The Catch Ministry’s Associate Pastor, Wayne Bridegroom, is leading with his experiences working with Laotian, Hmong, Cambodian, and Hispanic, peoples starting and pastoring churches among each of these nationalities as well as working with the African American churches in Modesto, California. Wayne was awarded the Martin Luther King Legacy Award for his contribution to the African American community in Modesto — the first time the award was given to a white person.

We welcome Wayne’s thoughts on Nehemiah while John & Marti are attending a 4-day conference on personal growth. Our MemberPartner campaign resumes on Monday.

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From the days of Joshua son of Nun until that day, the Israelites had not celebrated it [the Feast of Booths] like this. And their joy was very great … They stood in their places and confessed their sins and the sins of their ancestors. (Nehemiah 8:17; 9:2)

Sin is infectious. When indulged in over and over, it leads to further and further self-aggrandizement, ultimately plaguing one’s life, let alone the lives of those around that person. When indulged in by a large part of the population, any sin can become systemic. That is, it becomes normalized to the point where society takes it for granted. It literally becomes like the air we breathe. We don’t even think about it. It is simply “the way things are.”

Let me provide an example. Here in the US, racism is systemic — “the way things are.” I know of only one professing Christian, the deceased father of a neighbor, who was overtly racist. He was in church every Sunday and then 6 days of the week was a faithful member of the KKK. I have no contemporary Christian friends who would do anything deliberately racist. Every human being has biases. That is an individual issue, not a systemic matter.

However, when a practice gains enough steam so that it becomes the law of the land, a system is in place. Just prior to Bacon’s Rebellion in the 1670’s and cemented into full blown code after that rebellion, we have developed an “air we breathe” system of behavior that favors white people and demeans people of color. American slavery and the genocide of our indigenous people groups was systemic evil.

Here is a familial example of white privilege. In 1953 my dad went to the Bank of America and borrowed $10,000 to buy his first herd of dairy cattle. He did that, literally, on a hand shake. But a person of color could never have gone into that bank and received that same loan.

Why do white women clutch their purses when a black teen or man walks by? Why do white folk lock their car doors in a similar situation? Racist fears are built into the very warp and woof of our society.

How many decades did it take for non-northern-European “white” folk (the Irish, Italians, Poles, etc) to be accepted as truly white?

I think the people of God in Nehemiah’s day would look at many American Christians of today and legitimately ask, “What in the world is wrong with you brothers and sisters? Why can’t you acknowledge the sins of your ancestors? Don’t you realize that those sins will continue to be perpetuated in more and more subtle forms until you get honest with yourselves?” Individuals and/or societies can only begin the healing process when sin is confessed.