Is Awana Going Woke?

Is Awana going woke?  Something to keep an eye on.  For its second annual Awana Child Discipleship Forum in Nashville it invited woke preacher Derwin Gray to speak.  You can read about his sermon here.  

Pastor Gray does what all woke preachers do, which is to condemn colorblindness, and to say that churches that aren't multi-ethnic are racist.  Please beware of this false teaching.  

Colorblindness is a value advanced by the likes of Martin Luther King Jr.  The definition is to treat people according to the content of their character rather than the color of their skin.  A violation of colorblindness would be things like race-based preferences in hiring, college admissions, and government assistance (i.e. affirmative action).  Another violation of colorblindness is for a church to make it their goal to be multi-ethnic, a goal pushed by Pastor Gray.  To do so is to focus on race, which is racist.  While a church should treat people of all races equally, it should not go out of its way to reach more white people, or more black people.  That is by definition racist.  It should simply focus on trying to reach the people in its community for Christ and let God decide what the church looks like racially.

The flaw in Pastor Gray's philosophy is the belief that if a church is truly non-racist, then its racial make-up will resemble the surrounding community.  This is exactly what leftist politicians have been pushing on businesses for decades -- if your business is not racist, then its employees should look like the community.  Therefore you must prove you are not racist by making sure that you hire based on race, sex, sexual orientation, etc.  But there are many factors that play in to the racial make-up of a church, including preaching style, music style, dress code, décor, length of service, etc.  All of these things will attract a certain crowd.  As well, people naturally tend to associate with those who are like them (birds of a feather...).  In America, while there are exceptions, there are many cultural differences between white and black people.  These include things like fashion, hobbies, speech/dialect, humor, entertainment, music, etc.  Just as we don't accuse teenagers of being age-ist for preferring the company of kids their own age over senior citizens, we shouldn't accuse people of being racist for preferring the company of people with whom they share an affinity.  Churches should not exclude people on the basis of race, but we should not fault people for choosing a church because the people there are a lot like them.  Essentially Pastor Gray is accusing churches that are not multi-ethnic of being racist.  In reality that accusation is both racist and divisive.

Just because Awana platformed a woke preacher doesn't mean they are going woke, but it is cause for further investigation.