Should White Christians Overcome Their White Fragility?

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Though white fragility is triggered by discomfort and anxiety, it is born of superiority and entitlement.

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White fragility is not weakness per se. In fact, it is a powerful means of white racial control and the protection of white advantage.

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White fragility. If you have ever conversed with someone within the social justice movement, you have more than likely come across this word, explaining how your desire to defend yourself as a non -racist person is an exercising of your white fragility.

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But what is white fragility? What does it look like for a white person to exercise it?

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Could this concept be a racist concept in itself? And do Christians need to fight their white fragility to be loving to their

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BIPOC neighbor? In my early days of work of what was then termed a diversity trainer,

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I was taken aback by how angry and defensive so many white people became at the suggestion that they were connected to racism in any way.

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These questions and more are what we will tackle on today's episode as we review the

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Be The Bridge ministry and their training of white people to divest of their whiteness by overcoming their white fragility.

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And welcome Robin DiAngelo. I talked about white fragility, which is my concept of how our socialization sets white people up to respond really poorly to challenges to our racial positions, worldviews, or advantages.

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You started out with this level of denial, defensive, kind of corn today is like fragility, you know?

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So yeah, in case viewers don't know, she reports quoting Dr. Robin DiAngelo, right? She's the one who pointed to fragility.

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I don't think the fragility shows up until we actually start interacting with this stuff. I would say at this point, it's just still ignorance.

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It's still just chosen denial. It's just obliviousness, right? And oftentimes chosen, but we're not even being pushed enough to have that can be considerate of fragility.

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So, but that might be, maybe she would say, you know, so I'm not trying to answer that for her. I'd be curious her take on that.

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We'll have to read her new book. Where I, where I see white fragility being particularly important is when white people actually, when a light bulb goes on, and I think this is another common mistake for us who are white.

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When a white light bulb goes on, this stuff is serious, but when we start to wrestle with these things, when we start to see how deep it goes, when we start to discover our own complicity with it, which

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I think is really hard, when we just start to discover that despite our best attempts to not be racist, we've internalized some of the white supremacy kinds of ideologies, when we realize that we still have implicit biases towards people that we wish weren't there, but are there, all of those things fatigue us, disorient us, they disrupt kind of our worldview.

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And that's where I see white fragility being very, very serious. And those challenges can come in direct feedback, either from people of color or from other white people, but they can also come in challenges to very cherished ideologies, right?

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A challenge to individualism, a challenge to meritocracy, a challenge to white centrality, right?

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And I've been thinking about that one a lot lately, because it often manifests in organizations trying to sponsor ongoing work because they recognize that it's ongoing, that you're never finished.

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Don't think that you're going to become an expert. We are all learners in this. We never arrive.

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This is not a sprint, it's a marathon. This is not a movement. This is a lifestyle here.

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And so we are, this is a part of your life. It's like, I think, Margo, you said this, like I'm spending the rest of my life trying to unlearn the first 40 years of my life.

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And so that's a lot, like we are trying to deconstruct and reconstruct in a healthy way. I mean, theologically, all these things,

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I mean, how we've been cued, how we've been informed, you know, as children, you know, theologically, all of those things that we are now, you know, putting a microscope on those, a magnifying glass, excuse me, and putting ourselves on a microscope and just putting a magnifying glass on all these things.

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And so this takes time. This is one step at a time. But you continue to engage. I mean, if guilt motivates you,

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I'm okay with it, okay? And as a good Catholic, it does motivate me. If guilt paralyzes you, then uh -uh, you can't indulge in it.

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A lot of her dynamics actually are coming from Catholicism. There's a priestly caste, and then there's the

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Vulgate, right? So there's the people who know things, and then there's the congregation. And then there's these articles of confession.

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And so she's putting on this confessorial kind of attitude. And also, again, her view of racism, because she divests it from the individual, she puts it on the societal level so that it's always saturating everything.

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Again, it's original sin. Following her Catholic upbringing, how do you get rid of the original sin? You're not necessarily forgiven so much as you do penance, and you do penance, and you do penance, and you do penance.

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So this penance, in the first instance, is humility. What I invite white people to do is to reach for humility and be willing to just grapple.

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And that right there is an interruption to what it means to be white, is to have humility in the face of racism, in the ways that we've been set up to collude with it.

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What does growth look like to you in the area of racial healing, equity, and reconciliation?

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I think for me, one of the signs of growth, especially for white members, is increased humility.

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We talk a lot about centering in Be the Bridge. And I think when a white participant, which some people have this naturally, but not everyone does culturally.

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We do a real good job as white people of centering ourselves. But when we learn to just listen without adding in our own words and our own experiences, and just listen and believe the person who is speaking to us,

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I think is a huge, huge marker of growth. 24 -7, the forces around us push and seduce and compel us to participate.

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And the only way to not collude is to actively, intentionally, and strategically seek to resist those forces.

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And as soon as we're complacent, we get sucked back in. And the kind of resentment that a lot of white folks feel about having to do this, for me, is also a challenge to white centrality, white entitlement, white comfort.

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And so all of the ways we tend to respond when those things get challenged, and even though I'm using the term fragility,

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I don't want to suggest that it's a form of weakness, because it really does function to bully the challenge off and get us back into the norm, our equilibrium, and kind of back into the center and into kind of our comfort zones.

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But I think the most hostile, toxic environment for people of color every day is unexamined whiteness.

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Welcome to the Thoroughly Equipped podcast, where we compare the teachings from popular women's ministry books, conferences,

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Bible studies, etc., to Scripture. Our focus is 2 Timothy 3, 16 -17, that all

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Scripture is God -breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so the man or woman of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.

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I'm your host, Melba Toast. May this episode bless you and bring glory to God.

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Hey, ladies, welcome back to another episode of Thoroughly Equipped. If you are new, welcome. This is a podcast for women to discern teachings and books and ministries that center within women's ministry and the

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Christian community, and we have been diving into the Be the Bridge ministry.

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We're going over LaTosha Morrison's ministry that's been consistently promoted at Jenny Allen's very popular parachurch women's ministry,

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The If Gathering. Now, LaTosha Morrison built the Be the Bridge ministry with a certain vision of what a unified and healthy community would look like and built the ministry's training around her vision.

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Christians who buy into this training need to ask themselves, is this how Christ calls us to be unified?

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Is this a unity founded and built upon Christ's work and God's word as given to us by the prophets and apostles teaching in scripture?

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Or does this ministry train disciples after LaTosha Morrison's experience and vision and other feminist and anti -racist activist teachings?

