JDL - Direction Fifty-five - One Race

Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth. And from there the Lord dispersed them over the face of all the earth. (Genesis 11:9 (ESV))

“You are a racist!” What in the world does that mean? Does that mean that I am entered into a race, the one-hundred yard dash perhaps? Does that mean that I believe in the theory of evolution and the evolving of the races? Does that mean that you have no credible argument so you seek to end debate by calling me a name? What does it mean if you call me a racist?

Personally, although I do not believe in races, I do believe in cultures, and I do believe there is value in the various aspects of cultures. In other words, I do not believe the Inca culture was right when they sacrifice children.

If I were an evolutionist I would believe in races because that is what the belief system of evolution (Darwinism) teaches, that the different races evolved so that some races have evolved more than other races. If this was what I believed, then I would be shocked if a less evolved person were to accuse me of anything, much less even speaking to me. But, this is not what I believe.

I believe the various culture groups that we have in the world have come about because of the mixing of the languages at the tower of Babel. And when the Lord mixed the languages of the people, each language group took with them certain dominate characteristic traits so that we have certain dominate genetic characteristics in certain culture groups.

Having said that, perhaps the Bible does imply a second race, and no I am not talking about the other sheep that Jesus was talking about (John 10:16), rather I am talking about the inference that one race of people are the believers and the other race would be the unbelievers.

Am I prejudice and do I have prejudices? Most certainly I do, as I believe we all have prejudices and biases. Some are good and some are not so good. After all, I am a sinner, conceived and born in sin. I am prejudice in that I like seafood and Mexican food (rather Tex-Mex). Some are not so good in that I may have a certain profile, what we used to call stereotypes, of certain people or groups of people. Are all stereotypes and profiles wrong? Not likely, as a matter of fact, there are certain characteristics that are dominate in certain cultures. What is wrong is when we let our prejudices override our experiences, especially if we should let our prejudices keep us from a personal relationship with anyone.

So, call me a culturalist, call me prejudice, call me for profiling and stereotyping, but please do not call me a racist. Rightly you may call me a sinner, because I am a sinner and all of these things mentioned, and I believe we all have these sins to some degree, not that there is any degree of sin in God’s eyes, but that sin is sin. Thanks be to God that He has forgiven this sin and all my other sins and faults as well and that He helps me and directs me to better be able to see His people as He sees them, as sinner/saints, redeemed by Himself.

Think About
With the understanding that we can never change a part of us that we cannot admit, admit your prejudices and then, with God’s help, work to overcome them.

Prayer
Heavenly Father, thank You for the various culture groups You have given to our world. Forgive us when we let our fears and prejudices get in the way of meaningful relationships with others. Help us to look at others through our eyes of faith, for Jesus’ sake. Amen.