Simon Cox Blog: Race in America: The Golden Rule: A Call to R.E.P. Christ Well

Friday, 21 October 2016

Race in America: The Golden Rule: A Call to R.E.P. Christ Well

The context of most of our cities today is increasingly urban. We live in dense and diverse neighborhoods which embody the beauty and complexity of multiethnic people coming from multicultural backgrounds living in multi-socioeconomic situations.

Even if you live in the suburbs, you have most likely experienced the effects of urbanization and globalization. If you live in these contexts, then you know what it’s like to have neighbors who don’t look like you, talk like you, or act like you.

And if we are going to be effective as gospel witnesses in these contexts, we must move from an ethnic missiology to a neighbor missiology.

I want to share with you some principles Jesus gives us in Matthew 7:12-14 that will help give us a framework for reaching our neighbors. This passage is famously known as the Golden Rule and, within it, we find three basic principles for how to love our neighbors and R.E.P. Christ well.

First, we must reflect personally.

Second, we must empathize corporately.

And finally, we must put on the perspective of Christ.

So whatever you wish that others would do to you, do also to them, for this is the Law and the Prophets. Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few. (Matthew 7:12-14, ESV)

Inherent in the essence of how Jesus is calling us to treat others is a call to have an intimate understanding of how we want to be treated personally before we can properly administer judgment toward others.

All of us have a problem with objectivity when it comes to justice. This is a universal problem because we are all biased beings and ...