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To acquire racial righteousness, LaTosha Morrison has given white people a guide to center their whiteness and divest themselves of the original sin of white supremacy that all white people supposedly have inherited.

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This guide titled Be the Bridge 101 Foundational Principles Every White Bridge Builder Needs to Understand is required reading for all white people who decide to enter either the

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Be the Bridge Facebook group or any of their small group discussion groups.

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This is only one of the guides required with several other re -educational readings required for a new bridge builder before they can even post on even the

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Facebook group or comment in a small group study. This guide is what we have been looking at in the last several episodes and today we will go over the third principle that the creators of the

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Be the Bridge 101 guide wish to educate white bridge builders on.

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There's a lot to go into today so we're just going to dive in. But for a little recap, in the last episode we looked at the first two principles that this guidebook wanted to inform us on and that is developing a white identity and identifying our white privileges or being educated in the privileges that we have as white people.

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So in this guidebook, LaTosha Morrison has instructed that white people understand our racist historical past, that we root our identity in that historical past, and instead of choosing to accept it, we face it head on and become anti -racist in one, identifying our white heritage, taking a certain pride in it by humbling ourselves essentially to arriving at the knowledge that we have been brought up into this racist, white supremacist socialization that we were just breathing it in, we've come to accept it, and now that we have identified it, we can divest ourselves of it.

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Then the next step was, or not the next step, but the next principle that white bridge builders needed to understand is the white privileges that come from being an

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American or having this, as you find out more, it's more of the beliefs and cultural structures that come with European -centric beliefs and structures.

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So white supremacy within European culture, including

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American culture, but especially in our context, American culture, we look at what has presented, what they would deem as white supremacy, which you're going to end up seeing later in the next principle, the final principle that they want to train white people to understand.

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But before that is understanding that we have certain white privileges just because we're white.

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And we looked at some of those, just the first four, I think, as we reviewed Peggy McIntosh's first four on her list of white privileges and could assess that they're not necessarily privileges.

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And the problem with trying to make these as a white person needing to understand, the point is to say in a way that they are sinful because the nation that is equitable, that is just in their opinion, would not provide privileges to one ethnicity or one really skin color and not grant those same privileges to other skin colored people.

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Because it's really not about ethnicity. It eventually breaks down to white versus all the other racial or colored of skin, which are listed as or lumped up as the

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BIPOC community. And white people are all lumped in together as these

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European ethnicities. So they don't even differentiate between white ethnicities themselves, like German, Irish, British, American.

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White is just white. And then you have all the rest, which is the BIPOC community, and they are the minority.

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So the other thing we kind of looked at is the purpose of the guidebook, which is, in essence, a sort of purpose for the ministry is the way that they relayed that racial reconciliation is a gospel issue.

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I tackled the verses that they wanted to kind of twist to make racial righteousness a gospel issue, showing you that racial righteousness is not what those verses are talking about, but that reconciliation as given in those scriptures in those passages is the reconciliation between God and man.

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And therefore, because we are those people, the family of God who are in Christ are unified because of Christ.

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Basically, that our unification is that we are all sinners in the hands of an angry

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God deserving of wrath and punishment for our sin and transgression of God's law, that we are all on equal footing that way, but through Christ and because of Christ, we are saved.

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So our unity is actually built on an individual person who was of Jewish ethnic descent and who is also the son of God.

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And so our unity is not what we collectively come to know about racism or collectively try to divest ourselves in by divesting ourselves of whiteness.

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That's not what unifies us. What unifies us is that we are all sinners. We were all in need of Christ.

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And now those who are in Christ, trust in Christ, and we are unified because of his work, a work outside of us, not a work done even within the collective, because we are not saved by works or saved by a racial righteousness.

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We are saved by Christ's righteousness, which you will find if you have done any study of Be the

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Bridge, that it's all a matter of earning this righteousness.

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And the earning of this righteousness is to bring diversity, equity, and inclusion into the church.

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And so it's an idea that the church's role is to bring in social justice and to bring in a utopian society where all have all the same privileges and there are no disparities and there are no separations between people, which sounds great, but none of it is unified in Christ's righteousness, which if we understand that it is

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Christ's work and that we are clothed with a righteousness, an alien righteousness that was not achieved by our own works, then we rightfully understand that we don't have to work for racial righteousness because my

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BIPOC neighbor and myself who are in Christ are clothed with Christ's righteousness.

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That's the starting point here, biblically. But the unbiblical view that Be the

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Bridge will consistently promote and insinuate is that we have to earn, especially white people, together collectively have to earn a righteousness and working together to bring unity.

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And as we've heard in previous intro clip, you have heard

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LaTosha Morrison say that that would be the way we actively live out the true gospel, because the gospel that news that Christ has done a work and we are clothed in his righteousness is an incomplete gospel.

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Um, it is not sufficient enough to unify us. It is insufficient.

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So now we have to earn our, uh, separate righteousness or an additional righteousness to be unified.

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And this is just an undermining of the sufficiency of Christ's work and the sufficiency of God's word to equip us for the good work of unity within the church.

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All right, all that is a recap. But, um, let's dive into the third principle that white bridge builders are supposed to learn about, and that is, uh, overcoming our white fragility.

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We are encouraged to identify our white fragility as laid out for us by Robin DiAngelo, who defines it this way.

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Quote white fragility is a state in which even a minimum amount of racial stress becomes intolerable, triggering a range of defensive moves.

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These moves include the outward display of emotion, such as anger, fear, guilt, and behaviors, such as argumentation, silence, and leaving the stress inducing situation in quote, that's from the, be the bridge 101 guide page 14.

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So we must understand this, my white sister in Christ, white fragility is the outward display of defensive moves.

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These moves can range from argumentation to silence, to leaving the conversation.

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Basically, any reaction on the part of you and I as white people is our white fragility in action.

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And this is really going to be central to how we communicate and is going to have an impact on how discourse transpires in a, be the bridge group.

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This is where the tips for this guide are going to come into practice. You'll find tips in the back of the guide, directing white people on how to converse with people of color so that we keep our white fragility in check.

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And we're going to look at these in a bit, but what would trigger defensiveness when talking about race?

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I mean, most of us have been brought up to understand racism is a sin, the sin of ethnic partiality, enmity, and pride.

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Most of us are raised to hold a form of colorblindness when it comes to judging people and would therefore claim to not be racist.

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We may even avoid race as a discussion, as a precautionary way to avoid even being seen as a possible racist or so that we don't offend any person of color.

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If we are avidly avoiding offending a person, of course, we would get a bit defensive of being accused of offending.

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Now this is, we have to really think about this, right? Because if you come to the table with a preconceived idea about a certain person because of their color, you're already starting with division.

