There is a lot of discussion, even controversy, about race in modern society. But what is that really all about?
Well, first let’s look at some of the ways this word is defined. A definition is a necessary starting point because people use the word in different ways. Race is defined in the dictionary as:
Each of the major groupings into which humankind is considered (in various theories or contexts) to be divided on the basis of physical characteristics or shared ancestry.
- The fact or condition of belonging to a racial division or group, or the qualities or characteristics associated with this.
- A group of people sharing the same culture, history, language, etc.; an ethnic group.
- A group or set of people or things with a common feature or features.
- Each of the major divisions of living creatures (ex.: “a member of the human race” – nontechnical usage).
Based on most people’s use of the word, “race” is a sociocultural construct, not a biological classification. But while there are genetic and physiological differences between human populations, these do not align with categories that are able to be objectively codified as race.
The most common way people identify racial categories is by skin pigmentation or various other unalterable physical traits. These physical traits, however, have nothing to do with human identity. When people make classifications based on various immutable characteristics, their stereotypes quickly fall apart. For instance, While American and African black men have similar skin pigmentation, they are going to be very different as individuals. Even among American only populations there is going to be a huge difference culturally between someone raised in a city and one raised in a rural setting, or someone raised in an upper class family as opposed to one raised in a lower class family. The distinctions people typically make are not actually based on skin color, but on things such as culture, ethnicity, and nationality.
In our core, human beings are all a single race – the human race. It is an indisputable fact that within every group of people who share the same skin color, eye shape, body type, or other characteristic, there is actually a massive amount of variation. Within each one there are different economic, social, political, class, educational, and cultural differences. Judging an entire segment of people based on various immutable characteristics is rather common, but it does not reflect a biblical worldview.
There is a popular belief system these days that is based on dividing people according to groups. It is not necessarily by “racial” groups, but there is always some kind of grouping. That would be Marxism, which is based on a naturalistic worldview foundation. While divisions based on Marxist ideology are not always racial, there is a racial component in at least one area of modern American society.
For example, the University of Minnesota’s Culture and Family Lab website warns readers of a “whiteness pandemic,” and provides resources on how to “halt and reverse” the issue. On the site, parents are urged to “reeducate themselves in order to create a more fair society. (You can read about this at https://www.foxnews.com/politics/university-minnesota-site-warns-whiteness-pandemic-urges-white-parents-re-educate.)
Based on its underlying Marxist philosophy, oppression takes a lot of different forms, but there is always some arbitrarily selected group that is considered the oppressed (the good guys) and the oppressor (the bad guys). The object is, then, for the oppressed to rise up against the oppressors in order to overtake them. At the University of Minnesota Culture and Family Lab, the oppressors are, obviously, white people.
The Bible, though, doesn’t look at people that way. Based on biblical teachings, there are still two groups, but they are divided differently. One group consists of those who know God, and the other of those who don’t know Him. These two, though, are not in opposition to one another, as in Marxism. Biblical teaching doesn’t have anything to do with how people relate to one another, but how they relate to God. So how does God evaluate these two groups?
Well, He looks at them in two different ways. First, He sees all people as those He loves. He wants everyone to love Him back and enter into a personal relationship with Him. Second, He sees people who are separated from His love because of the sin in their lives.
Fortunately for us, He has provided a way to take care of the sin problem so that it can be put aside and we can enter into His embrace. Sadly, though, many people refuse to do it. Entering into a relationship with Him requires that individuals turn away from their sin by deliberately deciding to turn their lives over to Him by faith in Jesus Christ. It is the same for everyone, regardless of race, because, based on biblical teaching, immutable human characteristics have nothing to do with it.