The Problem We All Live With

Painting, "The Problem We All Live With" By Norman Rockwell

"Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness." -Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

This is going to sound trite and possibly cheesy, but hear me: my heart breaks for the journey of African Americans in this nation. It truly does. The fight for civil rights over the past 60 years in our country and the deep, sick injustices that have happened here are enough to stop me in my tracks when I think about it. Robert Pierce, the founder of World Vision and Samaritan's Purse said, "Let my heart be broken for the things that break the heart of God." I know that God purposely created humans across the pigment spectrum and I LOVE that about Him. I love His creativity with His people. But I believe that God created ONE race, the human race, and that humans created racism. And THAT breaks His heart. It breaks mine too...I am NOT a crier, and I cry almost every time I think about actual incidents (like riots, and Little Rock, and lynching) let alone have to see them in pictures or videos.

I spent a lot of time yesterday reflecting on MLK and the places that we've been as a country. I see pictures of civil rights walks and sit-down strikes and it makes me sick to my stomach that actual human beings had to fight so hard just to gain the equality that was supposedly a very "self-evident truth" hundreds of years prior. Then I see the white people who stood with them and I hope with everything in me that if I were a grown citizen during that time that I would have been one of those people standing up for what's right no matter what my personal cost was.

Maybe it's hitting home a lot more with me this year because we're waiting to bring home our third child, who will most likely be African American. I have zero intention of making any statement of social justice through our adoption. We're doing this simply because we believe whole-heartedly that it's the Lord's will for our family and we are privileged to be in His will. But I do believe that it's POSSIBLE for us to do this because we're standing on the shoulders of those who fought so hard to abolish ignorance. I could not have more respect for those people, whose names I don't know but whose actions changed the course of a society and of history.

Do you wonder what the greatest injustice of our time is? A while back our book club read the book, Night by Elie Wiesel, which is his memoir as a Holocaust survivor. It was terrifying to me to think that this absolutely huge and disgusting movement could be possible in modern society. What is WRONG with us as humans?? It's unfathomable to think that some people consider themselves so superior to others that they have the right to enslave them, traffic them, tell them where they can or cannot live or go to school, or even to kill them. I think some of the things that future generations will look back on and say were our greatest injustices are child trafficking, abortion, and the lack of legal gay marriage (a VERY touchy subject as a Christian, I know, but I think it's true...call me if you want to get into that one).

I am genuinely afraid to be raising my children in today's society. I think so many things are coming to light and we have come so far in our understanding of the things we're afraid of. But there will always be new dangers and things that arise and new evils that nobody ever knew humans were capable of. I know that as Christians we are to uphold the truth of the gospel but I also know that if we have to err on the side of intolerance or on the side of love...I serve a God who chooses Love. I will teach my children to choose love. Can that be the legacy of our generation? I'd say it's worth dying to try.

"The time is always right, to do what is right." -Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Ps...if you have kids, buy and read them this book.