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For decades, right? Americans have been working to rid itself of racist ideas, rightly so, and have been successful at it solely but surely up until the last couple of years where racial tensions have just gone through the roof.

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But people of certain worldviews actually want division because it benefits them in some way.

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And the easiest way of creating division comes through ideas, beliefs, and deception. And what is the easiest form of deception?

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The changing of words. That is why we will see division. Paul appeals to the

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Roman church to avoid people who cause divisions in Romans chapter 16 verses 17 to 18.

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I appeal to you brothers to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught.

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Avoid them. For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ but their own appetites.

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And by smooth talk and flattery, they deceive the hearts of the naive. So the division is happening because words one person uses has a different definition than another person is using.

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That's one way a division can happen. Division within the church happens because of false teachers who use

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Christian language, words, and concepts with different definitions and meanings to teach doctrines contrary to scripture.

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Like we are trying to deconstruct and reconstruct in a healthy way. I mean, theologically, all these things.

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I mean, how we've been cued, how we've been informed, you know, as children, you know, theologically, all of those things.

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According to Be the Bridge, white people's power, privileges, and fragility are what cause division among the church.

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They would argue the false teaching that all white people inherently believe that whiteness is rightness.

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That's the false teaching they are trying to eradicate, not realizing that the worldview that they have adopted is built on worldly, anti -Christian, culturally

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Marxist teachings. And by merely adopting the presupposition, the belief that all white people are racist and will do whatever we can to defend their whiteness,

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Be the Bridge disciples and other anti -racists come to the table even before the discussion takes place with prejudgments, different definitions of oppression, justice, and racism, and teachings regarding these that contradict scripture.

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You bring these to the church, which challenge the clear teaching of scripture, and you cause division.

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Why does this cause division? Because it's man's observations, assumptions, and lived experiences and word against God's standards and word.

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To take on man's definition of oppression, justice, righteousness, enmity, partiality, and equality is to create an obstacle that is contrary to Christ's doctrine taught to us by the prophets and apostles.

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Remember, racism is no longer the sin of pride and partiality, but is a system of advantages that produce an unequal distribution of resources, power, and privileges.

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Ones that are perpetuated by cultural messages or another way to state this is cultural beliefs.

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The cultural message or belief among white people is this supposed white consciousness, the white perspective, or in critical race theory term, whiteness.

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When our whiteness is challenged, it is then that supposedly we develop white fragility.

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From the Be the Bridge 101 guide, they state this, quote, Our white perspective has never been challenged.

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Instead, every aspect of our culture has reinforced our worldview.

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So when presented with an idea or a personal experience from someone that contradicts the narrative we have developed about ourselves and our world, we often feel unbalanced or even threatened.

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Even the idea that whiteness is a culture is challenging to white people. The reality is, however, we do view the world through a cultural lens, just as all people do.

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While understanding one's culture is a complex study, there are some major areas of white culture that are challenged when race and inequality are discussed.

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Things white people often take for granted and assume are the norm are actual ideas into which we were socialized.

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So now that we understand that whiteness is a culture, this is what we understand that they are attacking.

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The problem is, or the questions I guess we need to ask is, what part of our white culture that we have been brought up with is founded on Judeo -Christian beliefs or founded on scripture?

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Okay, if the whiteness, the typical

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American heritage, which has its flaws, absolutely. But if the foundation of this heritage was built upon certain

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Christian cultural structures or beliefs, the question is, then, is it right to take on anti -racism to combat those

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Christian cultural structures and beliefs? Take for example, a

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Christian cultural structure could be the idea of the family. Society is based on the ideal of whiteness.

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They're from a nuclear household, one, two parent households, things like that. Black people can have two parent households, but that's not how our community has ever been based.

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Even from Africa, we have been based on a village style of living and working together.

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It takes a whole village to raise a child and black people truly embody that. While white people tend to have more of a nuclear family, one parent,

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I mean, two parents and a few children, and they work together, right? There's nothing certainly wrong with a nuclear family, but it is like an embodiment of the

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American dream and whiteness, right? So because society is built on all this whiteness and all of these standpoints that are made for white people, they're just more used to that, right?

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And they're not really used to thinking outside the box and thinking about people of color. And that's what I'm talking about. And when they're confronted at the fact that they don't think about people of color, you get white fragility because they're scared and they didn't want to realize that they, let me rephrase this.

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Okay, that the family is very important, that it is a little culture in itself, a little kingdom itself, where you have the husband as the head of the wife and the wife as the helper.

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And then also the family dynamic of the, not only the submission of the wife to the leader of the family, the husband, but also the training up of the children, the children within that to understand and see marriage as a certain way that is between one man and one woman, that marriage includes the headship of the husband and the submission of the wife, that there are all sorts of dynamics, cultural beliefs,

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Christian cultural beliefs that are embedded in marriage, biblical marriage that are taught to us and that we are trained up into in the

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Christian family. Like, for example, the idea that Christ is the head of the church and the church submits to Christ, like the wife is to submit to her husband, that this is an image of the relationship between marriage is a reflection of the relationship between Christ and the church.

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These are things that eventually, yes, something like anti -racism will come and attack because it's going to look at minorities and the minority in this regards of marriage will be, or the family structure will be the children and will be the wife because the one in power, supposedly, will be the husband.

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And so it's going to undermine even teachings regarding marriage, placing more of an egalitarian view when it comes to family structure.

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And that is going to have an effect on the way even children within the family and the church will see

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Christ's headship and the church's submission to it. So it's, you play with that.

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You play with the family and you change the cultural structure, the Christian cultural structure that we learn from scripture about the roles within marriage and the roles within family and the dynamics that are within that plan.

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And you're going to undermine the gospel, believe it or not. That is how beautifully integrated the gospel is played out in marriage, which

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I would love to do an episode on looking at the beautiful display of marriage and its reflection of the gospel and the work of the headship of Christ and the sacrifice of Christ for his church.

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That would just be a whole nother topic. But while you're not going to see an attack from Be the

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Bridge on marriage, but this idea of anti -racism, the concepts that come with it, and the idea of whiteness and the cultural beliefs within whiteness that we actually can point to scripture and say, this is a truth.

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When anti -racism comes in and wants to undermine the authority, it's eventually going to undermine the authority and the teachings that we glean from scripture regarding several cultural structures within Christianity and several beliefs and teachings that come from scripture.

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Anyway, to all to all say that they will get into some ideas that are or, yeah, some ideas that are challenged when race becomes a discussion topic.

