SAME COLOUR DIFFERENT SHADES
Genesis 1:27 “so God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him, male and female he created them.”
The Corona virus has almost been pushed to the news sidelines by the brutal acts against a black man, causing his unnecessary death which we were all able to witness on our media screens. We know this is not an odd case, but an endemic problem in American policing. But also there isn’t any doubt that racism through out the world is getting worse rather than better. Evan in the game called beautiful (football) it has been there for us to see black players having to put up with taunts and mockery just because of the colour of their skin. Quoting from an article in the journal of counselling and development researchers argued that the term ‘race’ is basically so meaningless that it should be discarded. More recently those working on mapping the human genome announced that they had put together a draft of the entire sequence of human genome and the researchers had unanimously declared there is only one race The Human Race.
The Bible doesn’t even use the word in reference to people, but it does describe all human beings as being of one blood, Acts 17:26 We are all descendants of the first man Adam, 1 Cor 15:45 we are all created in the image of God Genesis 1:27. That’s why the gospel can and should be preached to all nations Matthew 28:19.
Once a Chinese young woman came to our house, she was representing a charity, I witnessed Christ to her, but her answer was I am Chinese, what you speak is for European people, I assured her that wasn’t true it was for everyone. When we read the scriptures notice we don’t see references to peoples colour black, white whatever, it is rather by tribe or culture, for instance it’s a fact people from Ethiopia are usually dark skinned, but we read in Act’s 20:27 speaking of the ministry of the evangelist Philip it says “so he (Philip) started out and on his way he met an Ethiopian eunuch an important official….etc note nothing about colour of skin. The same when the spirit came at Pentecost and the filled disciples went out onto the streets speaking in various languages by the power of the Holy Spirit, Acts 2:28. Speaks of the different cultures that heard them Parthians, Medes and Elamites; and the other verses speak of other cultures too. The only division we see in scripture is about good and evil or Jew and Gentile. The Jews had the law and the prophets, the Gentiles had neither. In Old Testament times Gentiles are often referred to as the people who are a far off, or as those who didn’t seek God. The coming of Christ changed all that. Isaiah 65:1 “I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me; I was found by those who did not seek me. A nation that did not call on my name, I said, here am I, here am I’ notice too that the name Gentile covered all people except Jewish people, nothing about skin colours here. So before Jesus in Gods eyes there was just Jew or Gentile.
So why are we different skin colours? Well I can’t cover such a subject in just this word but I can say that scientists have discovered that there is one major pigment, called Melanin that produces our skin colour, And there are only two main forms of Melanin; Eumelanin (brown to black) and Phepmelain (red to yellow) these combine to give each one of us the particular shade of skin we have, so as the title say’s same colour different shades! So how can we advance against wicked racist attitudes that prevail in our societies? Well Jesus gives us the simple answer’ love your neighbour as yourself’ Luke 10:27 most people know this parable “who is my neighbour Jesus was asked i.e. other human beings made in Gods image.
I remember a man who came to Christ, he was a drunkard, wife beater and a racist, he later told me that he had recently surprised himself by shaking hands with a Nigerian man in our church and that his attitude had changed towards his dentist who was an Asian. So there is always hope in Christ, two recent scenes during the trouble in America brought me close to tears, the first was a white National Guard officer facing a demonstration on his own whilst his men stood behind a fence. It looked as though he had deliberately placed himself in this position he had taken off his helmet and knelt down on one knee and was humbly asking for calm, next minute he and a demonstrator were having a hug. Later in the week I saw something similar only this time it was an African American police sergeant he too was going on bended knee speaking words of peace. Both scenes showed God at work Mathew 5:99 “blessed are the peace makers for they shall be called sons of God” surely these two men of different colour were such.
I do believe that one of the best things society in the west could do is to ditch the Darwinian Evolution Theory which has been proven to produce prejudice and wrong thinking, even Darwin himself in later life regretted producing it, but our scripture Genesis 1:27 gives us the right message “so God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them”
All men and women should accept Jesus Christ as lord and saviour, the last Adam. And then let God start dealing with any prejudices we may have.
And lastly sometime ago the remains of an ancient man were found in Cheddar near Bristol. Guess what? His DNA showed he wasn’t white, but dark skinned experts reckoned it was because he must have eaten a different diet, food for thought I think for those who hold racist views.
Stay well
Pastor Terry
Scientific Sources
Where did the “races” come from?
Kenham answersingenesis.org