Racial Reconciliation

From "Restoring At-Risk Communities," edited by John Perkins, founder and chairman of Christian Community Development Association:

"It is clear that the message of reconciliation between Jew and Gentile was a central part of the gospel Paul preached. A gospel that could not reconcile humans across the most difficult barrier of the day was no gospel at all. So it is with us. If the gospel is not concerned with reconciling us across the most stubborn ethnic and racial, indeed all man-made, barriers, then it is no gospel at all. Reconciliation is not optional, it is not a specialized calling for a few, it is not a trivial concern, it is central to the heart of the gospel."

How basic this is. And yet what a hard lesson to learn, one that we forget again and again. We cannot be reconciled to God yet remain unreconciled to our brothers and sisters.