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So in here, they quote, such ideas include the idea of the

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US as a meritocracy. What you have is based on how hard you worked and nothing else.

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Another idea is of individualism versus group identity. Each individual is their own person and should not be lumped in with others, and we should avoid good, bad or neutral generalizations.

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Another idea is binary thinking people or ideas are either good or bad, right or wrong.

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And then they state this, quote, all of these ideas shape how we interact with the concept of race.

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When the way we view the world is challenged, our worldview is shaken and we feel personally attacked.

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This response is white fragility at work. Recognizing and fighting our fragility is an essential first step in walking towards God's vision in Revelation 7, end quote.

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Yes, by all means. Okay, let's challenge these. But what do we challenge them with?

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A BIPOC view on them? An anti -racist activist view of these philosophies?

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I'm willing to hear what anyone has to say about them, but what ultimately would will be my authority and should be any

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Christian's authority is scripture. I don't want to challenge our culture's ideas just because someone says they are unjust, but I want to compare them to scripture.

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As a follower of Christ, it is his word that Christians are to abide in. It is his word that sanctifies us.

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It is his word that determines what is right and just for our family, our society, the community, and especially for the church who belongs or should belong to Christ.

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So, I'm not concerned with how certain American cultural ideas affect how we interact with race.

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I am, however, concerned with how we as Christians, sinners as we are, interact with other sinners.

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And what ideals and worldviews line up with God's revealed truth? Race here is just not in the equation.

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I by no means want to say that Western culture is better than another culture. Western culture does have its problems.

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The ever -growing ideas of pragmatism and postmodern thought are some of the problems

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I see coming out of our culture today. There are certain beliefs within Western thought that actually would find their roots from the

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Judeo -Christian worldview. And the philosophies and ideas that Be The Bridge mentions here specifically that we should challenge are some of them.

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Through colorblind philosophy, we have come to understand that meritocracy is a good ideal to strive for, though what

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Be The Bridge claims meritocracy is, is not really what meritocracy is.

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Meritocracy as a political ideology is the notion of a political system in which economic goods or power are vested in individual people based on ability and talent, rather than wealth or social class.

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Advancement in such a system is based on performance as measured through examination or demonstrated achievement.

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Our whole democratic republic has been built upon voting for representatives who show themselves approved for the task.

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Where that system is now, well, that's an issue we definitely need to tackle. But meritocracy as a philosophy applied to a governmental system, along with checks and balances from legislation and law, has given the

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Western people freedom and the most affluent, comfortable lifestyles for the vast majority of its citizens, because it is predicated on the belief that those who work hard have studied and shown themselves approved and are worth honoring.

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I recently came across a YouTube documentary about a Russian scientist named

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Trofim Lysenko, who was hired as the head of Soviet agriculture to help with production of food through Stalin's five -year plan to industrialize

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Russia and collectivize the farms. Stalin had become impressed by the ideas of a prominent scientist named

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Trofim Lysenko, a man whose policies would lead to waves of famines across multiple countries.

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Lysenko was born in Ukraine to a peasant family in 1898. He only learned to read and write at age 13. He graduated from the

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Uman School of Horticulture in 1921 and the Kyiv Agricultural Institute in 1925. There he worked on plant breeding experiments at an agricultural station.

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They wanted to promote homegrown scientists, and the more underprivileged their upbringing the better, because they were all about the working class.

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But the Soviet leadership liked his beliefs, and they especially liked that he was a hardcore communist who hated the West. So Stalin appointed him the director of the

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Institute of Genetics of the Academy of Sciences in the USSR and the president of the V .I. Lenin All -Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences.

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So he was like the guy. And as the guy, he wielded his power like a good authoritarian, and he made an enemy out of anybody who questioned his research.

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And of course, what happens to enemies of the state and Stalin's Soviet Union? They were imprisoned or executed.

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He was chosen for this role not based on talent, study, or ability, but because he adhered to the

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Russian communist ideology and narrative at the time. Instead of granting power over the development of food based on meritocracy, where regardless of ideological beliefs, someone studied and understood plant biology and food production and was given the ability to exercise their hard work in this area, in the production of food, in collectivizing of the farms,

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Stalin put ideologues in charge of them. And Lysenko was one of them. He applied the terrible, terrible idea of genetic

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Lamarckianism, which thought that physical changes in organisms during their lifetime can be transmitted to their offspring through education.

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An example would be to place seeds in freezing water so they would evolve physical traits that would weather the freezing temperatures.

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This evolutionary ideological theory applied to food production in the Soviet Union caused the famine in 1932, resulting in the mass deaths of starvation.

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Now, another thing I thought about is that there were centuries where the

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European world was not built on meritocracy. Think of feudalism, where your class, your resources, power, and privilege were inherited.

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Regardless of talent, interest, ability, or hard work, someone would be born as a noble in charge of vast communities.

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And if you happen to be born as a peasant, well, you were just destined for life to be a peasant.

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Now, do we really want to go into these type of realms? Do we want to cast off meritocracy?

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Society should be built on people who have demonstrated that they have studied and worked hard in their

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God -given talents and abilities. There is a difference between claiming that the US is a meritocracy versus claiming that it should be a meritocracy.

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In our sinful world, it may not always work out that way. But it has certainly helped.

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This goal towards meritocracy has helped Western societies to be some of the freest societies in the world.

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But it's not just governmental systems that adopt meritocracy as a way to structure community.

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Businesses and educational institutions hire based off of experience and demonstrated achievement.

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Companies should want to hire based off of education, experience, ability, and talent, though we are seeing a drastic change in this with the

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DEI philosophies being pushed in companies. And the same goes for churches. God calls pastors and elders in the leadership to study to show themselves approved.

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2 Timothy 2 .15 Again, DEI hiring practices come into the church, rejecting altogether the meritocratic ideal and adopting practices that satisfy anti -racist outcome of diversity of power in hopes of bringing in diversity of not only people, but theologies and doctrines as well.

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This is your multicultural church growth movement in action. Replacing substance for outcome.

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At an individual level, a person who works hard in the gifts and talents that God has given should be measured through examination or demonstrated achievement.

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Typically, people think of meritocracy as a worldly way of merit, that someone deserves what they have because of their talent and ability.

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The worldly and progressive view on this wants to say that meritocracy places a higher value on human life, on those who have more talent and ability.

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But a Christian view is different and understands that all human value is based on the image of God, not on talent and ability.

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No one merits God's favor, nor does God save based on that person's ability or talent.

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But God is clear that there is an outcome to putting talent and ability given by God to use and hard work.

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Those who work eat, and those who do not, we are told, do not let them eat.

