Fajitas or Fellowship

I was on the phone with a friend from seminary the other day, and we were discussing how to create a diverse church. Though HBC Austin seeks to be diverse in every way, I was specifically talking with my friend about ethnic diversity, since he is from Mexico City and has experienced what it feels like to be an "outsider" in the U.S.

During the conversation, he said something to me that has been ringing in my ear ever since. He said, "Bryan, we have to stop merely loving each other's food and start loving each other." At first it made me laugh, until I understood how right he was. There are many people who claim to have been transformed by the gospel of Jesus Christ but do not have any desire to minister with or to someone unlike themselves. We will happily drive to the local restaurant to enjoy some sizzling fajitas after church, but the idea of signs at the church in English and Spanish is WAY TOO MUCH TO ASK!

Sadly, all around us there are people claiming to be followers of Christ and yet harboring supremacist ideals. Sure, they are not members of the KKK or any such group. But don't ask them to sacrifice their way of "worshiping" on Sunday in order to accommodate another ethnicity. Maybe it's all just in the in the name of comfort and there is no issue of prejudice; regardless, the result is the same--homogeneous "churches." I'm not pointing a finger at any particular church or ethnicity. I believe it's a problem across the board. For me, growing up, it was no different. Our family attended, for the most part, churches that would fall under this title "The Church of Middle-class White Republicans."

Let's be clear. The gospel has NO room for this kind of "comfort" or segregated thinking!  Paul tells the Galatians, "For as many of you as were baptized  into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus" (Gal. 3:27-28). Praise God that Jesus didn't think the way many Christians do today. If Jesus had decided to stay comfortable, there would be no redemption because He would have never left the glory of Heaven (Phil. 2:5-8). If Jesus decided to segregate, those of us that are Gentiles would be left out (Acts 11:17-18). Either way we would be without hope.

What Jesus did is remarkable.  Peter says, "But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God's people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy" (1 Peter 2:9-10). His sacrifice made a new chosen "genos" (family, race, kind) and holy "ethnos" (nation or people) of all who believe in Him. Hallelujah!! What a Savior!

All who have been transformed through Jesus Christ are now a new family. We are a holy (set apart) people. And I, for one, want to have a church that celebrates this reality--we are ONE in Christ! When our earthly ethnicities get in the way of us worshiping and living life together, we have forgotten who we are. I am not a White American with Indian and Scotch Irish blood. I am a citizen of a Kingdom that was purchased by blood.

That is why HBC Austin aims to start a church that looks like eternity. A place where every tongue, tribe, and nation can "cry out with a loud voice, 'Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!" (Rev. 7:9-10). This goal is not without its complications. But we believe its worth it. And if you think it's worth it, we'd love to have you join us.

So what about you? Do you love your brother or just his food? Will it be fajitas or fellowship? I know my answer, "I want BOTH!"