Cho’s next “evidence” that the Scriptures speak against “racism” is,
5. THE WORK OF CHRIST
In Ephesians 2:11-22, the Apostle Paul reminds us that the work of Jesus on the cross not only obliterated the vertical wall between God and humanity but also tore down the horizontal walls between people. The cross was the great equalizer – in it, we see that everyone is equally in need of grace and nobody has first dibs on salvation. Racism, in contrast, is an attempt to reverse the work of Jesus. It is a demonic attempt to rebuild the walls that Jesus has already torn down. To Jesus’ “It is finished,” racism says, “Not if I can help it.” At its core, racism is an anti-gospel.
First, I readily concede that everyone is equally in need of grace, if by that it is meant that unless people trust in Christ they are all damned regardless of how much or how little common grace they have received. However, saying that all are equally in need of grace is not the same as saying that all are equally depraved. I do not agree that all are equally depraved.
Second, we quite agree that the Cross tears down the spiritual dividing wall of hostility so that, for example, Christian Japanese and Christian Hutus are one spiritually in Christ but that doesn’t mean that very real ethnic differences disappear once one turns to Christ. To insist otherwise makes one Gnostic. Becoming a Christian doesn’t mean that our creational categories disappear. I don’t quit being a male, a Father, a Son, or a husband because I become a Christian. Similarly, being grafted into Christ doesn’t mean I lose my racial / ethnic identity. The way Mr. Cho speaks here is to suggest that grace destroys nature as opposed to the Christian position that grace restores nature. Yes, the dividing wall that divided peoples is eliminated so that we are all spiritually brothers and sisters in Christ. However, being spiritually one in Christ doesn’t mean that race or ethnicity disappear, or become insignificant.
I’m merely echoing John Calvin with the above paragraph,
“Regarding our eternal salvation, it is true that one must not distinguish between man and woman, or between king and a shepherd, or between a German and a Frenchman. Regarding policy, however, we have what St. Paul declares here; for our, Lord Jesus Christ did not come to mix up nature, or to abolish what belongs to the preservation of decency and peace among us….Regarding the kingdom of God (which is spiritual) there is no distinction or difference between man and woman, servant and master, poor and rich, great and small. Nevertheless, there does have to be some order among us, and Jesus Christ did not mean to eliminate it, as some flighty and scatterbrained dreamers [believe].”
John Calvin (Sermon on 1 Corinthians 11:2-3)
Contrary to Calvin’s observation I’m sure it is not really the case the Mr. Cho is a flighty and scatterbrained dreamer. At least, I hope not.
Nobody is seeking to reestablish the dividing wall of hostility as the many Christian friendships among people of varying races and ethnicity who disagree with Mr. Cho demonstrates.
I disagree thoroughly with Mr. Cho and it couldn’t be more of a lie to suggest that I and all sane thinking Christians want the work of the Cross limited or that sane thinking Christians desire to build some kind of wall which separates the spiritual unity of all Christians. Cho is just in error here and the text he appeals to does not prove that Scripture supports “Racism” in the Cultural Marxist meaning of the word is a sin.
Mr. Cho’s next “proof” for the Scriptures opposition to “racism.”
6. PARTIALITY AND COMPLICITY
The
Book of James spends a great deal of time condemning the practice of
partiality within the church. Partiality is simply showing favoritism
to one group of people over another. It is to overvalue certain
people or undervalue others. James implies that partiality is
directly opposed to the ethic of love: “If you really keep the
royal law found in Scripture, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself,’
you are doing right. But if you show favoritism, you sin and are
convicted by the law as lawbreakers” (James 2:8-9).