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According to God, within the church community, the outcome of working is the ability to eat.

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Now we command you, brothers, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you keep away from any brother who is walking in idleness and not in accord with the tradition that you received from us.

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For you yourselves know how you ought to imitate us because we were not idle when we were with you, nor did we eat anyone's bread without paying for it.

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But with toil and labor, we worked night and day that we might not be a burden to any of you.

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It was not because we did not have that right, but to give you in ourselves an example to imitate.

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For even when we were with you, we would give you this command. If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat.

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For we hear that some among you walk in idleness, not busy at work, but busy bodies. Now such persons we command and encourage in the

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Lord Jesus Christ to do their work quietly and to earn their own living. 2

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Thessalonians 3 6 -12 The talent and ability God gave

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Paul in tent building provided for his physical needs, and the talent and ability

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God gave to Paul in preaching the gospel resulted in the salvation of groups of Gentiles and the building of churches in the areas that he preached.

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Scripture also talks about heavenly rewards to those who work hard in our service to Christ. The rewards in heaven are not materialistic, like word of faith teachers like to claim, but it is still rewards merited to us based on the faith granted to us by God, faith that we did not receive based on merit, nor by our will or our work, but by God's great grace.

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We see Jesus describe a form of meritocracy in his parable of the talents. Gotquestions .org

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talks about the universal application of this parable to all of mankind in this way. From the time of the creation of mankind, each individual has been entrusted with resources of time and material wealth.

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Everything we have comes from God and belongs to him. We are responsible for using those resources so that they increase in value.

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As Christians, we have additionally the most valuable resource of all, the word of God. If we believe and understand him and apply his word as good stewards, we are a blessing to others and the value of what we do multiplies.

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We are accountable to the Lord for the use of his resources. That's from gotquestions .org

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parable of the talents. God is a good God who does give reward to hard work and putting to good use the talents and abilities we are given.

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Where Christians can go wrong is forgetting that salvation is not a reward.

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It is a gift. And for Be the Bridge and other progressive Christians, there is a tendency to confuse these and claim that since salvation is not merited based on talent or ability, neither should privilege, power or resources.

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That's just not true. That's not the way we, uh, that's not what we see in scripture. Another thing we are told to challenge by Be the

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Bridge is individualism. Christian culture holds to a certain type of individualism because ultimately each will be held accountable on their individual rebellion against God.

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Deuteronomy 24, 16 says, Fathers shall not be put to death for their sons, nor shall sons be put to death for their fathers.

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Everyone shall be put to death for his own sin. There's also a justice issue as punishment is not given to groups of people because of individual sin.

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Revenge may want groups or families to be punished for someone's sin, but God's justice is dished out to the one who committed the sin, not to the family or tribe or nation.

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Societies that are collectivists, such as North Korea, will take on a collectivist view of punishment like this.

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One person's act of treason, such as in being possession, being in possession of a

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Bible results in the punishment, or as they call it, re -education of the entire family.

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Basically putting them in re -education camps. Think of Nazi Germany concentration camps.

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Collectivism always lumps people into groups and pins one against the other in some way, shape, or form.

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It by nature has to because the collective is identified by traits, whether that is physical or ideological.

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The third idea Be the Bridge claims is associated with whiteness that should be challenged is binary thinking.

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Christians directed by God's word understand when it comes to philosophy and ideas that there are good and bad ones.

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God is good. His word is good. His law is good. Christ's life and work was good, perfect, and sufficient.

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There is a reason why the statement ideas have consequences is a factual statement and is binary in nature.

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Even beliefs have good or bad consequences. Either you believe and trust in Christ and receive mercy from God or you do not believe and trust in Christ and receive wrath as the just payment for your sins.

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Does Be the Bridge want to really promote that this binary thinking or belief doesn't actually exist in scripture?

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As Be the Bridge encourages white people to challenge our western cultural ideas, they explain that in doing so, our white fragility will rear its ugly head.

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So how does a white person accomplish overcoming white fragility? What tips does

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Be the Bridge have for white people to withhold their white fragility and be re -educated on race in America?

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In the last pages of the guide, Be the Bridge provides 16 bridge building tips for white people.

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I don't have the time to go through all 16, but let's go through a few. Number four is don't whitesplain.

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So let's dive into this one a little bit. It says, do not explain racism to a person of color.

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Do not explain how the microaggression they just experienced was actually just someone being nice.

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Do not explain how a particular injustice is more about class than race. It's an easy trap to fall into, but you can avoid it by maintaining a posture of active listening.

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Again, they would say that whitesplaining would be an exercising of your white fertility and there is basically an encouragement of white people to just remain entirely silent.

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We are to learn and accept about microaggressions based on a subjective experience and to take it as truth.

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Five, don't make the conversation about you. Well, of course not. You know, they basically say in this one,

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I'm not going to read it, but white people have had a say in our Western culture for centuries.

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So now it's time for white people to basically just shut up. Number six, don't equate impact with intent.

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Yes, we all know your heart was in the right place and you meant well, but your words or behavior had a negative impact on those around you.

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And that is what matters despite the best of intentions. As you navigate conversations of race, you will make mistakes and missteps and hurt someone.

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Humbly apologize and do better next time rather than dig in your heels and try to justify yourself.

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So if I explain to a black person that my heart or my intention in asking those questions that they deem were microaggressions, if I try to justify myself in that regards,

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I am basically told to just shut up and I am wrong because what really matters is the impact, the way that person subjectively took it.

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So here, undermining in the very, very foundation of a discussion on building bridges, on building unity, we are told that truth doesn't matter.

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This is a postmodern subjective view. And not just a postmodern subjective view, but a people of color postmodern subjective view.

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That is how you find truth. That is where we're going to learn how to really racially reconcile, how to, according to Be the

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Bridge and LaTosha Morrison standards, have a righteousness that's built on race.

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11. Do not chastise people of color or dismiss their message because they express their grief, fear, or anger in ways you deem inappropriate.

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Understand that historically, we white people have silenced voices of dissent and lament with our cultural idol of niceness.

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Provide space for people of color to wail, cuss, or even yell at you. Jesus didn't hold back when he saw hypocrisy and oppression.

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People of color shouldn't have to either. I'm sorry why

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I am laughing because this, if you have done any research onto critical race theory and how it's kind of entered into the institution, there is a very popular story that went around back in 2017 of a school called

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Evergreen College. Brett Weinstein was a teacher there who had to deal with critical race theory and just this rebellion of students who overtook and overran the school.

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At about 2017, they pretty much kicked him out.

