Gobsmacked

This blog has been simmering in the back of my mind for a long time. I was hesitant to broach this subject because I am a coward. Do I like being hit by tomatoes? No. Do I like putting a bullseye on my back? No. Life would be simpler if I could just write about something, anything else. But Paul wrote, "For the love of Christ constraineth us" (2 Corinthians 5:14). When one is constrained, one feels forced to do something. I feel that constraining. I feel compelled, pushed, to address this subject, regardless of the negative feedback I might face. So here goes nothing but obedience to the Spirit.

Once upon a time in the early 1950s a girl met a boy and they fell in love. The boy was half German, half a mix of English, Scottish, and French. The girl was Mexican. In that era, before the time when everyone seems to wear their feelings on their sleeves, there was no such thing as an "Hispanic" (decades after its introduction I still feel like gagging when I use the word), there were just plain old Mexicans.

The pastor of their church, a Caucasian, absolutely forbade them to marry. When he spoke one on one with the perceptive young lady, she called him out. "Either you cease and desist trying to stop our marriage or I will tell everyone why you are doing it--it's because I am Mexican, isn't it?" The pastor backed off. The couple got married. And I am their progeny.

A few years down the road, their daughter (that would be yours truly) faced similar disparities. Some people at school, from more financially blessed backgrounds, absolutely refused to talk to her or include her in invitations. One school friend did invite her to her home. As she bid her goodby, she said, "I couldn't have invited you over if my father were home. He would have greeted you at the door with a shotgun--since you are Mexican." The pieces started falling into place. My German last name notwithstanding, I was not included in some friendships and activities because of the color of my skin.

I will say this. During my two years outside of God's fold, I battled with self -loathing. Not only was my family poor, but it struggled with severe dysfunctional issues. Watching TV shows that depicted the matrons of homes as picture perfect and white, I developed a theory. I could lay the blame for my family's poverty and dysfunction at the feet of our ethnicity. I began to loathe being Mexican.

Then came Jesus. In one fell swoop He wiped away all my sin--and all my self-loathing. Through my newly washed-in-Jesus's-blood eyes, I saw the truth: my problems stemmed from sin, not race or ethnicity. All was well, right? Unfortunately, my wonderful life-changing encounter with Jesus, while delivering me, did nothing to solve race problems in the church.

A short time later I found myself in a church service with my grandmother. A man she had grown up with entered, shook hands with people in front of us, in the pew behind us, but skipped us altogether. My grandmother was Hispanic, the man white. The man had grown up as poor as my grandmother, spoke Spanish like a Mexican, grew up as her neighbor, but now, both older Christians, he totally ignored her in church. I told my grandmother that maybe he didn't recognize her. My grandmother was not given to criticism or to ascribing negative characteristics to others. As a matter of fact, she often drove her sister crazy by finding excuses for the offensive actions of others. That's why her look, one that said, "Really, Janine?" and words shocked me.

Shaking her head, Grandma whispered, "We grew up together, Janine. He knows who I am. It's just that I am Mexican." I was very uncomfortable with this conversation. Surely my grandmother was wrong. Ha!

A few years later I ended up working in the ministry with that man's daughter. Once, she happened to mention to me that her father had absolutely forbidden her and her sister "to bring home a Mexican". He had seen how they treated their wives and wanted better for his daughters. At least that's what my friend said. I sure wish she had never told me that. I am only human, and that was TMI--it couldn't help but put a questionable veil over some of her actions with "the natives".

Also unfortunately, this conversation opened my eyes to the fact that Grandma had been right. The Christian man in the church had in fact slighted her because of her ethnicity. Why, you ask, would I share such a distasteful story? Because of the ending.

That man passed away. One day, my missionary friend, his daughter, was in a moving worship service and the thought tugged at her heart, "If only Daddy could see this! He loved the Mexican people and he would rejoice to see what God is doing here among them!"

At that very moment a visitor from the states tapped her shoulder and said, "I just had a vision! I saw clouds being parted up above the sanctuary and your father and others were peering down at the service and rejoicing!"

The friend who experienced the vision had no way of knowing what had been going through my friend's heart at that very moment. But God did--and in His mercy He blessed my friend with this supernatural blessing. (FYI--I am acquainted with the friend who had the vision. She is neither a quack nor a flake, but rather a staunch Christian with decades of serving the Lord under her belt.)

I was gobsmacked. How could this be? This man had slighted my grandmother, had shown obvious proclivities towards discrimination. With such a weight dragging him down spiritually, how could he be part of a supernatural visitation? How could God allow him to be part of it? Was he really rejoicing over the people he had once tried to avoid like the plague? I think in my heart of hearts I expected God to keep that guy at arm's length (even in Heaven) because of his faulty actions with regard to discrimination.

The question flummoxed me. Why had God done this? If that guy who died slighted my grandmother because of her provenance, why did he rejoice at God moving in and through the Mexican people? Had God taken him to task before his death for the imperfections in his acceptance of my people? Maybe being in Heaven had something to do with it (no sin allowed there!)? I don't know. I may never know.

What I do know is this: that "the Lord does not see as man sees"(1 Samuel 16:7). I saw a man who made differences between God's people. God saw an earthen vessel in which to manifest His glory: the man's very imperfections were the perfect base in which to make the glory of God all the greater (2 Corinthians 4:7). I felt like avoiding the guy--but my aversion to him did not negate the fact that he was a bonafide lover of Jesus whom Jesus loved, warts and all.

I hardly ever see my missionary friend of old. Did it just "happen" that she related that supernatural incident to me during one of the very few times we managed to fellowship? Nope. I am 100% sure that God was letting me know: "I see the disparities, My child, but in due season I will take care of them. Let not your heart be troubled. I will take care of them."

So, when I see a Christian who is lacking in some area, especially discrimination, I try to remember this lesson. Yes, in the Sermon on the Mount I am told to judge righteously; I am to judge if something is right or wrong, whether it is of God or not of God. But in that same passage Jesus also admonishes His followers not to judge unrighteously lest they be judged (Matthew 7:2).

What does this mean? While God does not approve of discrimination (Galatians 3:28), He has not anointed us to be His policemen. We cannot see into a man's heart. We cannot see how God is dealing with someone or how He will deal with them in the future about a problem. Our part is to pray for a brother or sister with a fault and commend him/her to God (Galatians 6:1). Even the fault of discrimination.

The end of the matter is this. Discrimination exists. But as Charles Spurgeon so eloquently put it, "In every believer there is darkness and light, and yet he is not to be named a sinner because there is sin in him, but he is to be named a saint because he possess some degree of holiness ... You are called the child of light, though there is darkness in you still. You are named after what is the predominating quality in the sight of God, which will one day be the only principle remaining" (From the Evening selection of July 10 of Morning and Evening, a devotional by Charles Spurgeon).

Let's not allow evil (discrimination) have a field day over us, causing us to writhe in hate and seethe in bitterness. Rather, as children of light, let us rest in the knowledge that God will make things right--in His time, in His way.

May God help us all to see the good (that would be Jesus!) in our brothers and sisters, encourage them, and pray for them when we perceive a fault.

"But the path of the just is as the shining light that shineth more and more unto the perfect day " (Proverbs 4:18).

"But thou, O Lord, art a God full of compassion, and gracious, long suffering, and plenteous in mercy and truth" (Psalm 86:15).