My mother, who was raised Seventh-Day Adventist, pretty much left the church shortly after my birth. My parents remained Adventists long enough to dedicate me in the Rockford Seventh-Day Adventist Church.

When I was just a tad over six years old, however, my mother, through the awakening of the Spirit of God, made an attempt to take my sister Paris and me to church one Sabbath. After the taxi dropped us off, we made our way towards the entrance of a large church building, wearing the best clothes we ever had in our North Chicago life. A jubilant woman was greeting people at the door with a warm smile. But in the middle of what seemed to be an eternal walkway, my mother looked over her shoulder and then abruptly stopped us.

She had noticed that there was another Seventh-day Adventist church nearby. She wondered for a moment why there was another church so close to the one we were at—it was virtually across the street. As she glared a bit longer over her shoulder, she noticed that all the people entering the church across the street were black. Then the color of the woman whom we had seen greeting people at the door became much more noticeable. She was white.

My mother, in a tone all too common in a Caribbean household, exclaimed, “I can’t believe they have a white church and a black church right across the street from each other!” She immediately turned us around, called a cab, and took us home. She simply told us that she did not want to attend, nor wanted her children to attend, a church divided by color.

Since that day my mother has not only failed to make any attempt in returning to the Church, but has been quite adamant in denouncing the faith. Since April 6^th, 2002, when Christ found me and placed me in His remnant church, I can only wonder, “What might have been my youth had our church not been divided?” “What pain might my mother avoided by following Christ?” “Could my parents’ marriage have worked out had they been in Christ?” The list could go on, but the point is clear.

I do not suppose that my mother is or was justified in leaving Christ’s church. I am a firm believer that the door to Hell is locked on the inside. People voluntarily choose to neglect so great a salvation. Yet and still, it cannot be denied that such divisions in the church, such as the one my mother witnessed, function as a stumbling block to many, as high walls. In today’s “age of Obama,” we must commend the United States for its willingness to rise above the color line, to elect a president based on his merits, character, and competence rather than color  What about the church?

The power of unity shows itself in no uncertain ways throughout scripture.  In Genesis 11, we find a global unity unparalleled in the history of the world, even up to our day.  We are told in verse 1 that “the whole earth had one language and one speech” (NKJV). Can you imagine? A global language?

According the next verse, the whole world, speaking one language, gathered at a plain in the land of Shinar. For what purpose?  Verses 3 and 4 tell us that the people united on this plain to “build a city and a tower whose top is in the heavens; let us make a name for ourselves lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth.”  The ultimate aim of their gathering was to protect themselves from being scattered abroad.  Their desire was to preserve union, not unity.  They wanted to secure their own safety, and this security came through the united efforts of the globe.

When God comes down to see the city and the tower, He makes a remarkable declaration in verse 6, “Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do; now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them…”  Powerful.  The God of the universe reveals the key that unlocks limitless possibilities for humanity without God—to be one.  In Divine eyes, unity in purpose, place, and language is a recipe for the fulfillment of human propositions and dreams.

The King James version renders the phrase imagined to do.  The Hebrew word for it is zamam.  It means to purpose, to devise, to plan, or to plot.  This word is used in the Old Testament thirteen times, of which almost half of its occurrences refer to the Lord.  God considers this unity so powerful that all three persons of the Godhead are referred to as coming down to stop efforts towards creating a unified world.  The Bible says in verse 7, “Let Us go down and there confuse their language that they may not understand one another’s speech” (emphasis mine).

The very fact that the Godhead stepped earthward to confound the Babel builders’ language to prevent them from achieving their dream suggests something about His perspective on unity.  God does not always desire unity.  In fact, there are certain instances of unity that God sees as harmful, disobedient, and perhaps dangerous.

We find this trend in the Creation story, where God divides the light from the darkness.  The Apostle Paul, drawing upon the Genesis record, counsels Corinthian believers, “What communion has light with darkness?”  Even Jesus stated in the gospels that He came not to bring peace but a sword, suggesting division.  God has deemed that certain people, ideas, and words should be united while others should not.  Babel fits the profile of the latter.

The question that lingers is, “What if this unity was for God’s purpose?”  We received a foretaste of the possibilities of such a unity in a similar account, Pentecost, in Acts 2.  The Bible tells us that on the day Pentecost, the twelve apostles were “with one accord in one place.” The word accord here in the Greek is homothymadon (pronounced ho-mo-thu-ma-don) and is suggested by Thayer’s Lexicon to refer to one mind or one passion.[1] Is this not tantamount to the type of unity on the plains of Shinar?

