And the digital collections on Overdrive and Libby also have topical lists.

He tells us what matters most, what matters less, and what matters not at all. I know we can talk about our kids and our jobs, our sins and our struggles, our joys and our trials, because we do, and we do, and we do. It belongs to God, who’s even now fulfilling his promise to Abraham that through one true descendant, all the families of the earth would be blessed. So You Want to Talk About Race Ijeoma Oluo For Discussion 1. We say we want the gospel torch passed down. We shouldn’t be afraid to speak about these issues if we trust God’s word. Without a big event to draw everyone together, the group is relying on virtual events to encourage people to read the books. Change ), You are commenting using your Google account.

For many months it felt like I was performing for high-end clients instead of feeding hungry friends. “Sometimes it might be difficult to say to your family members, ‘Hey, let’s have a conversation about race,’ ” she said.

This student had interviewed Christian millennials about their experiences in the church surrounding the issue of race.

And though not everyone will be reading the same book, there’s still a common theme that can help open up conversations. I love the church, I love our church, and I’m excited for the church. TikTok? Together they started questioning if he should keep going, because they didn’t want to divide the church. What must be done to prove that intelligence is not an unchangeable aspect of race, culture, or class, as stereotypes may have some believe?

Instagram? We all know that over the past three weeks, the constant news about our global pandemic has given way to relentless dialogue about race. They’d grown up in diverse neighborhoods and schools but don’t remember their churches talking about it. I can preach a message, or teach a series, or schedule minority testimonies, or host special events, or record a video, and I plan to do all of these things in coming months and years—not only about these issues, but many others. It was all still painful. And Other Conversations in an Era of School Resegregation by Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum, Ph.D. Includes citation in the APA format. But still I wonder: Can we talk about race?

These are all reasons why I’m wondering: Can we talk about race? I long to live the book of Acts forward, not backward. I truly have no animosity toward the brothers and sisters who’ve left our church, and I’ve rejoiced to hear of so many who’ve settled into solid church families in our area or elsewhere.

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Instead of hosting a community book event centered on one book, Spokane Is Reading released a list of titles for people to read this year. ( Log Out /  Spokane Is Reading created a list of 15 books to read this year.

But I’ve learned to wonder whether the church is a place we come to be equipped or a place we come to be coddled, a fellowship laboring side by side for the gospel or a club we choose because it caters to our comforts. In Can we talk about race?

He hadn’t addressed the topic directly before, but he and his leadership team believed it was now important to do so.

Last week I talked with a friend who recently started a sermon series on race at his predominantly white church. Twitter? But still, their churches didn’t talk about race. There’s one young adult book (“Long Way Down”) and a graphic novel (“Good Talk: A Memoir in Conversations”), too. That’s why, two years ago, our church embraced a new mission statement.

He’s one of the most gentle and humble pastors I know, he’s rightly trusted by his congregation, and he pastors in one of the cities roiling with protests over one of the recent killings. And Other Conversations in an Era of School Resegregation by Dr. Beverly Daniel Tatum, Ph.D.  Includes citation in the APA format. Post was not sent - check your email addresses! I knew I was broaching topics that might not be popular, because every page of Scripture says things that lodge uncomfortably in our lopsided hearts. We could go full-on Thanksgiving dinner and sit awkwardly with our racing minds and our plasticky smiles, walking on eggshells to avoid discussing anything difficult. ( Log Out /  What if we just looked the other way and refused to think or talk about homosexuality, transgenderism, the environment, sexual abuse, war, abortion, government, and immigration? I loved this training environment, and I loved being a learner in it.

Will we train the ones coming after them?

There will be Facebook and Instagram challenges centered on the books. “It’s so important because the world is much more diverse than the little bubbles around us,” Boggs said. Even though I’d been preaching straight through God’s word my first two years (Titus, Ezra, the Sermon on the Mount), I’d seen enough conflict and heard enough rumbling and watched enough of an exodus that I wondered what I was allowed to say. “Silence is not an option.”. What had happened? We were expected to engage the issues of the day, not run from them, because (1) we were convinced that a solid grasp of Scripture and a keen awareness of our own limitations should give us the baseline discernment to engage any thorny topic, and because (2) our task was to train students for a lifetime of Christian faithfulness outside of the controlled environments we instinctively construct for ourselves. Nicole Chung, author of All You Can Ever Know "Ijeoma Oluo's So You Want to Talk About Race is a welcome gift to us all -- a critical offering during a moment when the hard work of social transformation is hampered by the inability of anyone who benefits from systemic racism to reckon with its costs. I could scan the crowd every Sunday and see the faces of those upset about something, faces that soon went missing as person after person left the church. I’ve barely settled into our church here in Houston and I’ve already watched baby-faced 11-year-olds turn into strapping high school freshmen. The messages were stale, at least by my own standards. They then need to talk about this elephant, so they can understand how the hell it got there. An more importantly, how can we teach our children that they are capable of excelling even if they were not born as part of one of those groups?

But could it be that we’ve turned the gospel into a medicating message that mainly salves the disappointment we feel over our nagging sense of insignificance? Gifts processed in this system are not tax deductible, but are predominately used to help meet the local financial requirements needed to receive national matching-grant funds. We need the gospel soul care that heals our self-wounded hearts and stirs up our faith, hope, and love in the most practical ways (Col 1:3–4). Can we talk about race on a Sunday without people bailing on Monday before we’ve even endured a few months of Berean tension as we search the Scriptures together to “see if these things are so” (Acts 17:11)? Because we’re convinced that a family of Jesus-loving, neighbor-serving disciples is God’s vision for each local church.

I fear that many of our churches today are filled with therapeutic messages that turn preachers into life coaches and the refining fire of God’s word into the fuzzy blanket of positive thinking.

Teachers need to empower students through helping them believe in themselves, and not what they’ve been told they are – and part of this, says Tatum, means instructors learning to put away any preconceived notions about others they themselves may have. And while the books on the Spokane Is Reading list are geared to adults and teens, families who are wanting help picking books for younger readers by authors of color or that explore diversity also will find help at the libraries. In a more normal year, Spokane Is Reading – a collaboration of Spokane Public Library, Spokane County Library District and Auntie’s Bookstore – would pick one book for community members to read, then host author events in the fall. Sun., Sept. 20, 2020. Or we could do what so many Christians are secretly longing to do, whether they know they’re starving for it or not: We could recommit to our role as kingdom ambassadors, we could open God’s word afresh, we could commit to bearing with each other through the process, we could ask for Solomonic wisdom, and we could trust the Spirit of the one who’s greater than Solomon to unite us rather than divide us as we “speak the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:15). So I unwittingly resorted to more technical, from-the-page preaching—accurate, but not urgent; speeches, but no surgeries. “You don’t have to like them all,” she said. Because in the story, a reader might find that someone who seems different on the surface “shares lots of human things in common.”.

Because I’m wondering: Can we talk about race? I’m currently the Lead Pastor at BridgePoint Bible Church in Houston, Texas.