Idealistic Transformation Dialogue
It struck me once again this morning how idealistic much of our South African dialogue around transformation can be. On my way to a meeting I was listening to a radio debate (is that the sound of my street cred card being revoked?) around transformation of the judiciary.
The details of the debate were almost irrelevant; change the topic to another similar transformation issue, insert the appropriate terminology and you could have the same debate tomorrow.
Two particular responses stand out for me:
1. Force them to transform:
This is quite common among those who have been previously disadvantaged (to use the ridiculously convoluted politically correct term) who despite years of hard work and honest effort are still faced with the fact that white people control most of the wealth and economic opportunities in South Africa. If they will not change – then make them change! It is the government’s job to force them to share!
There are definitely days that I agree with this sentiment and there is much to commend it. But, besides the potential social fall-out of bitterness and division, this kind of transformation is shallow. It may transform the outward behaviour but it has not changed the heart. It may force a man to share but cannot make him want to share. It may, in fact, have the opposite effect resulting in deepened racial hatred and increased self-preservation. Compulsion may have the desired outward effect but even then rather than a spirit of giving and nation-building (to use another over-used phrase) it breeds as an unwanted side effect a focussing of energies, not on self-sacrifice and generosity, they rather on devising ways to “cheat the system” for “our” benefit.
2. It is the right thing to do:
This attitude goes something like this, people must change because it is the right thing to do. This might seem strange because I agree that it is the right thing to do. But why is it the right thing to do? Why in the world should a rich white man share his hard-earned (he did work hard for it albeit in a system that favoured him) material wealth or creative capital with a poor, ill-educated black woman who possibly does not even speak English? Why should he take from his children in order to give to another man’s children? Why would anyone disadvantage his own people in order to advantage another people?
Grass-Roots Transformation:
Transformation only makes sense to me in the light of the gospel. The gospel story of Jesus, who though he is profoundly not like us, gives up all his heavenly privilege for us. Jesus who does not hoard his treasure but instead gives up his own body to rescue undeserving sinners. Jesus who lays down all the riches of heaven in order to bring all the riches of heaven to us. Jesus who not only lays down his rights but who takes up his enemies and adopts them into his family.
It is only as I follow this Jesus; as I stake my life on this gospel that I not only want to see change but I rejoice to share my resources with those not like me. The gospel transforms not just the outward behaviour but the heart. The gospel is far deeper and richer than much of what passes for transformation today. When the gospel is at work we no longer have to settle for only a superficial transformation but now a deep and beautiful transformation is at work. The gospel redefines “those like me” – it is not race or economics but together we may all stand as sons and daughters of the Most High God.
Gospel transformation is not glamorous or high-profile. It is less concerned with what the president or constitutional court are doing. They can only control the superficial acts of transformation but thousands of ordinary Christians following Jesus everyday in the simple, loving acts of brotherhood can slowly and in weakness begin to transform a community.
Good News for South Africa: Racial Reconciliation 3
Some Practical Considerations:
We must never make the mistake of imagining that bringing people together simply means, hanging out under the same roof or in the same space, interspersed with some pleasantries. To be a church that truly is good news to Cape Town, that brings people together in a manner that can be described as “one new man”, will involve more than people of different cultures gathering in the same building once or twice a week. Even unbelievers do that regularly in restaurants, workplaces, sports events, malls or coffee shops (Matthew 6:46-47).
It will require something of us – a laying down of our lives, our cultural idols, our preferences, our way of doing things, in order to truly understand, love and serve our brothers and sisters. It will require us to eat together, spend time together, be in each others homes, with each others families, to pray together, study the Word together, engage on mission together.To learn to celebrate and enjoy the things which the other enjoys or celebrates. We will have to learn grace, mercy, self-sacrifice and open, honest-discourse if this is to happen. We cannot simply expect it to happen we must be intentional about it!
This will require:
a) Our hearts must want it, work for it, pursue it. In many ways the external actions are incidental to a changed heart that desperately wants to see the gospel reality that the divided walls have been destroyed embodied in the community of God’s people. Discussions of the externals in this forum become irrelevant then, all that counts is that we love our neighbour as ourselves – and follow wherever that takes us.
b) Perseverance: We cannot give up easily – this task is not for the faint-hearted, we will hurt, offend and misunderstand one another, together we must seek grace and forgiveness
c) Time: We must not be fooled into thinking that a couple of meetings in a week and suddenly we are having community. We must be prepared to “waste time” just hanging out with each other, laughing with each other, telling our stories and being together. In order for real community to be fostered, for us to really begin talking to one another we have to be spending time with one another.
