Christian Middle

Photo by Clay Banks on Upsplash

The protests that ended up in rioting this weekend confirm my belief in Satan. It’s an evil force that hijacks and exploits righteous anger, deflecting the focus on the very real problems facing black Americans and opening the door that allows people to dismiss the issue because there was violence. In the wake of this tumult – protesters and good police alike – are unfairly maligned, and plenty of innocent by-standing shopkeepers have found their livelihoods compromised. 

Clearly, violence is wrong, but isn’t it actually violence that is being protested? When we consider the number of similar incidences of white police mistreating blacks in the recent half dozen years, my first question remains: How can this still be happening? The answer is rooted in the failure of leadership.

It’s easy to say, “Well, Derek Chauvin (the police officer charged in George Floyd’s death) was a bad cop.” Yes, bad enough to have accumulated 18 complaints on his record in 19 years of service. How can the blame for this tragedy not also fall fairly on Chauvin’s boss? If the union that is supposed to support officers, protected him from the consequences of his bad behavior, how is it not also responsible for the fallout?

The Bible is full of diatribes against bad leadership – shepherds who lead their flocks astray in order to serve themselves. Think of how many injustices lie on the doorsteps of people who have abused their power (the MeToo movement and the scandal of pedophilia in the Catholic church to name two recent examples). In contrast, we see Jesus explain: “You’ve observed how godless rulers throw their weight around, and when people get a little power how quickly it goes to their heads. It’s not going to be that way with you. Whoever wants to be great must become a servant. Whoever wants to be first among you must be your slave (Mark 10:42-43 The Message). Unfortunately, the norm remains that most leaders spend more time serving the institutions that promote and maintain them, holding more allegiance to politics than to principles of justice. 

Today I saw the following quote posted: “Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are,” from Ben Franklin. Who are these people who can claim to be unaffected? Certainly, anyone is who is white falls into that category. That is not the same as saying all white people are responsible for prejudice, merely that they are not typically the victims of it. 

It was the hallmark of Jesus’ ministry that He challenged the religious hierarchy of His day, advocating for society’s poor and marginalized – women, slaves, tax collectors, prostitutes, and even Gentiles as people God loved. In this He stood in complete solidarity with the teachings of the Old Testament where Israel was constantly reminded to remember the widow and orphan, the poor and downtrodden. One of the things I’ve learned on my recent trip to Israel was that Jesus Himself was probably not one of these marginalized persons. With father Joseph as a carpenter (more likely builder), He would have grown up not rich, but financially secure, and He clearly enjoyed a fine education, enabling Him to hold His own among the elite religious class. Would He have been able to mount the movement He did from a lower rung on the socio-economic ladder?

We may not all see ourselves in positions of power, but we all, nonetheless, have opportunities to lead even in small ways: a word of contradiction to a bad joke, an effort toward empathy, an initiative of service, even a vote against self-serving and self-perpetuating politics. At the very least, however, we must be in solidarity in outrage at injustice – as much when it doesn’t affect us as when it does.

If we do not, whose side are we on?