In
fact, in Galatians 2, the Apostle Paul tells us that he had to
publicly rebuke a fellow Apostle, Peter, for his complicity in
partiality. Peter, a Jewish man himself, who had formerly been
fellowshipping with Gentiles, drew back out of fear of a Jewish
Christian faction that believed that Gentiles needed to become Jewish
before they could be fully included in the church of Jesus. While
these Jewish Christians had shown partiality by making ethnic and
racial identification an additional condition for Gentiles to become
children of God, Peter had been complicit in their actions by
disassociating with the Gentiles. Paul, therefore, quickly recognized
that both the direct partiality of this faction and the indirect
complicity of Peter were “not in step with the truth of the gospel”
(Galatians 2:14). He made it a point to address this publicly in the
presence of the church because of how serious of a matter it was to
the gospel.
The
James passage is not dealing with ethnic or racial issues. It only
forbids a sinful favoritism that is based on the love of money. It is
certainly true that Christians should not practice favoritism for
that which is sinful. The James passage however does not forbid a
biblical favoritism that is based on love for one’s own people such
as we see in Romans 9:3 and I Timothy 5:8. The fact that St. Paul had
a category for biblical favoritism is seen in his Holy Spirit
inspired warning against Cretans in Titus 2.
12)
One
of themselves, even a prophet of their own, said, The Cretans are
always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons. 13
This
testimony is true. Therefore rebuke them sternly, so that they will
be sound in the faith.
So,
favoritism because of the amount of filthy lucre one Christian has
vis-a-vis another Christian is sinful. However, to say that some
types of favoritism are evil while others are noble is unwarranted.
It certainly was required to not show any favoritism to non Christian
Cretans.
Indeed, Jesus Himself practiced ethnic favoritism at
the beginning of His ministry,
Matthew
10:5
These
twelve Jesus sent out with the following instructions: “Do not go
among the Gentiles or enter any town of the Samaritans.
6
Go
rather to the lost sheep of Israel.
We
see this favoritism again in Matthew 15 a few chapters later
21
Leaving
that place, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon. 22
A
Canaanite woman from that vicinity came to him, crying out, “Lord,
Son of David, have mercy on me! My daughter is demon-possessed and
suffering terribly.” 23
Jesus
did not answer a word. So his disciples came to him and urged him,
“Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us.” 24
He
answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.” 25
The
woman came and knelt before him. “Lord, help me!” she said. 26
He
replied, “It is not right to take the children’s bread and toss
it to the dogs.” 27
“Yes
it is, Lord,” she said. “Even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall
from their master’s table.” 28
Then
Jesus said to her, “Woman, you have great faith! Your request is
granted. And her daughter was healed at that moment.
Our
Lord and Master Jesus shows favoritism. He does eventually answer the
Canaanite woman’s request but his language to the woman shows
favoritism for His own people. Israel had not yet rejected her
Messiah and as such Israel is explicitly first favored with the
Gospel. And that rightly so.
Likewise we should demonstrate
favoritism even with whom we share the Gospel. Charles Spurgeon
reminds us of this.
“Piety
must begin at home as well as charity. Conversion should begin with
those who are nearest to us in ties of relationship. I stir you up,
not to be attempting missionary labors for India, not to be casting
eyes of pity across to Africa, not to be occupied so much with tears
for popish and heathen lands, as for your own children, your own
flesh and blood, your own neighbors, your own acquaintance. Lift up
your cry to heaven for them, and then afterwards you shall preach
among the nations.”
“Andrew
goes to Cappadocia in his after-life, but he begins with his brother
(Peter); and you shall labor where you please in years to come, but
FIRST of all YOUR OWN HOUSEHOLD, first of all those who are under
your own shadow must receive your guardian care. Be wise in this
thing; use the ability you have, and use it amongst those who are
NEAR AT HAND.”