Somehow out of the melting pot of hours and days and quick coffees and lazy braais and long walks there begins to emerge a “oneness”, an understanding of one another that is built on relationship. So that when we hit the hard cultural and racial issues we are dealing with these in the context of relationship. That is very different to trying to work that out with people who are functional strangers.
d) Space: The context in which this reconciliation must happen must be mutual – we must both enter each others worlds and experience, question and learn, know where we live, grew up, what we eat. Too much of this kind of community has happened on “white turf”. We must move it into the townships, Cape Flats and rural areas if we are to truly be “one new humanity”
e) Prayer: Only God can do this – left to our own devices we will fail. But we must pray for this with the passion and perseverance of the widow and the unjust judge (Luke 18:1-5). Lord we will not stop until you work in and among us and make us these people together!
You many also be interested in:
Good News for South Africa: Racial Reconciliation 1
Good News for South Africa: Racial Reconciliation 2
The apostle Paul writing about relationships between the Jews and Gentiles in Ephesians 2 has this to say:
“For he himself is our peace, who has made the two one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility… His purpose was to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace, and in this one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility.” (v14)
“Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.” (v14-16, 19-22 edited)
To believe the gospel is not simply to give mental assent to some rational truths that you agree with (it is certainly not less than this). To believe the gospel is to hear the word of declaration of the arrival of God’s King and his means of salvation and to join your life with His Story. It is the Great Story whose aim is the glory of God and whose plot is the restoration of true humanity.
When the gospel is at work among his people in South Africa we ought to see the church, in part and yet in significant ways, overcoming these issues. We ought to see churches bringing people of different races, cultures and socio-economic classes together in the gospel.
The desire of our nation, reflected in the talk of our politicians and thought leaders is for meaningful racial reconciliation. But for all that talk we have made little progress. We may work in the same buildings, ride the same trains or even attend the same churches but at the end of the day we go home to our own communities, by and large populated by “people like us”.
We may exchange small talk and pleasantries or even engage in rigorous professional or academic debate but what do we say when our guard is down and there are only people like us left? I am frequently shocked by other white people “taking me into their confidence” with the assumption that I too am like them and will concur with their frustrations and prejudices.
What of the church? If there is any place that racial reconciliation ought to be succeeding it is in the church. The gospel gives me reason to lay down my privilege, my grudges, my cultural distinctives, my personal preferences, my history and together stand at the foot of the cross amazed at the grace of Jesus. Jesus, who though he was so very different from us, became like us, in order to redeem us.
Jesus who died for us so that we might live, be forgiven and adopted into his family. Jesus whose resurrection life has broken out into the world breaking down the dividing wall of hostility (through his own body) and creating in himself one new man, thus bringing about the shalom (peace) of God. That would surely look and be good news to our divided and broken nation.
In Revelation 7:9-10 the Kingdom of God in it’s fullness is revealed as a heaving multi-national, multi-ethnic, multi-cultural people. And this united, restored humanity is directly linked to the gospel (v10).
“I looked, and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice:
“Salvation belongs to our God,
who sits on the throne,
and to the Lamb.”
You may also be interested in:
Good News for South Africa: Racial Reconciliation 1
Good News to our City: Economic Inequality
Good News for South Africa: Racial Reconciliation 1
In Mark 1:15 Jesus declares that “The Kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!” Jesus begins his ministry by proclaiming the good news or gospel that the Kingdom of God was near. God’s Kingdom was coming because God’s King was coming.
But how is the Kingdom of God good news? For most of us today the arrival of a King to rule over us does not sound like good news at all! We want to be free, no kind of rule sounds like good news.
And this was the lie of Satan way back in the Garden of Eden when the Serpent portrayed God as a tyrant, holding us back, keeping the best for himself. But God is not a tyrant – his rule is one of freedom, mercy, love, justice, life, blessing and peace.
King Jesus comes both to demonstrate to us the goodness of living under the reign of God and to set us free from our self-imposed exile from God and slavery to the tyrannical rule of sin. The church (the people of God) looks forward to a glorious future that God has promised us in Christ. But the story of the Bible is that this Kingdom has now broken in and is at work saving and restoring a people. Where the good and gracious reign of King Jesus can be seen. In the church we find a taste of what it means to be truly human… again.
It is the gospel which answers the deepest and most noble aspirations of our society. It is the gospel which satisfies the restless longing of our souls, the residual image of God in man, marred but not forever lost. The church as the foretaste of restored humanity demonstrates to the world (through the goodness of their lives together) that their good desires and aspirations are satisfied only in Jesus. The church declares to the world in word and deed that it is good to live under the reign of King Jesus.
What could it mean for the gospel to be “good news” to South Africa today?
Issues of race have been an even more contentious issue in South Africa over the last few months. From models tweeting, artists painting, students FaceBooking , bloggers blogging, politicians marching and presidents suing issues of race have been a hot topic in social media forums lately. Christians have not been exempt from these issues and sadly enough have mostly just been a PG-rated mirror of the attitudes emanating from their respective communities.
