Getting Real About Reconciliation
A Small-Group Case Study at Cal Polyby Todd Minturn
Do all chapters need to think about racial reconciliation? About gender issues? What if your campus is largely Caucasian? What if men and women seem to get along? We asked ourselves those questions (and others) at Cal Poly, a campus that is nearly 70 percent Caucasian and one that rarely shows outward racial tensions. Our chapter has seen how the lack of ethnic diversity and racial reconciliation in the group hinders our call to be a witnessing community. We have felt the pain of gender conflict. These and other broken areas, if left unaddressed, hinder our growth toward becoming mature disciples of Jesus.
These concerns led our chapter to start a small group dedicated to exploring issues of reconciliation and justice. It has been a challenge for me to plot the course and lead the way, but it has also been a joy, and so here I share the tack we’ve taken.
Begin at the Beginning
We began first by laying a foundation for the biblical basis of reconciliation as it applies to broken relationships wherever we find them. We started in Genesis, examining God’s nature and character as a reconciling God and our creation in his image. We drew some implications about our nature and character from God’s nature.
“So God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27, NRSV). In making observations about God’s nature and character in Genesis, and our creation in passages like this, it was very significant for us to see that God is both plural and singular, and humanity is too. God is one and only one God, yet at the same time three distinct and equal persons. There are amazing implications that can be drawn for humans from this foundational aspect of the Trinity.
First, God in three distinct and equal persons implies that these persons are in relationship with one another and that there is communication between them. Second, being one God in three persons implies that there is harmony and unity inherent in those relationships.
Our group then asked what it means for us to be made in the image of God, which includes the elements of his character just discussed. Humankind is referred to in ways both plural and singular. If humankind consists of both male and female and bears the image of God, then it must take both male and female to constitute the fullness of that image. Humankind was also created for relationship and communication, just like God.
If male and female together constitute one humanity, then this singularity means that the male and female were created for harmony and unity in their relationship just as God is in harmony and unity.
While the Fall introduced deep brokenness into relationships between us and God and between male and female, it in no way changed God’s nature and character, nor did it change the fact that we are made in his image. As a result, God sought to restore the relationship and unity between him and us; he sought to reconcile us to himself. At the same time he desires male and female to be reconciled with each other, to restore the relationship, communication, harmony and unity we were created for. To fail to pursue reconciliation where there are broken relationships - whether racial or gender in nature - is a failure on our part to understand God’s character and deny the reconciling work and power of the cross (see more on this in The Gospel in Black and White, published by IVP).
From Theory to Reality
After exploring the biblical basis of reconciliation, we began to look more specifically at racial and gender reconciliation. Ephesians 2 and Paul’s application of Jesus’ death on the cross to racial divisions has profound implications for the church in the U.S., given its incredible racial diversity and history. In our small group we began to explore these implications for our own lives and for our InterVarsity chapter.
The “mystery of Christ” that Paul unveils further along in Ephesians 3 is that a racially reconciled church reveals the “manifold wisdom of God” to the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places. It also, therefore, reveals God’s manifold wisdom and power to the watching world. If our chapters are not revealing this “mystery of Christ” to our campuses, then our witness as a community is lacking in God’s wisdom and power.
Why Bother?
If this is the mystery of Christ, then I must seek to understand it and embrace it wholly in my life. Our witness as communities and our discipleship as followers of Jesus are hindered by a lack of ethnic and cultural diversity - as well as racial and gender reconciliation - in our chapters. This horrible reality grieves me and is one of the primary reasons I sought to lead a small group on reconciliation and justice for some of the students in our chapter.
Why bother with all this on such a white campus? Because much oppression remains, even if it is hidden. For example, at Cal Poly only ten percent of the African-American and Latino-American students that begin school will stay through to graduation, while the overall retention rate for white students is more than 55 percent. Certainly, the playing field at Cal Poly is far from level and severely limits the opportunities of some students in their quest for an education. As a fellowship on campus we should be concerned, as Jesus is, that everyone who comes to Cal Poly has the same opportunity to graduate.
What can you do?
These are some of the difficult, but worthy concerns we are trying to explore from God’s perspective. Jesus intentionally pursued interactions with Gentiles and humbly ministered among them. A key question our small group wrestled with is how to go about intentionally pursuing interactions with people of different ethnicities. Some ideas that we discussed or pursued in our small group include the following:
• Visit or join a church that is ethnically and culturally different from us. Living in a college town where there is not a lot of ethnic diversity, this has been the most important opportunity for many of us to develop inter-ethnic friendships.
• Hang out at a multicultural center on campus. You can find out about events on campus that will give you opportunities to meet students of differing ethnicities.
• Be part of a summer Urban or Global project. These are excellent learning experiences and excellent tools for raising an awareness of God’s heart for racial reconciliation.
• Be a friend. There are opportunities for friendship around us every day in our classes and dorms. Don’t overlook the obvious opportunities.
• Develop inter-ethnic friendships in your fellowships and study passages of scriptures together to raise issues of racial reconciliation and racial justice.
A word of caution: we must follow Jesus’ example in developing these friendships. They must arise not out of tokenism or reluctant obedience, but out of a heart humbled and broken by Jesus as we learn of the ways that racial and ethnic separation grieves him and prevents the full mystery of his gospel from being revealed to us and to the whole campus. We need to approach such friendships with deep humility and an awareness that we have much to learn about Jesus from those who are ethnically and culturally different from us.
Gender Pain
True racial reconciliation requires a relationship with a real person, which is often deeply painful and difficult, but also rewarding. This is also true for honest relationships between men and women. Out of our exploration of racial differences, our group also began talking about the general brokenness that exists in relationships between men and women. What does our culture say about this brokenness? What do churches say? How does Jesus view this brokenness and demonstrate what it means for men and women to be reconciled through the cross?
We had many opportunities to learn about the brokenness just by hearing the stories of the women in our small group. One member was a senior engineering student. She has also been the environmental mitigation monitor for the new sports complex being built on campus. At the construction site she is not only the youngest one there by several years, but also the only woman. As the environmental mitigation monitor she had the authority to completely stop construction by uttering the word. But she is also weary from hearing almost weekly from others that she is “too pretty to be an engineer.” The struggles she faces as a woman, discovering that she can’t always pull herself up by her bootstraps, have led her to a deeper understanding of and empathy for the students of color and the issues they face daily on a predominantly Caucasian campus.
Hop on Board!
Jesus is at work to change the face of InterVarsity. We, his children, need to wrestle with his Word and what it says about reconciliation and justice. We need to take risky steps of faith in putting his Word into practice. As we do, we will grow richly in our relationship with him and with others. At times it can feel like we are walking through the “valley of the shadow of death,” but the promise of the Good Shepherd is that he will be with us, and there is nothing I desire more than for Jesus to be with me.
Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this article for educational purposes provided this permission notice, and the copyright notice below are preserved on all copies. Not to be reprinted in any other publication without permission. © 1999 InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA. All rights reserved. This article first appeared in the Fall 1999 issue of Student Leadership Journal®.
Unless otherwise noted, all materials on the urbana.org web site are Copyright InterVarsity Christian Fellowship / USA. All rights reserved.
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