God is not a part of race and does not give it meaning. God does not lend His support to the work of race and race cannot use God as a reference despite our attempts to locate race in sacred Scripture. God wants nothing to do with race and it is my mission to create as much distance between the two as I can. This is The Daily Race.
I can make these declarative statements without hesitation because God is one of newness. The prophet Isaiah records the voice of the Lord saying, “Do not remember the past events, pay no attention to things of old. Look, I’m about to do something new; even now it is coming. Do you not see it”(43.18-19)? It is not a matter of when or if God is doing something new but whether or not we can see it. We must not become distracted by the past; it doesn’t matter how loud it screams behind you, whether jeers or cheers, we must keep moving forward. What a poor race we run when we are constantly looking behind us.
And when God created us, God did not give us the same purpose or appearance as another. Our existence does not replace that of another neither does it suggest an improvement upon another’s life. Each of us are a unique contribution to the world and all of us have something to give despite to the pseudo- guarantees of stereotypes.
Our lives were not created to be grouped and categorized, labeled and stamped according to race and then assigned worth based on the current social marketplace price. We were not created, spoken into existence from the very mouth of God to then become trapped by words. People of the Word of God should not become ensnared by the words of human beings.
We are God’s creation, the evidence of the new things that God does every day. Race is a prepackaged existence, a ready to live, just add water and stir manner of existence. A racialized life is one with a pre- measured impact and contribution because race cannot create anything new. It can only repeat the past but as runners, we don’t look back!
Ok, I had a thought (devil advocate); was the class of people considered race during biblical times..reason being God may have not mentioned race but there was a clear distinction between Jews, Gentiles…etc….I mean its just like race to me, back then they said where are you from (meaning place) to distinquish you from another and you were treated accordingly, today we say where are you from (meaning color) to distinquish you from another and you are treated accordingly…I J S !!!
Note: “I love the quote God is going to do a new thing”
No, race in all of its complexity did not exist in the Bible. The differences were cultural and culture is not synonymous with race. I do think that though race is new, our inability to be in community with other cultures, to accept our differences without making one bad and the other good is not. Race is just another means by which to justify our mistreatment of each other. I will contribute a series of post to this question as it is a common misunderstanding. Thanks, George!