Change Starts With Me—Part One
Write it out, write it out, write it out...that’s the phrase that’s been whirling around my head over and over again the past few weeks. And for the first time, in a long time—I don’t feel that I have the adequate words or understanding to bring expression to the heartache that is under a magnifying glass in the world right now. But I have to write it out. I need to write, it helps me distil my thoughts and the one thing I do know: Black Lives Matter.
I grew up in suburbia, in southeast England, in a town of around 30,000 people. We were a predominantly white town. As a child, the first black person I remember meeting was Michael. We were both seven. He and his sister, whose name escapes me, were being fostered by one of my mum’s best friends. There are two things I remember about Michael first, his exuberantly joyful demeanour and secondly—the surname of his foster parents was Jackson. So, in my seven-year-old mind, I was friends with Michael Jackson.
In my teenage years, I was a consumer of black culture. I loved the music—gospel, soul, R‘n’B and a little hip-hop. One of my all-time favourite albums is Lauryn Hill’s ‘The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill’. It’s gritty, gutsy, soulful and timeless. I still listen to it. I still feel every word. And though I appreciate the music, I can’t appreciate the pain that the music comes from.
It’s a disturbing dichotomy—to me gospel music is one of the most joyful, the most glorious and most free music genres on the planet. And it wasn’t until late into my twenties that I learnt that the reason gospel music sounds so free, was because the church was one of the few places that black people felt safe to be themselves. My first response, oh that makes sense and then a beat later I was devastated. You see I had reveled in the joy, unconscious of the pain. Amanda Seales speaks to this, she said, ‘You cannot enjoy the rhythm and ignore the blues.’
On 25th May, 2020 a man, a human black man, died by asphyxiation because another man, a human white man, felt he was well within his rights to kneel on his neck. For over eight minutes George Floyd was knelt on. It left him unconscious and eventually he died from lack of oxygen to his brain. It takes a conscious decision to use your body with force. I’m aware it’s not an isolated incident. I’m aware that there are good law enforcers. I’m aware that this is messy. And I’m asking myself and God why this, why now, what should I be thinking, saying, feeling and doing about injustice. All kinds of injustice.
Over the last few weeks I’ve been listening to a song on repeat be Elevation Music. It’s a song of surrender to Jesus and there’s one line that’s repeated over and over and it’s shaking me to my very core...
‘You can have my heart; you can have my heart.’
It reminds me of Psalm 51:10 “Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.” And truth be told, I really struggle with that scripture. Not because it’s bad, but because purification is painful. I looked up what it means to have a ‘steadfast spirit’ and came across this description which deeply resonated with me.
“The steadfast spirit appears confident but not arrogant. It means to always be appreciative of others and always make people feel important. A person with steadfast spirit is upfront about what they do not know but never waivers in asserting their ability to quickly learn new things and grow.”
I do and I say things that I regret, that I don’t like. They are things that I’m conscious of. But you know what scares me more? The things I do and say because of my unconscious or implicit bias.
To consciously surrender to Jesus, means to surrender all that is unconscious within us.
For me to truly surrender my heart to the work of Jesus is to allow him to address my unconscious bias. If I want to have a steadfast spirit, it’s going to require the gentle work of the Wonderful Counsellor, the Holy Spirit, to purify me. And he does not just purify my heart—he helps me to renew my thoughts so that I don’t conform to wrongful patterns of thinking.
It’s a deeply personal journey. That said...
‘Knowledge is only rumor until it lives in the bones.’ – Asaro Tribe
If Black Lives Matter to me, then I need to go through a process of personal education—by seeking out knowledge and listening to stories. If Black Lives Matter to me, then I need to go through a process of purification. Why? Because change starts at home. Change starts in my heart and in my mind. Change starts with me.
