Yes, I'm breaking all the blogging rules with a long post, but here it goes...

A very thoughtful and godly brother recently emailed me about several of the contributions to the recent 9Marks eJournal on race. He had sincere questions, and wondered if we shouldn’t simply be working harder to simply affirm our unity in the gospel.

His email made me realize that it might be useful for at least for one or two people what I, as a white man at 9Marks, learned from reading through all the contributions to the last issue of the eJournal: in short, I’ve become fairly persuaded (together with every contributor to the forum) that we Whites aren’t getting it. And the fact that not many of us are even talking about the “race problem” is evidence of the fact that we aren’t getting it.

Here’s why I think we’re not getting it. We continually rehearse the line about the solution being in “the gospel,” as if that’s the final word on the matter. We feel satisfied with that. What we haven’t done, however, is the more difficult work of asking what the gospel requires from us personally. What I learned from a number of the contributors, together with several offline conversations, is that we Whites can display a fair degree of insensitivity toward non-white brothers and sisters in Christ by (i) affirming our unity in the gospel, while (ii) simultaneously paying insufficient attention to the existential realities of what it's like being a minority in the United States.

It’s like a conversation I once had with Thabiti in which I (proudly) told him that I didn’t think of a fellow friend as “black.” I just thought of him as a “friend.” Thabiti gently asked me whether I had asked this friend about what it’s like to be black. I said I hadn’t. Thabiti then remarked that I must not be a good friend after all, because those are the experiences this friend has on a daily basis.

Do you see what I’m getting at? I can say, “Hey, we’re all one in Christ.” But if I’m unwilling to enter into the experience of a minority as best I can—maybe by joining a different church; maybe by seeking out different friends; maybe by working extra hard to serve; most definitely by asking honest questions—I am potentially demonstrating a failure to love a brother or sister in Christ as an embodied human being. Rather, I’m showing an indifference to what he or she may experience on a daily basis.

Yet aren’t we all grateful that the God of the gospel is not like that? (Think of Frank Houghton’s hymn: “Thou who wast rich beyond all splendor, all for love’s sake, becamest poor; thrones for a manger, didst surrender, sapphire paved courts, for stable floor…”)

Are Whites willing to consider whether “systemic injustices” remain in the United States that minorities still experience in 2007? I sat next to an African American gentlemen on an airplane recently who has been living in Washington, DC for several years, having moved from Mississippi. We had been enjoying a good conversation for over an hour when I asked him what it was like to be black in DC versus Mississippi. He said it was harder in DC because he felt like he’s already hit the glass ceiling in his work for the government, something he never felt like he hit in the South. Wow. That’s not what I expected to hear. We had already been discussing the gospel, and so at that point, I was able to extend the gospel conversation with a little more conscientiousness.

In other words, unity in the gospel, ironically, means

1) that complete color blindness won’t work. Color blindness, in many circumstances, is insensitive. It’s wrongfully indifferent. It’s uncaring. We know this when it comes to widows and orphans and outcasts and aliens. Jesus tells us not to tell a brother to be “well fed” and then send him off with nothing. Why would we then be “blind” to the social disadvantages that come in American society with belonging to a minority?  If my fellow White brother or sister wants to argue that there are not social disadvantages that come with being a member of the minority, I would suggest asking whether that’s your idea or whether you learned it through conversations with minorities.

2) But unity in the gospel also means there is another sense in which we should be colorblind. There should be aspects of my affection, friendship, fellowship, and partnership in the gospel with Thabiti, for example, that we will share aside from, apart from, in spite of, without giving a thought to differences of ethnic background. To be constantly aware of our differences would allow the differences to overwhelm all that we share in common—both spiritually and temporally.

3) In short, Christians and churches need to exercise discernment for knowing when to be color blind and when to be color conscious. The different members of the body should recognize both our differences and our oneness, so that each can love and honor the different parts of the body as occasion requires (1 Cor. 12). One body; many parts. Being entirely unaware of our differences will demonstrate a lack of love and concern for one another. Being overly aware will undermine unity and promote division. In the final analysis, of course, our unity in Christ should govern everything. May God give us all more wisdom!

It’s on this third point where the rubber really meets the road for the actual decisions church leaders and members have to make: How does this affect our selection of leaders? How does this affect our selection of music or dress? How does this affect what Sunday Schools are taught? How does this affect the preacher’s choice of applications or illustrations? It’s in these types of practical areas where we Christians should be asking God for more wisdom in combining color consciousness and colorblindness in just the right ways and at the right times.

All this why I liked Thabiti's proposal: it remarkably combines both oneness in Adam and in Christ with actual color consciousness, i.e. "affirmative action in the church." Now, maybe this isn’t the right answer either. But we need to have the conversation to figure that out…