I’m excited to share a guest post from my beautiful friend, Tenell Felder. Tenell is a spirit-filled, Christ-centered woman of faith who compels the heart to draw nearer to Jesus. Tenell currently works at the University of South Carolina and some of her hobbies include cooking, reading and going on walks. Her love for the Lord permeates the hope she brings to a world shaken by our current injustice. I know you will be blessed and inspired by her words! Thank you, Tenell, for sharing with us.

Tenell Felder:

I love America, and her life is hanging in the balance. Unseen forces are desperate to tear her apart and the horrendous murder of George Floyd is being used to fulfill that agenda.

Five years ago, Dylan Roof said he wanted to start a race war after killing nine black church members.

It appears his dark desire is coming to fruition.

Mr. Floyd’s murder has ignited a global fury, a righteous anger imprinted on our hearts from a holy God – Thou Shalt Not Kill.

Mr. Floyd’s murder was the match to a history soaked in sin, violations against the moral standards of God. It is a history that our nation has not yet healed from after 200 years. How we suffer now from the sins of our predecessors! How we suffer now from ignoring God’s statutes!

Do not let our culture fool you. Social justice was not culture’s idea.

Justice originates from the very heart of God.

He is the defender of the oppressed!

He is the lifter of the lowly!

He is the one who sustains the meek and makes a way for the downtrodden!

He is the one who has stepped into this cursed, broken and evil world to provide a way back in relationship with Him until He makes all things right!

I caution believers from jumping on our culture’s current social justice bandwagon and being swept away by the mighty current of conformity.

It will demand your allegiance.

It will demand that you elevate its mandates and desires above your Savior’s.

It will leave you exhausted, bitter, hopeless, angry and if you are black suspicious of anyone who does not look like you – if you are white, laden with a burden that Jesus himself lifted from your shoulders when he bled and died.

It will be a gradual then swift descent.

One moment, the church is acknowledging our Savior’s call to help the oppressed and the needy and the next we are stumbling down a mountain of political correctness, apologizing for whiteness, demanding vengeance and grasping at the coat tails of an enraged culture.

Despite society’s current narrative there is a fate worse than suffering the indignity of racial injustice, and that is an eternity separated from Jesus Christ.

As angry as we are, the fury and indignation we felt watching Mr. Floyd having his life’s breath being squeezed from him, this is what God feels towards all sin.

Can we even fathom being the object of such holy fury?

The anger, the outrage, the grief … all emotional imprints from a Holy God.

And just as George Floyd’s spilled blood cries out to God demanding judgement …

My sins against others and God cries out for judgment.

But Jesus.

Imagine with me the officer who killed George Floyd is bought into court. He has been convicted and is awaiting his verdict. But before it is read, the judge informs the courtroom that a Supreme Court Justice has asked to serve the life sentence in the officer’s place.

“Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” Romans 5:7-8

Do not for one moment let the Gospel, Jesus taking on the penalty of the sins of mankind to reconcile us to God, be overshadowed for the sake of being politically correct or for social justice.

Our first message must be to point the world to a greater hope than this broken place we live.

That hope is in Jesus Christ alone.