Charles Spurgeon
WORDS OF COUNSEL FOR CHRISTIAN WORKERS, pp. 5-6
When we turn to the Galatians passage we must realize that we are not dealing with an issue of favoritism here so much as we are dealing with a refusal to be obedient to an explicit commandment. The issue we are dealing with here is Peter’s refusal to embrace Jesus commandment that the Gospel was to go to every tribe, tongue and nation. What is communicated in Galatians 2 is not that it is sinful to show favor to one’s own people. What is communicated in Galatians 2 is that it was sinful to suggest to people that they had to become cultural Jews before they could become Christian. Peter is practicing an unbiblical favoritism because he is communicating to the Gentiles that they have to reject the new covenant in favor of the Jewish old covenant. Paul resist Peter to his face not because Peter withdrew from table fellowship with the Gentiles, thus practicing unwholesome racial favoritism, but rather because by refusing table fellowship with the Gentiles Peter was favoring the old covenant over the new and better covenant. Peter was denying the Gospel. That was and remains a unbiblical favoritism.
Again, on this matter Timothy L. Cho is just in error when he suggests that Scripture forbids Racism as defined as,“a system of advantage based on race.” As early as Augustine Cho’s idea was rejected,
“Difference of race or condition or sex is indeed taken away by the unity of faith, but it remains imbedded in our mortal interactions, and in the journey of this life the apostles themselves teach that it is to be respected, and they even proposed living in accord with the racial differences between Jews and Greeks as a wholesome rule.”
St. Augustine on Galatians 3:28
Still Cho presses on trying to make the Scriptures say what they do not say. The Scriptures do not characterize Racism as a sin when Racism is defined as “as a system of advantage based on race.”
Next Timothy L. Cho offers as Scriptural proof against “Racism,”
7. THE GREAT COMMISSION
In
Matthew 28:18-20, Jesus commissions the church to make disciples of
all nations. We have to remember that the original hearers of Jesus’
Great Commission were Jewish men, who by tradition and custom had
long-considered non-Jewish people as unclean and cut off from God’s
promises to Israel. Jesus’ commission pushed these Jewish men
outside of their own ethnic boundaries and comforts to bring the
gospel to the ends of the earth and to fellowship with non-Jews. The
Great Commission is a mission with a centrifugal direction that flows
outward to those who are different from yourself. In direct contrast,
racism – especially in the form of ethnocentricity and racial
superiority – are essentially centripetal, always flowing inward
into one people group at the expense of others. Racism attempts to
reverse the direction that Jesus’ Great Commission calls us
toward.
The
Great Commission only proves that the Gospel is to go forward so as
to conquer all the Nations. It calls for incorporating the nations
into the Church and that as identifiable nations. What it doesn’t do
is provide an expectation that all the nations enter into the body of
Christ (the Church) the way Orange Juice, Tomato Juice, Creme
de-menthe and Olive Oil might enter a full on blender. The Church is
comprised as a Nation of Nations – a Confederacy if you please –
with Jesus Christ as the King of all the various Kings representing
their various nations. So, appealing to the Great Commission as a
proof text against how Cho is defining racism is a non-sequitur.
Secondly, on this point we must remember where Cho started
out in his calumny against Christianity in these united States. Cho
started out by associating US Christianity with racism and yet the
Missionary effort in these united State to the Nations, as called for
in the Great Commission, has been exemplary. Billions of dollars have
been raised to bring the Gospel to the nations. Missionaries on the
way to the mission field in third world countries packed their
earthly belongings in coffins because they knew they wouldn’t be
coming back home. Some of the most self-denying Missionaries in the
history of Missions have come from these united States. American
Missionaries spent their whole lives seeking to bring the Gospel to
the nations and Timothy Cho wants to complain about how “racist”
America has been with its Great Commission endeavors? The article
that man has written is insulting – and that is being kind.
The
Great Commission in no way proves Cho’s point that the Scriptures
forbid Cultural Marxist Trotskyite notions of “Racism.” In point
of fact the Great Commission proves that God delights in nations as
nations and desires the nations to continue as self-identified
natios.
Finally, Cho ends with one more jejune appeal to the
Scripture in order to prove that Scripture is against his definition
of Racism.
Cho offers,
8. A NEW HEAVENS AND NEW EARTH
“As surely as God promises a new creation, he also promises a beautiful tapestry of people from all different backgrounds and cultures worshiping Jesus on equal footing with one another.”
