Artificial Categories - The One Year Uncommon Life Daily Challenge
Artificial Categories
You are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus. And all who have been united with Christ in baptism have put on Christ, like putting on new clothes. . . . You are all one in Christ Jesus. Galatians 3:26-28
God sees all of us through a different lens than the world uses. That should not come as a stunning revelation. God has always seen us and the world itself in the context of His vision and plan, beginning with Creation and through His return and ultimate victory over evil, and to the time when He will reign victoriously over all. God doesn’t see us as black or white, big or small, fast or slow, or any other separate categories—categories the world sets up and that ultimately act as barriers between us. Instead, God sees every one of us as full of potential and purpose, each His children, one and all.
When Nathan was born, his parents decided they would be more proactive about knocking down some long-standing societal barriers. They had grown up seeing segregation and separation firsthand—“whites only” water fountains, public bathrooms, restaurants, and hotels. They wanted Nathan to grow up as accepting as possible, to see life from a different viewpoint—the way they felt God saw things.
And so they implemented a family rule: no one in the Whitaker family was allowed to describe a person by his or her skin color. For example, if there were three boys standing together and Nathan wanted to point out one of them, he had to say something other than “the black boy.” He could say “the boy in the middle” or “the boy with the red shirt on” or “the one who is smiling.”
How about you? It’s easy to fall into the habit of describing people by skin color or nationality. I don’t think I am being overly sensitive when I say that I most often hear skin color being used as a descriptive adjective when the “white person” is referring to an African American or black person. May I suggest that the next time you hear that description used, politely ask the person if that description is relevant to the point they are trying to make. It usually isn’t.
Uncommon Key > If you “color” your language when talking about other people, be diligent about changing that. View people through God’s eyes—we are all His children.
