Red and Yellow, Black and White...

After reading this post by my brother-in-law I was reminded of a post (read it, really) by the son of one of our ministers.

It really makes you think...how many people do we pass up every single day because they don't look, act or smell like what we think is acceptable.

I work at a downtown church and we have a "neighborhood" ministry. What does that mean? Well... here "neighborhood" has turned out to be code for "black". It means that we have some extra kids that come on Wednesday nights for dinner and either youth Bible study or children's choir - depending on their age. They come here from several of the surrounding apartment complexes. MOST of these kids are GREAT kids (some of them are real toots - but you would find that with any group of kids). They come from a very different culture ...even though they live right here among the rest of us. Most of them have single mothers, all of them are low income, many of them have emotional issues ...the list goes on and on.

But here we are... this big ...white ...wealthy church. And how do we treat these kids? Terribly!
There isn't acceptance here, they don't find love from most of the people they encounter while at church. This is what gives Christians a bad name or at least one of the things.

Just a few weeks ago I walked down the stairs to find one of our elderly members ripping into a "neighborhood" boy (who by the way was doing exactly what I had asked him to do). In a matter of 2 minutes of my hearing the conversation she accused him of stealing, accosted him for not having shoes on, and basically told him to leave and stop causing problems. It is so frustrating to me that this is the impression they get of church. All he did was stare at me with huge eyes and promise me that he wasn't doing anything... and I believe him... I would have believed him anyway, but just to prove it - we have a camera system and I was watching him sitting peacefully on the bench waiting... playing with his toys... just as I asked him to do.

Now don't get me wrong, we aren't going to put up with any crap. The rules apply to everyone - regardless of color. But only a few of us really care about what happens to these kids... only a few of us are willing to deal with the crap for now in hopes of making a change in the long run. For everyone else it is just too uncomfortable... too foreign... too difficult. They would rather turn them away so that they don't have to deal with something ookie like unchurched kids.

How do you teach a church to love those who aren't "like" them? How do you work through prejudices to find the love? How do you teach the un-churched about the love of God when they don't even see it within the church walls?

I think we could all take a lesson from the Amish on how to love...