The Holy Spirit descends upon the Apostles and gives them the ability to speak with diverse languages to the gathered throng in Jerusalem.  This is amazing.  In Genesis, the whole world was gathered to reach up into heaven; in Acts, just twelve were gathered to reach the world.  In Genesis, God came down to miraculously confound the language of the earth; in Acts, God came down to miraculously overcome the challenge posed by the diversity of languages created at Babel.  The Babel builders wanted to make a name for themselves; the Apostles wanted lift up the name of Jesus.  In Genesis, the people were united against the purpose of God; in Acts, they were united in harmony with the purpose of God.   This unity in Acts was comprised of few.  But their impact was immense. In Acts 17:6, the apostles are described as those who have turned the world upside down.

Results?  Although the purposes of these two powerful instances of unity widely differ, we find an unfortunate commonality.  The tower and city were never finished; neither has the gospel been taken to the world.  Babel’s tower was never finished because it was never God’s will for it to be built.  The gospel has never been finished because, perhaps, we lost our oneness.

The American young adults of our generation imagined to have a minority president, an achievement that is the political Jericho of our day, and through a unity of effort achieved that which they imagined to do. Have we not imagined taking this gospel of the kingdom to all the world in this generation?  Have we not imagined seeing our Lord come in our lifetime?  Have we not imagined being that generation that accomplishes what every other generation had to accept by faith?  Then whence the power?  The power of one, the power of unity.

In Jesus’ last recorded prayer with His disciples, He prayed, “I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word; that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me.”(John 17:20-21) Jesus saw in the unity of His disciples and those who would through the disciples believe an almost unconquerable argument for the truth, that He was sent by God. The walls of color and race must come down.  If we are committed to convincing the world of Christ’s Messiahship, then let the walls of this Jericho crumble at the blow of unity’s trumpet.

Sebastien Braxton serves as the director of STRIDE (Student Training and Resource Institute for Discipleship and Evangelism), a missionary training program for public university students based in Boston.

Once was told a story of a man who built a house, dug deep, and laid the foundation on a rock. When the flood arose and the stream beat vehemently upon the house, it did not shake, because it was founded upon a rock. Another man, however, laid the foundation of his house on the ground, so when the flood came upon the house, it fell and its destruction was great (Luke 6:48-49, paraphrased).

The Bible tells us that God’s household is “built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone” (Eph 2:20, KJV). Jesus Christ is the name after which the whole family in heaven and earth is named (Eph 3:14-15), a family consisting of those who are saved and faithful to Him.

The membership to this family of Christ is secured by one thing only: faith in Jesus Christ (Gal 3:26). Those who were once a stranger to this family are now “made nigh by the blood of Christ” (Eph 2:13). However, the Bible tells a story of a group of people who clung on to another source of spiritual security, who thought to themselves, “[w]e have Abraham to our father” (Matt 3:9) and thus had no need of repentance (Matt 3:7-9; John 8:31-59).

In the early church, the Jews found security in their racial identity. Indeed, the Jews were God’s chosen people unto whom “were committed the oracles of God” (Rom 3:3), but they were chosen to be a blessing and a light to all nations, not to consider themselves superior to others. By their witness, the world would marvel and say, “[s]urely this great nation is a wise and understanding people. For what nation is there so great, who hath God so nigh unto them … And what nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law?” (Deut 4:6-8).

God set them apart to be a holy nation, not because of their might or their righteousness, but because He loved them and He was faithful to the oath He made to their fathers (Deut 7:6-8). By the time of Jesus, however, their perceived identity was no longer the one that God had intended, but was based on the mere fact that they were Abraham’s biological descendants. They believed that their genealogy gave them a righteous standing before God automatically to the point that they rejected and threatened Jesus for rebuking their sins (John 8:31-59).

The testimony of Scripture regarding the condition of humanity is that “[t]here is none that doeth good” (Psalm 14:3; 53:3; Rom 3:12), “[t]here is none righteous, no, not one” (Rom 3:10). But just as all men are under the curse of sin, salvation comes to all by Jesus Christ in spite of the human condition: “For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God” (Eph 2:8). The cross of Jesus Christ is the only thing that justifies a person in the sight of God, and is the only subject about which a child of God can and should boast (Gal 6:14).

