Considering Reconciliation Blues

I read Reconciliation Blues to better understand the tension between the races that exists in the American Church. I had the blues. After reading this book, I feel even more blue.

I’ve been wanting to read this book since it first came out in 2006. Since it is 7 years old, some of the material is a bit outdated. But many of the issues still ring true- progress is so slow as Edward Gilbreath notes late in the book.

As one chapter notes, the barriers still exist on “Christian radio”. He brings up an interview with Nicole Mullen, whose award winning music was not played much on “Christian radio.” Neither was GRITS, whose member Teron Carter said, “They feel safer with a white face promoting that kind of music than with a black face.” Christian radio still struggles with this. You will hear Toby Mac, but not Lecrae. The names have changed, but not the circumstances.

He knows the blues of being often misunderstood, left out, dismissed and more. He knows the frustration of being the “first black.” Many of the people he interviewed or discusses were older and experienced the bitter sting of racism (hearing white students at school cheering when Martin Luther King, Jr. was murdered). Many other stories seem more mundane, unless you are in their shoes of course.

“… it took me awhile to shake the white off I got there- the stiffness, the narrow theological perspectives.” Chris Williamson

There was a provocative chapter on Jesse Jackson. He is a polarizing figure on the national landscape. Gilbreath himself wrestles with how to understand Jackson, as do many black evangelicals.

Much of the book frustrated me, honestly. I felt misunderstood because he (and those he quoted) refer to “whiteness”. It is a subject I struggle with. If whites voted as a block like blacks, I could see this “white mentality”. Even among evangelicals, there is a fair amount of disagreement on issues theological, social and cultural. I more understand what it means to be white by what it means to not be black. And that isn’t very helpful.

“I grew up around whites. I know how they think …” Chanel Graham

How I think and act has been shaped by a number of factors: my family of origin, the neighborhood I grew up in, the nominal Catholicism of my youth, socio-economic background, my conversion to Christ and subsequent studies, how I’ve sinned, been sinned against and a whole lot more. There are a number of things that make me, me. I don’t really know what the white part is- though I’ve been called a greasy haired Italian, a WOP a guinea etc.

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Considering the Deep Things of God

Earlier this year I made a sad discovery.  I discovered that I have no books on the Trinity.  I have plenty of Systematic Theologies with sections on the Trinity.  The closest thing to a book on the Trinity in my library was probably J.I. Packer’s Knowing God.  While not on the Trinity, as an heir to the Puritans he was quite Trinitarian in his theological approach.  So, in the words of Uncle Duncan in Braveheart, “We’ll have to rectify that.”

“Forget the Trinity and you forget why we do what we do; you forget who we are as gospel Christians; you forget how we got to be like we are.”

One of the books I bought to remedy that was Fred Sanders’ book The Deep Things of God: How the Trinity Changes Everything.  I’m on a combination of vacation and study leave, so I thought this was a good time to read it.  I’d have a bit more time to think on it.

Prior to leaving on vacation the guy who lives with us commented “he keeps talking about evangelicalism”.  Sanders’ point is that Trinitarian thinking has long been foundational to evangelical thinking.  This foundation has been cracking of late as the implicit has been largely forgotten or at least seen as non-essential.  His goal is limited to evangelicalism.  This is the Christian heritage of which he is a part and which he wants to be healthy and growing.  He’s not trying to evaluate and critique other traditions in the visible church.

These means that while Sanders uses Scripture, he’s not putting forth a biblical-theological defense of the Trinity.  He’s more concerned with how our Trinitarianism plays out in our understanding of our faith and practice.  So the reader must keep this focus in mind and not expect something profoundly different.

Sanders does draw on the writings of earlier evangelicals of different stripes to illustrate how deep the heritage runs (and how shallow our present experience).  So you find sections looking at Francis Schaeffer, Susanna Wesley, C.S. Lewis, Adolph Sahpir, Henry Scougal and more.

“A gospel that rearranges the components of your life but does not put you personally in the presence of God is too small.”

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