I am writing on these two interesting men today because it is important to listen.
1. Brooks of Detroit: When Grace College had a Weber School site in Detroit, it was hosted by Pastor Christopher Brooks and located at his church, Evangel Ministries. Several of his people now have degrees from Grace College. I led the Weber School back then; we all spent time together and became well acquainted. Pastor Brooks and I both were also involved in (and spoke at) Acton University, a summer conference of the Acton Institute in Grand Rapids. He led Michigan’s Moody Seminary program.
It was on his Moody Radio talk show that I heard him interview Neil Shenvi, a man knowledgeable about critical race theory (CRT). Pastor Brooks had some important insights. 1) He almost interrupted Shenvi to say that the African Americans who protest racial injustice are not Marxists, even if CRT has a Marxist root. Brooks did not want to focus on sources but on the application. 2) Brooks said that grouping people, as the Social Gospel did with the rich and the poor, is not biblical. You cannot be saved because you are poor, or if you are black, or if you have any other identity. Salvation by the blood of Jesus on the cross is individual.
More: 3) Codified injustice is real, it is serious, and it is worth resisting. 4) Just because the injustice of the system is worth resisting, it does not mean that CRT is beyond scrutiny or that its agenda should automatically be accepted. 5) Even if laws are changed, that does not change the human heart. 6) Brooks quoted a statement from Union Seminary that indicated that the Bible was just man’s view at the time it was written, and that CRT helps us understand the message of the Bible for today. Brooks disagreed with that statement as strongly as possible. Our standing is (and our salvation comes) as individuals before God. Neil Shenvi had much to say, but I am much more interested in listening to Pastor Brooks, who now is a pastor in Troy, MI.
2. Meeks of Chicago: Another African American pastor that I have heard, but do not know, is Rev James T. Meeks. He is the pastor of the Salem Baptist Church of Chicago. I hear it is quite an influential city church. Rev Meeks was an Illinois state senator and ran (briefly) for mayor of Chicago twice. I was sent a link to his July 5, 2020, message, Black Lives Matter. He talked passionately about the supremacy or dominance of white culture and the severe difficulties of living as blacks in it. This difficulty has continued over the 400 years since slaves first came to America’s shores. Rev Meeks wants to hear many more white people, including the President, affirm that black lives matter. He ended his message with a call for restitution. He does not resist reconciliation, but reconciliation is not enough without restitution.
Rev Meeks had five specific areas of restitution: 1) He called for a job for every black person in America. 2) He called for free college for all blacks for the next 100 years. 3) He called for free childcare so that black people could go to work. 4) Meeks called for free health care (especially with many black COVID-19 deaths) as well, again, for the next 100 years. 5) He called for the forgiveness of all black student college debt.
If you expected him to talk about defunding the police, you would have been disappointed. His practical application of his ideas (and frustration) as he cares for his people is directed to ways to help people function as families and as working citizens in society. Meeks is, sadly, used to not getting what he believes is best for his people. In 2013, he led a statewide coalition that was unsuccessful in its strong opposition to gay marriage in Illinois. He was more successful in addressing critical housing needs and in supporting young mothers, though not successful in his 1998 effort to close 26 liquor stores in the Roseland neighborhood of Chicago.
The main way to learn what people think and to calm the rhetoric is to listen. I respect these two men.