I Am "Other"

Lemuel was having his windshield repaired the other day. He struck up a conversation with a man a couple of seats over from him in the glass-repair shop. As is often the case, a television was on in the waiting room with bad news upon bad news – man’s inhumanity to man (a good argument for God – where do we get the idea of inhumanity from?).

Lemuel and Ed quickly realized that they are both followers of Jesus. Ed, whose skin color is black, said, “I told my adult daughter that when I have to fill out a form that wants to know what race I am that I check the box that says ‘other’. When she wanted to know why, I told her that I am ‘other’ – I am not white, or black, or any other skin color, I am ‘other’ because Jesus changed my heart. We Christians need to see that we are ‘other’ and live as if we are ‘other’ because we are ‘other’”.

The world doesn’t want us to be “other”, it wants us to deny who we are in Christ. We’ll probably continue to have divisions in the church, both racial and socioeconomic, until we follow Ed’s example, who in turn is following Christ.