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And what you see is the people of color, or not just people of color, many, many white people as well, being allowed to supposedly express their grief, fear, and anger in very inappropriate ways.

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If you had any data, I would have seen that they were talking about white allyship and targeting white allies when understanding, when you do something that's racist, owing up to it, taking responsibility, and adapting your behavior.

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I believe that you're definitely a white ally. Yeah, bitch! How do we help them out?

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Black people, what do we need from you? You can't tell us what we need from you! No. We have the email!

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Would you like to hear the answer or not? Literally cursing at their teachers, at the people in charge, at the very president of the school.

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Cursing and calling him names, unbelievable. And it was given, they were given license to continue to do this because always it was under the guise of they're oppressed.

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Just give them the ability to speak and release their frustration. And what it ended up doing is destroying that college.

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So I laugh at this because it's, it is such a license to give people the ability to sin.

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And it's horrible. You're excusing bad behavior. The more I read this,

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I get frustrated. As I was editing this portion of the podcast, I realized something

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I failed to mention here. Notice that they equate the people of color's inappropriate behavior to Jesus's actions, saying that we white people need to remember that Jesus too reacted in ways that seemed inappropriate in that culture in response to the injustice and oppression of that time.

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Straight up, this is blasphemous, and a twisting of Jesus's action to support their sinful behavior.

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First, Jesus's reaction was never inappropriate. He was sinless and reacted always in line with the father's instruction, therefore they were the exact reaction needed for what was being done or said at the time.

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Two, the problems that Jesus was responding to were not in line with what

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Be the Bridge and other anti -racist activists are actually fighting against. Jesus always responded and fought against the misuse of the means of grace that God had given to bless his people.

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We see Jesus turning over the tables in the temple because they turned what was a place to receive grace, forgiveness, a house of prayer from God into a den of thieves.

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When Jesus called the Pharisees whitewashed tombs or sons of the devil, it was because they had taken

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God's good word, a means of grace to God's people, and twisted it for their own means and added laws or restrictions to bind

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God's people. There is so much more to get into here, I could do a whole episode on this topic really relating how

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Be the Bridge itself produces Pharisees and working for racial righteousness, righteousness apart from Christ.

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I could do, it could be a whole nother hour. But basically,

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Be the Bridge draws people away from the means of grace that God has given in Christ by deceiving its members to believe that their fight against the so -called white supremacy in Western culture is equal to Jesus' fight against the abuse of God's grace.

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Nope. That's not what's going on in scripture. One is fighting for their own comfort, power, and glory with Be the

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Bridge and anti -racist action, and while Christ was always fighting to uphold

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God's word and his glory. Back to the tips for white people.

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13. Don't underestimate the impact of your words. You have the power to inflict real, lasting damage in these conversations.

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Be careful. Melanin is not a protective shield. When did we ever think that?

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14. Decide if you want to be a balm or a battering ram. This one perpetuates the idea that your words abuse people, that hateful words cause such, like they said, lasting damage to people of color, and yet, if a person of color seems to express their grief or anger in ways that are inappropriate, that's not abuse.

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The hypocrisy is very interesting, but the psychological idea that your words create abuse and there needs to be safe spaces, but of course not for white people, they don't get safe spaces.

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People of color are allowed to wail, kiss, and yell at us. Those aren't abusive. That's just them releasing their anger.

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14. Don't forget racism is our problem. Our people created and sustained it, and now it's our job to dismantle it.

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Only by the grace and mercy of God are people of color willing to walk this road with us towards racial healing and reconciliation, honor that reality, and how you treat those with whom you want to build bridges.

01:00:11

Racism is not just our problem. True racism, the idea of hating somebody or being at enmity with somebody because of the color of their skin or their ethnicity, that is not just our problem.

01:00:26

15. Don't get defensive when you're called out for any of the above. Of course, when a person of color tells you that your words, tone, or behavior are racist, oppressive, triggering, you stop.

01:00:37

Don't try to explain yourself. 16. Don't become passive -aggressive or sarcastic. Don't leave in a huff.

01:00:43

It may be helpful, however, to inconspicuously step outside, go to the restroom, take a deep breath, remain cognizant of the dynamics of white fragility, and take note of how it usually shows up in you, basically, whenever you get defensive.

01:00:55

When you get defensive or leave the conversation, you reinforce to people of color that white people are not a safe people with which to have this conversation.

01:01:07

So, any type of reaction that a white person has relays to people of color that they are not safe.

01:01:16

Well, how can there ever be unity if no matter what I do, you, LaTosha Morrison, and all the other bridge builders train not only their white people to check their white fragility, but that anything that they do is a result of white fragility.

01:01:37

You therefore train the people of color within those discussion groups that, well, their silence is because they are feeling fragile.

01:01:50

And you know, you are now entering into an unsafe space, or you're in an unsafe space because that person is silent.

01:01:58

No matter what their reaction is, the white person's reaction is, it displays that that white person has fragility and holds to white supremacy and see that's the white supremacy that they have been inculcated and they need to release that.

01:02:20

White people cannot win in these Be the Bridge discussions. They have no say.

01:02:26

They are not allowed to correct anybody based on truth. What happens when a white person wants to say, here, this is the word of God?

01:02:35

Can't even say that. That's their white fragility. So as you can see, white fragility is an accusation flung at white people to get them to shut up and not be defensive, not react.

01:02:49

It first presupposes that any sort of reaction on the part of a white person is because deep down they are prideful, want to be right, and are by nature racist because they were born white in a white supremacist culture.

01:03:02

This is why you continually hear Be the Bridge leaders and teachers instruct white bridge builders to always be growing in humility, to set aside their pride.

01:03:13

And the evidence of one growing in humility is to be quiet, to just listen, and to submit to BIPOCs or especially

01:03:21

LaTosha Morrison's expertise and knowledge. The presupposition that white people have more pride than any other ethnicity, that they struggle to be humble and really just wish to hold to power and privilege, that they will defend it in any way possible, is truly, truly a racist belief.

01:03:41

It imposes a spiritual and moral inferiority to someone simply because of the color of their skin.

01:03:47

I want to present to you a clip by Paul Maxwell from the Southwire YouTube channel talking specifically about the understanding of racist beliefs that come with the accusation of white fragility.

01:04:06

I don't know all of what Paul Maxwell teaches, but I do know that he is a

01:04:14

Christian psychologist or he at least has Christian views and then brings in psychological understandings and teachings within his channel.

01:04:27

So I don't know about the whole of what he teaches on this YouTube channel, but at least this clip when

01:04:33

I was doing my research on white fragility and trying to understand what is being taught and what are the accusations that come with white fragility, his episode on white fragility and looking at it from a psychological standpoint and a

01:04:53

Christian standpoint especially, is just a very good and it's very spot on. It helps you understand and see the racist belief within it.

