“They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated;
they will renew the ruined cities that have been devastated for generations.”
- Isaiah 61:4
This verse has been SO grounding and guiding for me this past year or two! It has been the anchoring verse for our Bridge Builders group as well, and I couldn't love it more. As 2020 came to a startling halt in the wake of Covid 19, there was all of this time and space to process life in a way that many of us had never experienced before. In some ways, it seems like the stillness created space to see and hear more clearly. My heart started to break in two as I began to understand more of how broken our country still is, with racial tension at an all time high. During this season of more stillness, I was horrified as I watched Ahmaud Arbery on a run in a neighborhood get shot down by a white man and his son. I heard George Floyd repeatedly say, “I can’t breathe,” while a white police officer continued to press his knee into Floyd’s neck, ultimately killing him. I saw chaos ensue in the wake of Breonna Taylor’s death, revealing, yet again, a need for more accountability and police reform, but it’s not just police precincts and justice systems that need reform, it’s our hearts. It’s my heart.
For the first time, I began to intentionally listen to the perspectives of my black friends, and as they shared their stories and experiences of being black in America, my heart broke again. I had no idea . There is so much injustice I didn’t see because it wasn’t my experience. There is so much prejudice and racism that I never encountered because I am not black. I always thought of myself as “colorblind”, but when I began to hear story after story of dear friends being discriminated against because of the color of their skin, I began to realize that this “colorblind” perspective is dismissive of both the beauty reflected in each person of color, but also dismissive of the pain that has been endured by each person of color. I began to see the ugly truth of the past and present racism that stains our country’s history from the very beginning as we displaced and destroyed indigenous people and as we enslaved black people and treated them as less than human and put policies in place that were intended to keep them from flourishing. I began to lament. I wept. I grieved.
It was a dark season of beginning to understand the pain SO many have experienced at the hands of racism. I’m still weeping and grieving and repenting, but… as I’ve been waking up to the pain in other people’s stories and experiences, I’ve also been waking up to the beauty of the love of God, who calls us to wage peace, who calls us to rebuild ancient ruins, who calls us to be a part of building a kingdom from every nation, tribe, and tongue that will have no end, whose foundations are LOVE. I thought this journey of grief and lament might make me sick some days, but I have discovered instead a secret. I’ve discovered the power of a love that meets us in every ugly, stained, scarred, weary, wounded place, and instead of the gospel being diminished, it has become wider, higher, deeper, longer, more colorful, and more wonderful than I ever imagined it would! My heart is awake, it continues to grieve and lament and repent, but it also gets to feel the beat of justice and love as I show up conversation by conversation, moment by moment, to be an agent of peace and truth and grace… THIS is the Isaiah 61 work of rebuilding ancient ruins that God invites us into, and I don't want any of us to miss this beautiful and vital invitation!