To my brothers and sisters in what I perceive to be a Social Justice movement in the Reformed Evangelical wing of the church (some of the prominent voices, I perceive, so I could be wrong and please correct me if I am: Eric Mason, Kyle Howard, and Thabiti Anyabwile):
I love you deeply. Not just because we are fellow image-bearers, not just because we are fellow Christians, not just because we are both united to the same Christ, but we have a lot of theological like-mindedness! We all believe in a big God, in Calvinism, in the necessity of the preaching of the gospel, in the exclusivity of Christ, in the absolute sufficiency and authority of the Bible, in the essential role of the local church. We are brothers and sisters in the closest sense. If the context in the U.S. were different religiously, I am certain we would all be willing to burn at the stake together. On the front end, it is clear to me that this is an in-house discussion, a family debate, only friendly wounds here. Which leads to:
- Please do not throw any more heat. Light, not heat. I totally understand how the some of the Dallas Statement guys can get under your skin. But they are your brothers too. Light and love and the rest of the Fruit of the Spirit. No more heat.
- Please be humble about history. We must all learn from church history, and history in general. But please acknowledge that history must be interpreted. And similar to how I think New Perspective on Paul guys throw down historical nuggets from the 1st century (that may or may not be true) to make a point, I do think you have a tendency to do that as well. And know that all of your brothers and sisters in Christ desire to repent of current, personal (and corporate) sin, and if you show them from the Bible where they are currently in sin, they will repent.
- Please do not elevate all racial sins to the level of the murder of unborn children. Many racial sins are on the same level. But racial sins come in so many different forms, don’t they? There is the KKK bigot who should burn in hell, if not for the mercy and grace of God. There is the willfully ignorant fool who thinks African Americans are raising their children badly by putting the fear of cops in them. There is the well-meaning Japanese American who teaches his children to be “color-blind”, not because they want the status quo of whiteness, but because they really believe that is the best way to bring back the one-ness of the human race. Then there is the little Reformed church in urban Atlanta that only knows how to sing the Trinity Psalter, and has never known of a tradition of Reformed African American worship songs. You may call all of these racial sins, or sins of racial ignorance. But my contention is that only the first is on the level of abortion. And I think you need to make that clearer if you agree with me there.
- We could be helped by a much more thorough conversation biblically about the church’s role in social justice. It is confusing for most of us. Hopefully that is surprising to you. The fact that you think it is so simple shows pride or ignorance on your part. It is not simple to know how “the Lord works righteousness and justice for all the oppressed” or “do good to all, especially to the household of faith”– how that automatically means the church must do more for those on welfare, or more in the political realm, or more to combat all the anecdotes of questionable police shootings. I find a lot of generalizations and assuming going on in your rhetoric, and I don’t think either is helpful. But please know we all want to do our part as the Church. We want to be found faithful. But it is not that clear how your view of justice is not eerily close or overlapping with a sort of aggressive Theonomy (the Church’s Law being the authoritative Law of the land, and vice versa). And if I am way off there, hence, the confusion.
Lastly, can you please be open to being wrong on some things? Surely, none of us have this all right. And wherever you find yourself wrong–whether in belief or in conduct– please repent. We will forgive. We will keep loving you, no hard feelings.
Your brother in Christ FOREVER
Todd
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