Is Liberation Theology The Gospel Of Jesus Christ? Pt. 1

The Pope of the Catholic Church recently claimed that the rejection of poor, illegal immigrants into the US was a sin and not in accord with the gospel..

Paul proclaimed that the Gospel of Jesus Christ was the power of God unto salvation (Rom. 1:16). However, many within today's church have reduced the Gospel to politics, and social morality defining terms to suit as we see with Catholicism. Is the message of the gospel of Jesus Christ solely a spiritual message? Or is the gospel merely one of "social justice" or material "equilibrium"? How is this discerned and more, how is it applied to our current condition?

Pastor Burnett takes a deep dive into what the Bible says about the subject and why there is yet power in the word of truth which is able to not only save souls but produce life in the lives of believers.

    PART 1

PART 2

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The Cost Of Reparations

I know many of my regular readers may think I may have gone off the "deep end" over reparations talk etc. Well, truth is, although reparations is not an end all to all problems associated with our community and in particular the Black community and the Black church (and don't give me this that the church is colorless, it is NOT.), the issue or reparations is one that every church and pastor should be fully aware of and enlightening the congregations about. 

Why? 

We spend time praying for people's financial needs to be met and addressed. Some of you critics have implemented more "give to get" schemes than a little bit. Consistently telling, many times, poor people, to give and expect a blessing...Well, what if our church, your church, can raise itself to a level that everyone could give out of abundance and with greater purpose than looking to receive? What if families, can be equipped, to not simply occupy land and homes while renting and making others fat, but to actually own their properties, raise their families, create their own schools or at least have the ability to self direct and take control of their financial horizons and outcomes? 

This is the story and the land (so to speak) of reparations, which our ancestors paid for! They PAID through abuse, blood, sweat, tears, loss and suffering for our ability to come up in this world and not only take a greater place, our rightful place within society, but also advance the Kingdom of Christ from a position of strength. 

Reparations is an answer to long prayed prayers and a direct demand for our Government to finally get the issues right and address her response to the underlying atrocity of slavery and the resultant rejection of the era of reconstruction, the implementation of Black Codes, Jim Crow and failed promises of social and financial restitution. This issue is important whether one embraces 1619 under British North American rule or our country's founding as a Constitutional Republic 1776, as both segments embraced slavery as a method and practice. The minister, bishop, pastor, evangelist, missionary, must familiarize themselves with the issue and educate the people on why this particular time is so important and why prayers over decades could now finally be answered. 

Living In The Past?

I once thought that too. Until I really looked at the reparations argument. First, America has never failed to restore groups of individuals for their suffering. American has sent over $1Trillion in 2 years to Ukraine, taken in dislocated Afghans at a cost of $80,000 per individual, illegal immigrants (now calling them migrants) to the tune of $20,000 to $50,000 per individual, compensated Japanese Americans over $20,000 each (over 120,000) for 3 years of internment during WW2, overseen the settlement of some of the Jewish reparations as a result of Holocaust to the tune of over $55Billion dollars, the reparation of 11 Italian American's lynched in 1891 ($25,000 paid in 1892 a modern equivalent of $800,000 per family)...NOBODY accuses any of these folk who were repaired or who's sufferings were acknowledged by direct payments to their families as "living in the past". Individuals have those sentiments for Blacks because they can and or think they should.  In other words, many, who say they are "Christian" perpetuate the abuse of generations before them without regard for what God thinks and or concepts of righteousness, morality, justice and or truth. 

Yes, this may be challenging. Yes, like me, you may have to rethink what your once casually dismissed, but it is an effort certainly worthy of your time and one that history demands that we regard. 

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Reparations, Exorcising The Demon w/o Power, The Black State & Black Participation Liberation

 

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Why Has The Western Church "White-Washed" Biblical History?

It may simply be a "sociological" phenomenon. The desire for a culture, any culture, to make the imagery and moral codes of historical, heroic figures their own. To identify themselves with the best and most heroic figures and acts in order to associate themselves with positive and virtuous ideals and ideology.

Is that the case with Western Christianity? Why has the influence and even inclusion of Black people in the bible, in significant roles I might add, been either reduced or overlooked in biblical discussions and studies? Then what of the contribution of African Christians and apologists during the early post Apostolic era? Why has their imagery also suffered from this "white-washing" motif? 

