His intent was that now, through the church, the manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms, according to his eternal purpose that he accomplished in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Ephesians 3:10-11

A funny thing happened on the way to the chapel. 

My son and I were visiting a local college, Grace Christian University, because he is considering taking classes there this coming semester. So we wanted to check it out. We asked for a campus tour and I especially wanted to attend a chapel service. I remember how vital chapel was when I attended Moody Bible Institute 30 years ago. Wow, has it been 30 years? I’m so old…

Anyhow, that is beside the point.

The student tour guide at Grace said that the chapel speaker was a visitor and he was here to speak on race relations in the church. His name is Dr. Charles Ware. I asked, “You mean THE Charles Ware? I have heard him speak at many different conferences and every time I have been blessed. What a treat.” I wasn’t expecting this caliber of speaker during my short tour of campus.

Dr. Charles Ware is the Executive Director of Grace Relations and Special Assistant to the President of The College of Biblical Studies. In other words, he is has been everywhere and has a very influential voice around the world when it comes to bringing the gospel to some of the most difficult situations, especially race divisions in the United States. And did I mention, he is also a black man who has been fighting for justice for a long time in the church.

So as my son and I went to sit down in the small but very quaint and welcoming chapel of Grace, it was hard to find a seat because it was packed.

My first impressions of Dr. Ware: Tall, dignified and earnest. He dripped authenticity and urgency. Even though I have heard him numerous times before, on this day he seemed especially determined to have the students understand his message. Or maybe it is always exciting to speak at a college because young students still have dreams and a passion to do something. Sometimes adults are too stuck in their ways to think they can effect real change.

I didn’t have a notebook, nor a pencil, nor my trusty iPad, but I had my smart phone so I pulled up the note app and thought I would thumb in some of the things he was about to say. I am glad I did, here they are. I will put them down is short sound bites because I know you will be blessed like I was…

1. Dr. Ware started his message by sharing a visit he had when he was a contributor to the Lausanne Conference for World Evangelization in 2004. During a strategic breakout session, he was put at a table with 20 different people all over the world to talk about how the Gospel changes hearts, especially of those who once hated each other. At the table he was assigned there was a Jewish Christian and Palestinian, a Chinese Christian and believer from Japan, a Black man and a White man who were both from Apartheid South Africa, and a member of Hutus and a member of the Tutsis the two tribes that were involved in the slaughter of Rwanda. Talk about racial strife. When Dr. Ware introduced himself and said he was from the United States, one person said to him, “The gospel of the West is too weak for us. It seems Americans are too busy fighting for their own personal rights instead of dying to self and sacrificing for the other.” Wow! I wondered, “Is our gospel too weak?” I think so…
2. Dr. Ware then said, “At the central core of racism in America are sinful hearts.” Stop demanding your rights, God needs to invade your life, and our history needs to be rewritten.
3. He said the only way for people to change their relations is by revelation. Meaning the principles in the word of God are the only things that can bring actual change. I said to myself tongue in cheek, “You mean politics can’t?”
4. Here he shared a powerful statement from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., “The law can’t make you love me. But it can keeping you from lynching me.” In other words, policies and hate crime laws can only do so much. It is the gospel ALONE that can actually change hearts.
5. “We are polarized right now, and our rancor is unbiblical!” He shared a time when he was a working at his college how on the same day two students in a couple hours time talked to him about Donald Trump. The first student asked him if he thought Donald Trump was the anti-Christ? A few hours later another student asked him if he thought Donald Trump was a savior sent by God? He said politics has blinded us to fallenness and to love and forgiveness. We are too interested in gaining power for both sides, and because of that no one hears the message of forgiveness anymore. “So true!”
6. He then described a time he was approached by a white lady in his church that adopted two black children. She told him how she has apologized almost everyday to her kids for being white. He asked her, “Who made you white? Didn’t God make you white? Why do we need to apologize for the Creator’s work?” I wondered, “Do we demand people to repent for something they can’t control? Like being a man, a women, being white, or black, or from the US, and born into wealth or poverty?” Who made you the way you are?
7. He paused and looked out on a majority of white students, and in a very direct and sincere tone he said, “Privilege is not a sin! But it is if you use it sinfully.” He went on to say how Moses came out of a place of privilege to help rescue his people. Privilege is both the way life is, and it is a necessary tool to effect change. So if you are privileged you have a responsibility to effect change, and it is not repenting for being privileged.
8. History is always full of both good and bad people. Events are always complicated. So we should all stop spendIng our time arguing about the past; instead we should do something about the present in order to make a better future. Because “A house divided against itself will never stand!” (This point by Dr. Ware reminds me of when I have married couples come in for counseling. If we spend all our time talking about the specifics on how each of them hurt each other in the past you never get anywhere because people each view offenses differently. When you keep a list of offenses in your mind humans have a way of always slanting offenses in their favor. Instead of determining who is the worst offender, to move forward the question is about forgiveness. The present needs grace and hope is the only thing that can positively change the future. If you can’t move past offense and you continually demand more payment than Christ already paid, true reconciliation and restoration will never take place.)

He finished by focusing on Christ. He said, “Christ initiated love. He loved you first, and it cost him everything. So what price are you paying to love others?” Jesus died for relationship (John 17:3). Are you trying to get into heaven hoping you won’t have to live with those who are not like you? Or are we all God’s children? Lets start acting like it.

He ended by saying, “Pray with people who are nothing like you. God will us a crisis to help bring us together. “

My son and I drove out of Grace getting more than a tour, we received a word from on high. Truly a God-thing happened on the way to the chapel.