01:05:03

Having a conversation with a friend of mine who is black about trauma, but the conversation turned political at one point and I expressed some of my misgivings about intersectionality politics from the perspective of somebody who did his doctorate with a dissertation on trauma.

01:05:19

He disagreed with me and he proposed that the reason that I took issue with identity politics and with intersectionality was because it threatened my white privilege.

01:05:29

This was a suggestion he made to me about me, that the reason I disagreed with him was because I was subconsciously threatened and therefore thereby deployed a defense mechanism, which was my counter argument to him.

01:05:41

And I was compelled to disagree with him because of a psychological defense mechanism which produced denial of the intersectionality perspective.

01:05:50

Now, he was the first to introduce me to this psychological phenomenon, which is unique to whites,

01:05:56

I'm learning, which the political left calls white fragility. So he said, the reason you're disagreeing with me right now or the reason that you don't see things my way is because of your white fragility.

01:06:06

White fragility is a psychological mechanism predicated on a certain view about the status of white intellect, the psychiatry of the white mind and the moral constitution of each white person.

01:06:18

D 'Angelo writes that white people are so dazzled by their whiteness that their own regular, normative, explicit and implicit reasons for violence against racial minorities are actually camouflaged to them.

01:06:32

So they almost can't even conceive of themselves as racist. But not only are these racist practices camouflaged to whites, but when these practices are brought under the stage lights through conversation or reading or cultural messaging and when they are diagnosed or highlighted and challenged by minority culture, such that white culture's enchantment with its own whiteness is threatened, that they resort to denial tactics which refortify their enchantment with whiteness and center their own whiteness and re -center their own whiteness.

01:07:07

D 'Angelo reduces all forms of disagreement with her to epistemological and moral deficiency, to ignorance and selfishness.

01:07:15

She argues that white people are so socialized by their whiteness that they cannot, without proper racial education and re -education, accurately perceive the extent to which their racist prejudice against minorities is baked into their own worldview.

01:07:31

White people are, in this presentation, philosophically and specularly handicapped by their own race about their own race.

01:07:40

And two, she's able to make individual psychiatric diagnoses of individual whites by using their race as a proxy for diagnosis.

01:07:51

Three, she is licensing anyone who drinks the Kool -Aid of this white privilege concept to extend that diagnosis to individuals with whom they converse, who actually happen to disagree with them about this issue of white fragility or race or white privilege or so on and so forth.

01:08:07

D 'Angelo proposes a third deficiency of whiteness that builds on the first two, a moral deficiency.

01:08:13

And D 'Angelo argues that whites who disagree with her about racial theory are actually culpable for the existence and effects of explicit and implicit racism in American culture.

01:08:25

The white person is intellectually and psychologically and psychiatrically and ethically inferior and must begin every conversation about the topic by repenting of their whiteness.

01:08:37

First, the reason white fragility is an evil concept is that it is racist.

01:08:44

It makes a race -specific generalization about the intellect, psychiatry, and morality of an entire ethnic group.

01:08:52

And those who operationalize the concept of white fragility implicitly affirm the legitimacy of stereotyping white individuals as representative of an inferior ethnic class and consequently of denying them a voice in the conversation.

01:09:06

Second, those who operationalize the term white fragility signify a staunch unwillingness to engage in conversation whatsoever.

01:09:14

And this has manifested itself in a conversation or in conversations as an impulse to silence whites.

01:09:22

And as soon as your ethical model allows you to hold a certain race responsible for the ills of society and then you treat that race differently, right, and even culturally or informally, well, now they don't have as many rights in a conversation.

01:09:35

They can't speak as much. They couldn't possibly ever understand because of their ethical and epistemological and psychiatric handicap.

01:09:42

As long as you start saying that that our race deserves to be silenced or reeducated, you have gone too far, too far.

01:09:50

Your ideas have become evil. Your ideas no longer hold a legitimate seat at the table of ideas and an inability to recognize this as abusive and inappropriate can no longer see that its ideology is spiteful and destructive for a society to adopt, not even to mention less than Christian.

01:10:08

OK, the white fragility concept is deeply morally objectionable, and this concept is becoming a tool for great evil because it is racist about the white intellect.

01:10:19

It is harmfully unscientific in its psychiatric overgeneralizations about white Americans and overreaching applications for white individuals and its licensing of people who have racial conversations to diagnose white people with white fragility.

01:10:32

Absolutely unscientific and ridiculous and absurd. Preposterous. And for these three reasons, the concept of white fragility, as it has become popularly operationalized by leftists in modern political discourse, is evil.

01:10:48

And the concept of white fragility conflicts with basic Christian principles of charity and human dignity.

01:10:54

So why the Be the Bridge so -called educators can't see what white fragility is at its core is just beyond me.

01:11:06

The Be the Bridge proponents must presuppose that white people have a psychological handicap.

01:11:13

And in Christian spheres, we we hear this term spiritual blindness. White people have this racial spiritual blindness when it comes to the racial righteousness and that white people have a moral inferiority or what they would they continually relay that white people have a racial or are lacking in racial righteousness that so much so that Latasha Morrison has built a whole ministry on trying to help not just white people, but even people of color build and develop a racial righteousness and racial racial unity.

01:11:54

Claiming whites have this fragility. Will result in bias against people of European descent, a bias is a cause to feel or show inclination or prejudice for or against someone or something to tell every white person that this is a foundational principle that they need to overcome is to prejudge them entirely on their skin color.

01:12:19

Any Christian and by being this idea already has divided themselves from their white brother or sister.

01:12:26

And this is the other reason teachings like these entering the church cause division because it grants one group a type of superiority based on racial righteousness that another group is incapable of achieving without learning from the superior group and performing acts of repentance and reparations to said superior group.

01:12:50

I hate to say it, but for white bridge builders, it seems that Christ is no longer their master teacher, people of color or more specifically

01:13:01

Latasha Morrison is. In fact, that's what we will look at in the next episode.

01:13:07

How Be the Bridge's goal is to fundamentally change the church and they will fundamentally change whose authority the church should submit to.

01:13:20

Ladies, this episode may have at times frustrated you or angered you in some way.

01:13:27

I mean, it's totally understandable. It did for me. I exercised my white fragility many times while reading this book, almost at times wanting to throw it across the room, but more times than many simply in frustration and closing in and walking away.

01:13:49

I exercised my fragility in that way. But what really frustrated me was how many times

01:14:00

I thought this idea of white fragility, if being implemented in a

01:14:07

Be the Bridge discussion group, how that would cause such division in a local church.

