The Scourge Of Racism
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Released January 5, 2024
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Just as Black History Month, so, Juneteenth is a commemoration started by black Americans for our people and fellow citizens to remember the end of American slavery. Juneteenth is the clever handle used for June 19, 1865 which marks the date the last slaves in Texas heard about the end of slavery with the defeat of the Southern Confederacy in the Civil War a few months earlier and over two years after President Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation. This year we have reached the one hundred and fiftieth year since that first Juneteenth. While this is a good thing and should be celebrated to the fullest, I am concerned about the condition of freedmen today.
There will be Juneteenth parades, picnics, concerts, church services, memorials and many community events featuring political, social, educational, religious and financial heavy hitters celebrating a great moment in our nation’s history; a moment when an evil chapter was brought to its end. Indeed, it was in 1865 Texas and should be today a celebration like unto ancient Israel’s Jubilee year that God instituted for them (Leviticus 25:8-17). Every fiftieth year the sound of a trumpet on the Day of Atonement announced the Jubilee when liberty was proclaimed in all the land. Slaves were set free, oppression banned, fields not planted and debts cancelled.
Launched as it was on the Day of Atonement, the Jubilee reconciled men to God and to each other as families were restored and neighbors brought back together after forced servitude along with other types of oppression due to disputes and indebtedness had divided them. In my mind’s eye I see the ancient Jews and my slave forefathers in their respective historical years of jubilee shouting, leaping, dancing and singing as the long wait to be released from heavy and painful burdens ended in freedom and hope for a better future! However, for both peoples the time of jubilee was all too short-lived as the evil works of human sinfulness in a fallen world overtook them.
For America’s black freedmen in the aftermath of that first Juneteenth, the realities of unabated racial bigotry and hostilities from many of their fellow white citizens have dogged them to some degree or another to this very hour. In spite of this, a relative few especially of those energized by the faith and love of Jesus Christ have been able to move past all artificially imposed barriers of race to achieve much. Accomplished African Americans are found in nearly every field of endeavor including the highest political and legal offices in the land. This post-slavery progress is undeniable and yet, there is still so much holding back the remaining number of freedmen.
Keeping it real, we cannot in all honesty assert the deep seated problems of over the top black male incarceration rates, gang violence, low educational attainment, joblessness, female single parent headed households and poverty are all caused by persistent racism--though most assuredly it has its surmountable in Christ part (John 16:33; Philippians 4:13; 1 John 5:4-5). No, the poor state of many freedmen today is due in large part to self-sabotage in that the guilty have chosen the sluggard’s way of victimization, entitlement, lawlessness and hedonism in all rebellion against God and His Word (Proverbs 6:6-11, 20:1, 23:29-35, 24:30-34, 28:19; 2 Thessalonians 3:6-15)!
Freedom from physical bondage did not also equal freedom from the always deadly trio of Satan (the ultimate oppressor), sin and self for many blacks. As permitted by God in perfect mercy and grace, the black experience beginning with slavery was not intended to embitter us in perpetual inner bondage, but bring the willing among us to the greatest possible freedom (Lamentations 3:19-42). This freedom is found by faith in Jesus Christ alone. He is the eternal Jubilee for all yearning for liberty, new beginnings and a superior future (Psalm 146:5-8; Isaiah 42:5-9, 61:1-2; Luke 4:16-21; Romans 8:1-2)! In the freedom of the Son clung to through all adversity, we were meant to be powerful latter day witnesses to all men under the sun and bring much glory to the God of our salvation!
So, did God fail in His good purposes toward us because the greater numbers of freedmen one hundred and fifty years later are in dire straits spiritually and materially? No way! Those who have refused to muster the will to move beyond the admittedly real obstacles of racism even through faith in Jesus Christ from that first Juneteenth until now have failed themselves and their children. Truly, generational patterns of alcohol and drug abuse, irresponsibility, sexual promiscuity and out of wed-lock births (all of which I also once had my time) have taken hold to produce entrenched poverty. To be sure, generational patterns of sin that only a personal life changing faith walk with Jesus Christ can permanently reverse are by no means limited to the physically poor.
The Liberating Gospel Of Jesus Christ!
“For I delivered to you first of all that which I also received: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures,” (1 Corinthians 15:3-4, NKJV).
The Scriptures teach that if a man will repent from his sins and believe the Gospel he will be forgiven and declared righteous. Such a man will also be indwelt by the Holy Spirit and brought to spiritual life; beginning what is intended by God to be a lifelong journey of growing faith, love, obedience, transformation and empowered service (Romans 1:16-17, 3:21-31, 8:1-17, 12:1-21).
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