Just
as the Bible opens with God creating everything from nothing, it ends
with the great hope that God will make a new creation from what is
now broken. In Revelation 5:9-10, God promises a new heavens and a
new earth, where tears no longer will be shed and His righteousness
will shine forth forever. At the center of this new kingdom are
people “from every tribe and language and people and nation,”
worshiping a risen, dark-skinned, Middle-Eastern God-man. As surely
as God promises a new creation, he also promises a beautiful tapestry
of people from different backgrounds and cultures worshiping Jesus on
equal footing with one another. Racism, therefore, is a direct
rejection of God’s new heavens and new earth.
When
we turn to the Apocalypse of John we find Nations littered everywhere
and what is being communicates, contrary to Cho, is the fact that
Nations as Nations (as opposed to a blender universalism) are present
in the New Jerusalem. Space does not permit us to mention every
instance. We start with Rev. 7:9:
After
these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one
could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing
before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with
palm branches in their hands…
When this passage is read in light of all that has been teased out before then it is past obvious that these nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues are to be considered as gathered in their nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues. The Lord Christ sends forth His spirit to collect people in the context of their ethnic and cultural identity – together won to Christ — not only individually but also collectively as Peruvians, Japanese, Hutus, Frenchmen, etc. There is no indication in Revelation that the Church is present in an undifferentiated mass of humanity. The very “racism” that Cho is seemingly arguing against is present in spades in the New Jerusalem. Cho doesn’t know what he is talking about and so mishandles the Scripture.
Again,
in Revelation 21:26:
And
they (the
respective Kings) shall
bring the glory of the nations into it, into the new Jerusalem.
Dutch
Reformed minister Doctor Klaus Schilder comments on this:
The
universality of this covenant requires that not one race or people be
left out. Yet during the old Testament times there was one nation
singled out of the many as the chosen people, such separation was but
an ad-interim. We may look upon the covenant as then on march toward
fulfillment, towards times when all nations from the uttermost parts
of the earth would belong to the covenant.
Schilder
is telling us here that while there is one covenant and so one church
that one covenant and one church has within it distinct and differing
people and nations. This is just what we would expect from a God who
is both One and Many in His essence. God Himself is One and Many and
so the Church of Jesus Christ is likewise One and Many. One body …
distinguishable parts. Unity in diversity.
Finally, in the very last chapter of Revelation:
1
And he showed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal,
proceeding from the throne of God and of the Lamb.2 In the middle of
its street, and on either side of the river, was the tree of life,
which bore twelve fruits, each tree yielding its fruit every month.
The leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
Here
we see Eden restored. The tree of life as it was in the garden is in
the New Jerusalem – in the eschaton. In this Eden fully realized
the tree of life is present to heal – not merely individuals –
but whole nations. The redemption that Christ brings is a Redemption
that is not only individual but especially National. Nations are
redeemed. The Races maintained.
If Racism is defined as a
system of advantage based on Race we see it everywhere in the
Scripture. The family is a system of advantage based on Race.
Marriage is a system of advantage based on race, up until the rise of
Cultural Marxism 70 or so years ago. The Church was often organized
according to race as articulated by Reformed theologian John
Frame,
“Scripture,
as I read it, does not require societies, or even churches, to be
integrated racially. Jews and Gentiles were brought together by God’s
grace into one body. They were expected to love one another and to
accept one another as brothers in the faith. But the Jewish
Christians continued to maintain a distinct culture, and house
churches were not required to include members of both groups.”
John Frame,
“Racism, Sexism, Marxism”
So, contrary to Timothy Cho’s claims, the Scriptures are silent on “racism” being a sin as Cho defined racism. There is nothing inherently sinful about advantaging your kin, tribe, and nation unless somehow in doing so one is overthrowing Biblical Christianity.
I can only pray that Cho takes serious this rebuttal and determines to examine his worldview which has been salted with Cultural Marxism categories.
