The Deeply Formed Life: Five Transformative Values to Root Us in the Way of Jesus

by Rich Villodas

God is not simply in the business of saving souls; he is in the business of creating a new family.

In a Fast Company article, the term filter bubble describes an algorithm on Facebook that created an echo chamber for people to see only the content they would most likely agree with.4 The filter bubble is a good image for what is happening in our time. We surround ourselves with ideas, interests, and political thoughts that reinforce what we already believe. This has led to a brazen demonizing of people who think otherwise.

Reconciliation in community will always cost us something, and in Christ the barriers that separate us can come down in his name.

James Baldwin observed, “Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.”

At the core of racism is the lie that some people are superior or inferior to others.

To do the work of racial reconciliation is to take ownership of the marginalizing ways we see others who are in some form or another different from us.

To do justice means that every person is taken seriously as a human being made in the image of God.

There can be no true reconciliation without justice. For relationships to be fully restored, things have to be made right. Justice is the presence of right verdicts and right relationships, and it’s characterized by undoing power abuses and redressing sins against oppressed people.

For many people, color blindness is seen as a virtue—something to be applauded and celebrated. Some people are still fond of saying, “I don’t see color; I see people.” And although that seems really sweet, color blindness is not the MO of heaven:

Believers often think that if we can only convert more people to Christianity, this will solve the issue of racism. We think that if someone makes a decision for Jesus, this will end his or her racialized perspectives.

People often want to look to the success of individual minorities as proof that racial oppression has been eradicated, but that’s much too simplistic a view. James Baldwin aptly pointed out, “The inequalities suffered by the many are in no way justified by the rise of a few.”

Unless we look back to see how we have been improperly formed, we will continue to live out the same patterns from one generation to the next.

When it comes to conversations on race, our level of offendability often reveals the level of our maturity.

Deeply formed reconciliation can’t happen without the spiritual discipline of lamenting. The act of lament is the spiritually mature response to sadness and sorrow.