You Tube Theology

Thabiti Anyabwile, pastor of Anacostia River Church, discusses the sin of excessive nationalism and American exceptionalism with Dr. Soong-Chan Rah.

--TRANSCRIPT--

SOONG-CHAN RAH: Why is there such a strong pushback for this [critical analysis of American history]? And some of it is, when we hear the stories of brokenness in our narrative and the sinfulness that is a part of our history, about everybody's history, you know, as an individual we're fallen human beings, as a society, we're fallen and broken. And so when that narrative gets challenged, I think that's when the pushback comes, and "Black Lives Matter" is a statement that challenges American exceptionalism, to say we have not always done this well and we're still not doing it well and we've got to deal with that reality.

THABITI ANYABWILE: Man, that's a good word. And what you're pushing up against, as I listen to you recount that, is you really are pushing up against pride, aren't you? And for as much as it chafes some people, even the language of white supremacy or the language of racism and alleging racism, when you see some of the strident pushback and this inability even to acknowledge that the extermination of native peoples was what it was, it was a genocide, you realize that there's a root of pride there that is resistant to repentance, is resistant to culpability, is resistant to any form of redress or reparation.

The stronghold of whiteness and white identity and pristineness is really part of what keeps us from making progress on this, because for Christians in particular, it should not be any threat to admit wrong. We have a savior that atoned for it. We have a cross that carries it away. We have a resurrection that brings justification and righteousness. But it requires repentance, right?

And the other thing you get is this refusal to sort of acknowledge any kind of group-level, systematic kind of sin and injustice, right? It's all boiled down to this individualism, this American individualism that goes along with that triumphalism and those stories. And as long as people are resistant to that, it's gonna mean a number of things. It's going to mean that that our progress will be slow. It'll be hard-fought and slow.

But it also means that those Christians are going to be unable to read their Bibles. Significant portions of their Bibles. Particularly the prophets who speak to Israel and speak to power and call them to repent of those same kind of systematic injustices and systematic sins and call them to smash the idols of pride, of national and nationalistic pride that God disdains. And it's the same kind of sin that we see in this country, that triumphalism, that exceptionalism. It's the same kind of sin that the prophets railed against.

But there's a blindness over the eyes of Israel. There's a blindness over the eyes of America when it comes to repenting of that. And so, we need prophets. We need, if we're thinking about this from inside the church, we need prophets who will thunder the "Thus sayeth the Lord" and who will smash these idols and pull down these asherahs.

Source video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y7ox0TiCh34

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