We live in a county that eighteen years into democracy remains heavily divided along racial and economic lines. How is it that the gospel can be seen as good news to South Africa? For make no mistake, if we have a gospel that has nothing to say to this issue in our time, in our country – then we have an impotent gospel!
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Good News to our City: Economic Inequality
On the radio station I used to listen to growing up – Friday was “old skool” day. So I thought I might continue that trend for a while (maybe even sporadically) and on an “old skool” Friday I will re-post an old post of mine that I think might still have some value. So if you have read this before maybe ask yourself – has anything changed? If this is new to you, I would love to hear your thoughts and reactions.
Good News to our City: Economic Inequality
Let us begin with a statement of fact – whites (including Christians) are (present tense intended) the benefactors of the apartheid system. Yes, we all know that “all that discrimination” is in the past and that now we are all even (?!) But to imagine that 40 years of institutionalized (that is even to ignore the fact that racial discrimination was crippling black people long before apartheid was on the statute books) can simply disappear overnight and that previous privileged and disadvantages are no longer valid is simply naive or ungodly.
Let us try an analogy: It is as if we whites and blacks have been playing a game of football and for the first half all the black players have one arm and one leg tied behind their back. Predictably the score at half time is 28-0. At half time the whites realize the error of their ways (best case motives allowed) and untie the blacks for the second half but do nothing about the score. And when the black players, understandably, protest – the white response is anger, whilst pointing out the only now even (?) playing field.
That is Cape Town/South Africa today, we may be 14 years into our new democracy but whites have conveniently forgotten that blacks started this era of democracy 28-0 behind. In order for South Africa to work towards significant economic equality white people have to be prepared to give something up. The question for Christians in Cape Town today is – where does the Kingdom of God fit into all of this?
Martin Luther once said: “If you preach the gospel in all aspects with the exception of the issues which deal specifically with your time you are not preaching the Gospel at all.” (quoted in Ron Sider p52).
If you have any doubt as to whether this is one of the issues of our time here are some statistics:
According to the 2007 statistics on the City of Cape Town website results:
- Unemployment in Cape Town is at 16,9% (2007)
- 58.4% of people aged 20+ have an education level less than grade 12. (2007) whilst a further 23,6% have Grade 12 as their highest education level. Leaving only 16,8% of people aged 20+ with a tertiary qualification.
- 8.4% of people 20+ have less than Grade 5 (2007)
- 38.8% of households are living below the poverty line (2005)
- 6.7% of households have no access to safe drinking water (2007), and 5.8% no access to adequate sanitation (2007) and 2.8% no access to electricity for lighting (2007)
- 108 889 – informal dwellings were serviced by the city in 2007 (this obviously does not include those that were not serviced)
According to the 2004 Study on Informal settlements:
- Amongst those living in informal settlements only 16% have Grade 12 and this drops to as low as 2% among the unemployed.
- 25% of those living in informal settlements are regarded as functionally illiterate.
- 98% of these were Xhosa speaking with 92% having been born in the Eastern Cape.
- 39,5% of adult residents were unemployed (34% men and 66% women)
- 52% of the unemployed had never worked in paid jobs before
- Average household income was R1315 per month (inclusive of state grants received by 41% of households). At the time of the survey the Household Subsistence Level was R1900. More than 80% of households fell below this level.
- 54% of households spoke of times when they had no food for the day. Whilst 61% did not always have enough to eat.
- On average 30 people were sharing one toilet cubicle
- 83% of residents experienced serious problems with flooding around or in their shacks.
According to the Informal Dwelling Count for Cape Town 1993 – 2005 (June 2006),
- The city had a backlog of housing of 260 000.
- The 50 informal settlements in 1993 had grown to over 200 by 2005. Khayalitsha for instance has a total of 13 informal settlements containing 42 170 shacks. And Philippi with a total of 23 informal settlements containing 15114 shacks.
- Since 1993 informal dwellings have grown from 28 300 to 98 031 in 2005.
- Impacting the lives of approximately 400 000 people, almost 13% of the Cape Town population.
According to the City of Cape Town’s Employment Status of Potential Labour Force (those aged 15-64):
- The total unemployment levels in Cape Town are 19,4%
- Of those Black Africans have a 34,8% (225473 people) unemployment rate, comprising 31% of the population
- Coloureds have a 15,8% (147250 people) unemployment rate, comprising 48,13% of the population
- Asians and Indians a 7,1 % (2072 people) unemployment rate comprising 1,43% of the population
- And Whites a 3,1 % (11987 people) unemployment rate comprising 18,75% of the population
Thoughts:
1. In SA this is largely a black-white issue and this is how it is at best perceived and at worst intended. We cannot get away from the reality that white people including Christians are the major beneficiaries of apartheid. If we are serious about racial reconciliation (see part 1 of this series) then we must ask questions about an economic system that entrenches the divide not only between rich and poor, but often also between white and black. If the gospel is to be good news that works to our city then it must be seen to overcoming these divides, uplifting the poor, changing the priorities of the wealthy etc.
