Be Awake, Not Woke

How should Christians navigate the race discussions occurring in the West? We should be awake to the wickedness of racial injustices but not woke in the sense we should apologize for our whiteness.

As CBC, we believe that man is corrupt in his nature and consequently a child of wrath (Eph 2:1–3). Mankind evidences this sin in different ways. One way is through racism—treating others in an ungodly way because of their race. Paul talks at length regarding racial divisions in the early church (Eph 2:11–22). Paul calls us to unite in the gospel. The church must be unified (John 17:21). Racial divisions harm our witness and destroys our unity. We must be awake to these realities.

This awareness of the perennial problem of racism does not mean, though, that we should adopt a notion of “social justice” that remains so popular today. Much of the social justice theory is Marx’s communism repackaged under the umbrella of tolerance. Communism is evil and anti-God. Wokeism is “compassionate” communism. It masquerades as a “loving” answer to the evils of mankind, but it is no such thing. Wokeism—the belief that evil is a uniquely white-skinned phenomenon—will never bring healing, only further division.

Woke is bad because its repackaged communism. Avoid it. Be awakened to the reality of sin in all of our hearts. We must show genuine compassion to all. Pray that the Lord would save people from all tribes, nations, peoples, and tongues (Rev 7:9), but don’t allow the pursuit of compassion to lead you into anti-biblical notions of thinking like wokeness (Rom 12:2).

Pastor Chance