The Scourge Of Racism
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Considered uncivilized like other natives of the islands and lands in the Western hemisphere because they lacked the knowledge and customs of Western Civilization as well as the heavy clothing due to living in a much warmer climate, my West African ancestors were at first intrigued by the white skinned visitors. They engaged in trade with these men that also initially involved the selling of usually captives from rival tribes in territorial wars as slaves. They welcomed the Catholic and later Protestant missionaries who found them to be as spiritually unregenerate as the formerly mentioned barbarian tribes of Europe which after a millennium, had apparently been forgotten about.1
Indeed, just like the Europeans and every Gentile nation on the face of the earth, my West African forefathers had been guilty before God of practicing all manner of spiritual wickedness. This includes worshipping the creation--demons as themselves and masquerading as gods they deceived human minds to invent and construct with their hands as idols, the heavenly bodies, nature, sinful mortal flesh and ancestors long deceased. They too practiced witchcraft, sorcery and blood sacrifice in rituals of ignorance. Many tribes were also violent, ruthless and predatory; biblically defined sexual immorality, widespread. All of this is true while they also built great and rich empires.
Nevertheless, as with all other Gentiles since the first century, the grace of God in restoration came to West Africa as initially the Gospel was preached and Christianity introduced to many by the European missionaries. However, the simmering wrath of God longsuffering and forbearing in judgment, who had with all other nations post-Noah’s flood been good to Africa also while He waited to judge their sins (Acts 14:8-18, 17:29-31), brought it through the imperialistic Europeans as His instruments when they violently launched their transatlantic slave trade. Again, the prophets of God foretell His judgment on the Gentile nations for sin (Isaiah 14:22-16:14, 18:1-19:17, 21:11-16; Ezekiel 25-26, 29-31).
Besides death and destruction, among the judgments God foretold through His prophets He would visit upon the Gentiles is captivity and bondage (Isaiah 20). For those heroically minded individuals cut from the Patrick Henry, “Give me liberty or give me death” mold, I remind you that any one that dies without faith in Jesus Christ or perfect obedience to God’s law, perishes eternally with no hope of deliverance from Hell whether Jew or Gentile (Jeremiah 9:25-26; Romans 1:18-3:20; Hebrews 9:27; Revelation 20:11-15).2 Therefore, in a biblical worldview being a living slave with hope is better than being hopelessly double dead in sin (Isaiah 38:9-20; Ephesians 2:1-10)!3
While lamenting his people he watched go into Babylonian captivity as divine judgment, the prophet Jeremiah found hope renewed in God’s mercy, compassion and impeccable character (Lamentations 3:19-38) asking, “Why should a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins,” (Lamentations 3:39, NKJV)? Though a number of West Africans were killed on their soil resisting the Europeans and others in transit to slavery, the survivors who became Christians experienced God’s restoration in chains. They came to appreciate Jeremiah and Daniel’s conclusion that slavery as God’s judgment was righteous and merciful (Lamentations 3:40-42; Daniel 9:1-15)!4
What is God’s will for those He restores in grace and mercy through the Gospel and delivers from bondage of any kind? Is it not to go tell it (Exodus 10:1-2, 12:21-28; Luke 4:16-21, 8:26-39, 22:14-20, 24:13-49)? Surely, my Christian slave forefathers did tell it in a rich legacy of work songs and spirituals I will not cease to remind the generations behind me are there for their benefit first, then, the entire world! They chose not to run away or escape on the Underground Railroad and instead, stand by faith in God. Satan has deceived many into scoffing at them, but they are heroes in God’s eyes because like Daniel, they willingly submitted to His judgment; trusting in His goodness, grace and mercies new every morning when joy comes after any night of weeping (Psalm 30:4-5)!
Though the release from bondage brought still more adversity, those that clung to God by faith in Jesus Christ walked in the victories of restoration and testified, while waiting for new deliverances and His majestic coming (1 John 5:4; Revelation 1:4-8, 2:8-11, 3:7-13)! For as Paul, the Jewish apostle to us Gentiles consoles, “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us,” (Romans 8:18, NKJV). And again, it is written, “The just shall live by faith,” (Romans 1:17, NKJV). But the numbers of those living by faith among black Americans today are certainly relatively small since the heavy hand of divine judgment hangs over our communities like the soupy mist of settled fog; a clear sign of God’s displeasure (Hebrews 11:6).
1 In a nod of appreciation to the days of radio drama, I was blessed of the Lord to write, produce and voice my personal search for biblical understanding of the black
experience in an award winning docu-drama entitled, From Slavery To Victory: One Man’s Journey now a Webcast on The From Slavery To Victory Education Project
Web Site.
2 Quoted from Patriot, Patrick Henry’s speech made to the Second Virginia Convention held at the St. John’s Church, March 23, 1775, Wikipedia.
3 I do realize there are many different worldviews black Americans have of our historical experience that are mostly rooted in victimization. A biblical worldview of the
black American experience is only possible by the mind renewing work of the Holy Spirit when a man has been truly converted. I am led by the Holy Spirit to explore
eleven major worldviews black Americans have of our experience and compare them for benefit to us with the biblically formed worldview consistent with God’s
now, nearly two millennia long cause to restore men and punish the sins of Gentile nations in a seven-part 2006 article entitled, The Renewing Of Our Minds. Read it
in the Journal Archives on the From Slavery To Victory Education Project Web Site. 4 Read through the presentation beginning on the Home Page of The From Slavery To Victory Education Project Web Site that uses art and graphics to make these im-
portant points as well.
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