"The White Jesus. The God Of The White Man's Religion, Christianity"

One of the chants that have been reverberated over and over, quite in error, by groups such as The Nation Of Islam, and the Black Hebrew Israelites, and others who have held to Black Nationalism and Black Separatism, has been that the Bible and Christianity in general is the "White Man's Religion" and Jesus is a "White man's God".

In short the story goes like this:

The White man, took Black man both from his home (Africa), and his religion (Islam ~ at least in most cases) and stripped him of his cultural identity and re-indoctrinated him to believe in White superiority (aka: Christianity) and in the White man's god (aka: Jesus) and did this all as a control mechanism.

But the question is how did this "White man's religion" become a "White man's religion" and the Jewish Jesus become a White European in the minds of many?  

Author Forrest G Wood states this:

"Graphic portrayals of Christ had to be “as far removed as possible from anything that could suggest darkness or blackness.” The result was a Renaissance image of Christ that recorded his transmogrification from Semitic to Aryan, his dark hair and beard evolving into “the color of sunshine” and his dark eyes magically taking on the “color of the sky” from which he descended and to which he returned." ~  Forrest G. Wood, The Arrogance of Faith: Christianity and Race in America from the Colonial Era to the Twentieth Century (New York: Knopf, 1990), pg. 51.

So it seems that the evolution of the European Jesus and his association to a Eurocentric religion, where a cultural virtues were aligned with biblical values, was more of a sociological event than a biblical or religious or even migrational truth. 

White Christian teachers and preachers such as the late Billy Graham, noted relentlessly that Christianity was NOT a White man's religion, neither was it a Black man's religion, but a religion of ALL men, and that there was no cultural advantage/disadvantage to any race in accepting Christ or in repentance.

However, what some teachers did was severely reduce and downplay the influence of Blacks and Black culture from the biblical narrative itself. in the many places where Blacks or African countries and cultures are mentioned, they are nearly always downplayed when the teaching is positive and hailed when the teaching is negative. 

For instance...When I was in theology school, our Old Testament Survey professor taught a message on Moses wife, Zipporah without the mention in any form that Zipporah was or could have been a Black woman and that the reason that Moses sister Miriam and Aaron did not like her, or mocked and criticized her, was because she was Black. (Num. 12:1) 

Now, part of this stems from the fanciful conjecture that  Moses had 2 wives as opposed to 1, and that Miriam and Aaron were simply criticizing the one. However, there is no reason to think or believe that Moses had 2 wives from the text. There is reason however to believe that Zipporah, was not only a Midianite (Jethro or Reuel's  daughter) but was also a fine dark skinned woman of possibly Cushite (Kushite) or as the KJV says "Ethiopian" descent. Either of which would have led a faithful historian to conclude that the woman had African ancestry or heritage and therefore was a Black woman by heritage. 

Conversely, in Exodus 18, Jethro (aka: Reuel), Zipporah's father, being a Midianite, who by virtue of his lineage also had a historical Black heritage, was responsible for helping Moses to effectively organize his duties as a chief Judge to adjudicate the grievances of the People under God's direction. 

In other words, the first theocratic form of governance that the bible points to was, in part, organized by Blacks and people of color. 

This is hardly a narrative that anyone within Christianity preaches or teaches today. In fact it is often held that churches organized by Blacks are somewhat disorderly while churches organized by Whites are generally more orderly. (which is a completely different article) But the point is clear, Black people and positive Black culture over time, and even within the biblical narrative, has been downplayed or ignored and even cursorily stepped over in many instances. 

Very little effort has been given to pointing out the praise or positive contribution of Blacks within the pages of biblical writ and I personally believe this has led to the confusion, alienation and even anger of millions of Black people over time to conclude that they have no or very little positive place or history within the world and ultimately society itself.

Teach It In Schools. The Bible IS Black History

Most shocking to many is that Black people's place and history within the bible is certain and in many instances if not most, very positive. For instance, it was a Black man, from an African territory of Cyrene, that helped bear the cross of Jesus during the crucifixion. (Mk. 15:21, Lk. 23:26) That is certainly not coincidental. 

There is much more that can be said on this topic, but please watch this interview with Dr. Theron Williams. I believe you will find it eye-opening.    

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