Black Theology Incoming

Oh, Serenity now, Serenity now, Serenity now. Got a delivery just a second ago.

When else do you get the mail? Getting mail is always a fun experience. You never know what's going to come in the mail.

Mostly it's just bills and junk mail and stuff. But every now and then you get something cool.

You get a package or maybe a card from your mom or something. That's cool when you get cards from your mom.

It's nice to know that your mom loves you from time to time. That's nice. When you get a package, that's extra special.

Sometimes you know what's in the package and you're expecting it. The anticipation is there. When it arrives, you're just excited.

Other times you don't even know what the package is. It's a complete surprise. That's like Christmas morning.

But I got a package. Here's the packaging. You can see it says Thrift Books on the outside of this packaging.

I knew as soon as I saw that what this was. I was not excited at all.

Because here is the book that came in the mail. A Black Theology of Liberation by Dr.

James H. Cone. Serenity now, serenity now.

I don't know if I'm quite ready for this. I don't know. I pride myself on having a bit of a tough stomach with some of this stuff.

I remember when I first started getting involved in the social justice thing. I would listen to all kinds of stuff. I'd listen to alt -right people all the time.

Red Ice TV. Have you ever listened to Red Ice TV? It's amazing they haven't been banned yet. Maybe they have. I haven't checked it in a long time.

Listen to some Red Ice TV. Listen to some real crazy people. I wouldn't classify

Red Ice people as crazy. They're actually quite erudite and intelligent.

There's no question about it. I find their views abhorrent. I've got a tough stomach for this stuff.

I just don't know if I'm ready for this. Serenity now. I played a little

Black Theology roulette just a second ago. Just to give myself a little bit of a taste of what

I'm in for. I just happened to turn to page 123. I did not do this intentionally.

This is literally the first page I turned to. I was going to play a little roulette. See what I could find.

This is the great James Cone. This is one of Jamar Tisby's heroes. This is the guy,

Walter Strickland, a professor down in Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. This is what influences his thinking in many areas.

This is the person that he's teaching to your kids. Without citing him, of course, because he doesn't want to put a stumbling block in the way.

I'll just read to you what I read. You can experience this with me. Serenity now. He says, quote,

Of course white theologians today have a better way of putting it, but what difference does that make? It means the same thing to black people.

Sure, as the so -called radicals would say, God is concerned about black people. Then they go on to talk about God and secularization or some other white problem unrelated to emancipation of black people.

This style is a contemporary white way of saying that Christianity does not make the least alteration in civil property.

In contrast to this racist view of God, black theology proclaims his blackness. People who want to know who

God is and what he is doing must know who black people are and what they are doing. This does not mean lending a helping hand to the poor and unfortunate blacks of the society.

It does not mean joining the war on poverty. Such acts are sin offerings that represent a white way of assuring themselves that they are basically a good people.

Knowing God means being on the side of the oppressed, becoming one with them, and participating in the goal of liberation.

We must become black with God. It is to be expected that white people will have some difficulty with the idea of becoming black with God.

The experience is not only alien to their existence as they know it to be, it appears to be an impossibility.

How can white people become black, they ask? This question always amuses me because they do not really want to lose their precious white identity as if it is worth saving.

They know, as everyone in this country knows, a black man is anyone who says he is black, despite his skin color.

In the literal sense, a black man is anyone who has even one drop of black blood in his veins. But becoming black with God means more than just saying,

I am black, if it involves that at all. The question, how can white people become black, is analogous to the

Philippian jailer's question to Paul and Silas, quote, what must I do to be saved? The implication is that if we work hard enough at it, we can reach the goal, but the misunderstanding here is the failure to see that blackness or salvation, the two are synonymous.

Serenity now. Serenity. Now. Misunderstanding here is the failure to see that blackness or salvation, the two are synonymous, is the work of God and not of man.

It is not something we accomplish, it is a gift. That is why they say, believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved.

To believe is to receive the gift and utterly to reorient one's existence on the basis of that gift. The gift is so unlike what humans expect that when it is offered and accepted, we become completely new creatures.

This is the holy otherness of God. This is what the holy otherness of God means. God comes to us in his blackness, which is wholly unlike whiteness.

And to receive his revelation is to become black with him by joining him in the work of liberation.

Even some black people will find this view of God hard to handle, having been enslaved by God, by the God of white racism so long, they will have difficulty believing that God is identified with their struggle for freedom.

Becoming one of his disciples means rejecting whiteness and accepting themselves as they are in all of their physical blackness.

This is what the Christian view of God means for black people. Serenity now.

Serenity now. Blackness and salvation is synonymous.