2. White Christians (this is a generalization) need to give up their love affair with Western capitalism. Out of the West and particularly the United States comes a form of Christianity which is often too closely wed to capitalism. Capitalism as an economic system is about the maximum profit for the minimum expenses. As Christians in business, running businesses, endorsing and using businesses, this “raw capitalism” is most often at odds with the people-centred, looking after the vulnerable, type economics of the Bible.
We have to practice and endorse and look to encourage whatever form of economic system (in one sense that is irrelevant) best looks after “the poor and the widows”, the vulnerable, those who are without means and resources. Whatever system best allows the greatest number of people to rise above poverty, unemployment, unsanitary living conditions, lack of access to proper healthcare and education is the system/policy/party which we ought to be endorsing.
The sad reality is that most of our decision-making and values are played out not by reading the for instance the Old Testament prophets but by the values which we inherit and endorse as those who are the (continuing) beneficiaries of an unjust economic system. White Christians fail to critique or even see anything wrong with our capitalist economy mainly because we are the beneficiaries and propagators of an unjust system which continues to make the (white) rich richer and the (black) poor poorer
3. White Christians need to consider their living standards and priorities in the light not of first world countries but in light of Africa. In a city where hundreds of our brothers (if we limit it to Christians alone for the point of illustration) regularly go to bed hungry how is it that rich Christians so easily justify the luxury motors, holiday homes, bigger and better homes, gadgets, television screens etc? How is it that rich Christians have wardrobes full of clothes they never wear whilst their brothers and sisters have no shoes or warm top?
How can it be that those who claim to disciples of Jesus and citizens of the Kingdom of God, have the same lifestyle as unbelievers just without the smoking, sex and foul language? How is it that whilst are values are supposedly radically different yet our lifestyles are exactly the same?
4. Reformed theology has traditionally had a defective theology of the Kingdom: we are obsessed with saving souls for heaven,whilst God is busy calling us to join with him in reconciling all things to himself. While we are busy preaching a message which inadvertently has lowered expectations of life now (what is called under-realized eschatology), God is calling us to live now as citizens of his Kingdom of justice, peace, mercy, compassion, and self-denial. We are exclusively concerned with personal holiness while God is calling us to lay down our rights, give away our excess, feed the poor and join with God in demonstrating the in-breaking effects of the new life of the resurrection now.
“For the first Christians, the ultimate ‘salvation’ was all about God’s new world; and the point of what Jesus and the apostles were doing when they were healing people, or being rescued from shipwreck, or whatever, was that this was a proper anticipation of that ultimate ‘salvation’, that healing transformation of space, time and matter. The future rescue which God had planned and promised was starting to come true in the present. We are saved, not as souls, but as wholes.” Tom Wright: Surprised by Hope p211
5. As I alluded to earlier reformed theology has traditionally had a deficient theology of the church. We are all about me and my personal salvation. At best church is a collection of individuals who share common interests and values and who help each other out occasionally. The biblical picture has at the centre of God’s working, not the individual but the people of God, the church. We need a far more communal identity than we often practice. The biblical picture is that of a family, a body, a building, a people belonging to one another, one new humanity.
A more biblical picture of church cannot accept a situation where we buy a new car, or a bigger house, or more shoes whilst our brothers and sisters go to bed hungry or homeless – and we don’t even care enough to pause and consider what we are doing! “Our understanding of the poor, it seems reveals a lot about our understanding of God’s grace.” Tim Chester p29
6. This is not a call to give money to poor people. That may come in time but what white and black, rich and poor need more than anything else in South Africa and Cape Town today is to meet and connect with one another. As Christians we have to stop giving money to appeals or projects (to ease our guilty conscience) and we need to start giving ourselves. Ask yourself this question, where would you find Jesus if he was living in Cape Town today? Among the poor, in the townships, on the gang-ravaged Cape Flats, among the HIV positive crisis? Where do you think he is calling you to be today?
Stop fearing the consequences. Stop worrying about the future. Stop thinking about all the logical reasons why you should maintain your comfortable middle-class white bubble. If you know where Jesus is calling you then why aren’t you following? That is the only question worth answering!
“It is through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ that we are all invited to devote our lives to the subversive cause of the mustard seed that is destined to redeem a people and transform a world.” Tom Sine: Mustard Seed vs McWorld p27
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