.  Really?  Shoppers literally stealing items out of each other’s carts.  Policemen breaking up fights over televisions…as though there was anything good to watch on them in the first place!  Is it me, or is this ridiculous?

Oh, that you would rend the heavens, and come down!

Doctor’s appointments and medical charts that tell the sad news…cancer.  Stroke.  Alzheimer’s.  MS.  Miscarriage.  I’m sorry…you’re just getting old.  Downcast faces, and the words, “there’s nothing more we can do.”  Sudden, tragic, unexpected deaths.  Are they better or worse than long, painful, agonizing, drawn-out dying processes?  I don’t know…

Oh, that you would rend the heavens, and come down, because Thanksgiving is over and it’s supposed to be the Christmas season, and it sure doesn’t feel like Christmas, does it?

No, it doesn’t feel like Christmas.  It feels like Advent.     

Oh, that you would rend the heavens, and come down!  This is the cry, the theme of Advent.  We so often talk about Advent as a time of waiting, before Christmas, as though Advent was some sort of invention by the boring old party-pooper Church to keep you from getting too excited about Christmas…or perhaps it’s some sort of counter-cultural few weeks meant to teach us to slow down, and not be so darn materialistic about Christmas…we so often talk about the waiting of Advent as though the Church, during Advent, was your mother, standing over you, lecturing you about not shaking the boxes under the tree to try to figure out what your presents are before Christmas. 

But that’s not Advent.  Advent is not four long weeks of sitting in the doctor’s office waiting…waiting…waiting…what is going on, I have things to do today, can’t we just get on with it…and so you tap your toes and play on your phone and rummage through your coat pockets looking for a tic tac, while listening to the tacky “smooth jazz” renditions of 1980s Michael Bolton hits, which reminds you of the ex-girlfriend you took to the senior prom and maybe you should look her up on Facebook.  (No.  No, you shouldn’t.)

But anyway, that’s not Advent.  Advent is not so much the Church standing athwart the Christmas-Industrial Complex yelling, “Stop!” as it the Church praying, “Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down.”  And whether that prayer comes with the fervor and enthusiasm of a Billy Graham style revivalist, or the last weak breaths of a dying woman, whether it comes in the simple bedtime prayers of a child, or the reverent notes of a congregation singing “O Come, O Come Emmanuel” again this year, just as they have every year, it is the words, the voice of a faithful people, calling on our God, living in faith, hope, and trust that God hears our cry – and that pleases God. 

“Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!”   

And just as figs follow the green branches and budding leaves, Christmas follows Advent, as God’s answer to our prayer, as proof positive that God does hear us, He does see us poor miserable sinners, and He does indeed rend the heavens and come down to save us, for we are His people.

In the gospel lesson from Mark today, we hear Jesus discussing with His disciples about the time that He will return to them, about the final, ultimate time when God will rend the Heavens and come down.  He tells them that at that time, there will be great distress, the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light, the stars will fall from the sky and the heavenly bodies will be shaken, and then, into the middle of terror and torture, darkness and distress, we will see the Son of Man, coming on clouds with great power and glory, and send the angels to gather all the elect (that’s you), from the ends of the earth to the ends of the heavens. 

Oh, that you would rend the heavens, and come down.  The disciples would have known this old Scripture, this old prayer from the prophet Isaiah and Jesus says to them, and to us today, “Oh indeed, I shall.” 

When that will be, we don’t know.  The Israelites, the whole world, really, who had been praying, hoping, watching, waiting for a Messiah since, gosh, the 3^rd chapter of Genesis…who would have expected the way the birth of Jesus played out, the time of the first “rending of heaven,” and “God coming down”?  No one, of course…but they were not expected to, either.  God didn’t ask the faithful people of old to “predict” the birth of Jesus, the coming of the Messiah, any more than He asks us today

to “predict” when Christ will return. 

He simply asked them, and us, to be faithful in the interim.  To watch for His coming.  Not to try to read the tea leaves about wars and rumors of wars. Not to party like it’s going out of style because, well, there’s nothing we can do about it anyway.  Simply to watch.  To watch and to wait, eagerly, clinging tightly to Him.  He is the one who will hold us firm, He is the one who make sure that we are blameless on the day of Jesus Christ, He is the one who hears us when we cry, “Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!”

May this be our Advent this year.  May the next three and a half weeks be filled with prayer and watching for the many ways in which God rends the heavens and comes down – in the words of Scripture and in His Holy Sacraments, in the forgiveness of our sins and the encouraging words of fellow Christians, and finally then at Christmas in the birth of His Son, Jesus. 

God has already rent the heavens and come down – and He promises to do so again – when the world, our world, your world is dark and despairing, shaken from its foundations, enslaved to sin and death.  God is faithful, and He has called us into fellowship with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. As we look around ourselves this month – and always – and notice that it doesn’t always feel very much like Christmas, may we remember that it does feel like Advent, and so offer up our prayers to the God who hears, and always acts on behalf of His people, especially in our darkest moments, when the world is at its worst. 

Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down.  Amen.