One in Christ

Critical race theory teaches that there are races that are oppressors and races that are oppressed. This is not what God intended, it is not what the Bible teaches.

We are all one race. We may differ in the genetic expression of skin color and physical characteristics but we are all the same race. In Genesis 3:20 we are told that Adam named his wife Eve (Hebrew for “life” or “living”) because “She was the mother of all of the living.” Paul in Acts 17:26 taught that “God made from one man (father or blood) every nation (race) of mankind to live on all the face of the earth.” If we are all descendants of the first man and woman, then we are all one family and one race.

At the tower of Babel people were scattered over the face of the earth and developed into the nations and ethnicities we see today. However, God had a plan to reach out to rebellious mankind and to reestablish unity among His children. God begins this plan by making a covenant with Abraham. The covenant was not limited to blessing the nation that God would create through Abraham. Instead God promised that through Abraham “all the nations of the earth shall be blessed” (Genesis 18:18 and 26:4). Abraham would begin the process of bringing the truth of Yehovah to the earth. The promised Messiah would trace His human lineage through Abraham’s family.

In Leviticus 19:34, we see that when gentiles converted to faith in Yehovah, the Jewish people were instructed that the foreigners “shall be to you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself.” The shared belief in Yehovah eliminated the distinction between Jew and gentile.

The New Testament teaches this same concept. Galatians 3:26-28 states, “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

Unity is possible, “since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices, and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him — a renewal in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and freeman, but Christ is all, and in all” (Colossians 3:9-11).

Just before His crucifixion, Jesus prayed for unity among His followers throughout history. He prayed, “Holy Father, keep them in Your name, the name which You have given Me, that they may be one even as We are” (John 17:11).

We cannot deny that people have misapplied the Bible to justify racist behavior. However, adherence to accurate Biblical teaching ended slavery around the world and calls us to a unity among believers where racism has no place.