01:14:13

And it really, really breaks my heart. So how do we fight this teaching?

01:14:19

Well, let's go to scripture. First, of course, I believe we need to be self -aware of our own tendency, even as Christians, to want to stoop to their level and become biased against people who teach this.

01:14:33

I lump myself in here. If we remember that it is only by God's grace that we have faith and this by no power of ours that we are sanctified by the power of the

01:14:43

Holy Spirit working through us that made us a new man, then our desire and prayer should be for our own battle against the flesh first.

01:14:53

Now, the works of the flesh are evident. Sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies and things like these.

01:15:09

I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self -control against such things.

01:15:24

There is no law. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

01:15:32

We are called to live by the spirit, to keep in step with the spirit and to not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.

01:15:42

Galatians 5, 19 to 26. So we are all called as Christians to look at ourselves first, see where we might have impurities, sensuality, sexual immorality, idolatry, etc.,

01:15:54

etc., all that's listed in this passage here, to address it and confront our own hearts and take it to God in repentance.

01:16:04

But we're not left for love's sake on our own. We not only pray for our own growth and discernment and maturity, but the salvation, discernment and maturity of all those who have fallen prey to false teachings like these.

01:16:21

For our battle is not against flesh and blood, right, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.

01:16:34

So first and foremost, I think we let scripture assess our own hearts and cause us to repent of a lack of truth and a lack of love where we may identify it.

01:16:44

But then I would encourage you that after we have done that, we take advantage of our white fragility and we put it to good use because we are not left to ourselves, but are also instructed to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another and love, eager to maintain the unity of the spirit and the bond of peace,

01:17:17

Ephesians 4, 1 -3. True unity within the church does not come by getting all races on the same understanding of our historical past or root our white supremacy together or call one group to humble themselves by fighting their white fragility so that other groups may express their truth.

01:17:36

But it comes through the teachings of the apostles, prophets, evangelists, shepherds and teachers of God's word.

01:17:43

It is these who God has gifted to equip the saints for the work of ministry and building up the body of Christ in unity.

01:17:52

The word of God is given to us by the apostles and prophets and preached and exposited by faithful evangelists, shepherds and teachers are how we all attain to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the

01:18:06

Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness and deceitful schemes.

01:18:22

Rather, speaking the truth in love, so in this context and with their terms, that is done by expressing our white fragility in love by calling out the unbiblical and racist teachings springing forth from these ministries.

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So speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way unto him who is the head unto

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Christ, from whom the whole body joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love,

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Ephesians 4, 13 to 16. With first our addressing our own hearts and then coming to scripture as not just our authority for faith, but as the tool

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God has given to us to equip us not only for good work, but for the fight against principalities, philosophies and ideologies of this world.

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We who are spiritual are to restore any brother or sister caught in a transgression,

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Galatians 6, 1 to 2. In our white fragility, we have the calling to call out the transgressions these teachings produce in people, addressing the works of the flesh that is often the fruit of false teaching.

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Remember what Paul says those are in Galatians 5, sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, orgies and things like these.

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Several of these such as sensuality, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, we can clearly see within the social justice movement played out, mapped out by proponents who take on this ideology.

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Think about sensuality. We tend to think of sensuality as this related to sexuality or being sensual in some way, but that is not what is meant here.

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Sensuality is a broad term referring to a kind of shameless, opulent lifestyle that flaunts indulgence in doing anything that feels good in spite of consequences or morals.

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The original Greek term asalgeia carries a sense of being out of control.

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It suggests a person lacking discipline or any capacity for self -restraint.

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We see sensuality at play when Be the Bridge gives license to people of color to act out however they feel, to even allow bad behavior because of preconceived oppression.

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Other sins such as idolatry, enmity, strife, jealousy, coveting, you know, fits of anger here, rivalries of people of color against white people, dissensions and the divisions that anti -racism cause, and especially, of course, envy like we see jealousy and envy and coveting of material and possessions and power and privileges.

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In love, we Christians, regardless of color of skin, are to call these sins out which we so clearly see displayed within the social justice community and call them to repent of their division and partiality for the

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BIPOC community. Their sensuality, enmity, covetousness, the lack of trust in God's sovereignty and the

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Holy Spirit and his word is sufficient to disciple Christians to Christ's likeness and call them to trust in Christ and the gospel alone.

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Because as Virgil Walker states so clearly, the gospel is the solution.

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Jesus would instruct that his kingdom would not be a kingdom that he would establish to change from the outside, but rather that the kingdom would be a part of the heart transformation, necessitating the complete change from the inside out.

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What we're witnessing are men who desire to see this transformation, this utopia, if you will, take place from the outside in.

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They're trying to use their own powers of persuasion, their own ideological framework, their own economic empowerment, their own political strategy in an effort to change society into what they believe it needs to be.

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Well, the gospel of the kingdom works absolutely the reverse way. What happened in the first century after Jesus ascends, those men whose hearts were transformed began to have a massive impact on the culture, but they did so not by trying to change the government structure.

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They did so because of the heart transformation that was in on the inside of them. And they began to proclaim that gospel message person to person, house to house, and the society and the culture transformed as a result.

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So that by the time we read about Paul and the church in Ephesus and Acts 17 and 18, and you've unpacked what

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Paul is doing, there's a riot that breaks out. Why? Because the silversmith there is upset because everybody in the world seems to be turning over their hearts and giving them to Christ, and it's having a large economic impact on Ephesus.

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He's saying, if all of these folks become believers, we're going to be out of business soon. Nobody's going to want to worship the goddess

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Artemis. What's going to happen to us? He didn't do that based upon the marching on Rome.

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No one did that as a result of them deciding they were going to change the political structure during that time.

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They did so person to person, heart to heart, as a result of gospel proclamation.

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So, ladies, if you have come across anti -racist teachings or Be the Bridge has entered your church and they are now calling for the white women within the women's ministry to earn a racial righteousness,

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I pray that you put your white fragility to good use and call your brothers and sisters in Christ to rely solely on scripture and trust in Christ and the gospel.

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I pray you are in God's word. Ladies, thanks for listening or watching this episode of Thoroughly Equipped.

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If you are interested to know more about Thoroughly Equipped, check out the blog or just find some other great

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Christian resources, you can go to my website at ttew .org.

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Christian walk. Check that out at christianpodcastcommunity .org. I pray the

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God of all grace grants you more and more knowledge and understanding of Jesus Christ as the

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Holy Spirit thoroughly equips you through His written word for every good work.