When race became a source of confidence to the Jews, they relied on their own nature and racial traditions, which were insufficient to save them from sin, rather than relying on Jesus. But no one is saved by race. Once a man is born again (John 3), his identity is no longer based on his earthly family; he bears the name of God and is now therefore “no more [stranger] and [foreigner], but fellow [citizen] with the saints, and of the household of God” (Eph 2:19).

In this family, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for [we] are all one in Christ Jesus” (Gal 3:28) because Christ “is our peace, who hath … broken down the middle wall of partition between us” (Eph 2:14). In talking about men of different races and their standing with God, Ellen White writes,

The black man’s name is written in the book of life beside the white man’s. All are one in Christ. Birth, station, nationality, or color cannot elevate or degrade men. The character makes the man. If a red man, a Chinaman, or an African gives his heart to God in obedience and faith, Jesus loves him none the less for his color. He calls him His well-beloved brother. (The Southern Work 8 )[1]

When they learned that the Gospel needed to go to the Gentiles, the Jews were astonished that God could and would also speak to the Gentiles (Acts 10-11). The Jews thought it implausible that God would work in the hearts of “unclean” people. God had to give a special vision to Peter to help him understand that “God is no respecter of persons” (Acts 10:34) and that he “should not call any man common or unclean” (Acts 10:28).

The Jews thought that the Gentiles did not have access to God because they were not Jewish. They did not understand that Christ, as the only Mediator between God and men, mediates for all men. Ephesians 2:18 says, “For through him we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father.” “Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me” (John 14:6). “I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture” (John 10:9, emphasis added). A man’s access to God is only made possible by Jesus, not by the ‘superiority’ of his race or station. A passage from Christ’s Object Lessons says,

No distinction on account of nationality, race, or caste, is recognized by God. He is the Maker of all mankind. All men are of one family by creation, and all are one through redemption. Christ came to demolish every wall of partition, to throw open every compartment of the temple, that every soul may have free access to God. His love is so broad, so deep, so full, that it penetrates everywhere. It lifts out of Satan’s circle the poor souls who have been deluded by his deceptions. It places them within reach of the throne of God, the throne encircled by the rainbow of promise. (COL 386)

In essence, racial identity became an idol for the Jews and a gift about which they sinfully boasted. The question for Christians today is, Do we put race above the Gospel of Christ? Do we boast about our race more than we boast about Christ? Are we laying the foundation of the household of God on the shifting sand of race or on the solid rock of Christ in the way we mingle, associate, and organize ourselves? When we cling onto our race, nationality, color, or any marker of identity more tightly than the identity we gain by faith in Jesus, we deny Christ and His power to unite and to save us to the uttermost.

The root of racial segregation in our churches lies in the prideful, idolatrous human heart. We all have partaken of this sinful attitude and practice. Indeed there are measures that need to be taken administratively and structurally, but there are individual decisions to be made as well. This individual work starts with confession and conversion in the presence of God, giving an honest answer to the question, “Do I live by race, or do I truly live by faith in Jesus?”

Josephine Elia is a graduate student at Princeton University.  She currently resides in New Jersey and is involved with the campus ministry network in the Mid-Atlantic region.

Where are you from? Until recently, I never had trouble answering that question: I’m a Zambian national who grew up in Swaziland and has some Zimbabwean heritage. In my eyes, I was always Zambian, never Swazi or Zimbabwean. It was not until I traveled to Zambia for mission work last summer that I was forced to question my “Zambianness.”

At my first Sabbath School at a church in Zambia, I found myself in a class with a teacher who took special care to warmly greet all the visitors. She initially didn’t recognize me as a visitor. Perhaps I blended in, who knows? At a point in the study, I volunteered to read the Bible passage under consideration. As soon as I opened my mouth, she stopped me. “Wait, so you’re from America too? I just heard your accent. You came with the other missionaries! Welcome, it’s so good to have you!”

I sat in stunned silence for a few minutes. Had she actually just recognized me as American? The thought that came to my mind was, “I am not American! I know I may sound weird and I’m a stranger to some Zambian cultural norms, but I am Zambian! Am I?” I was livid, not at the Sabbath School teacher, but rather at the deep-seated struggle the situation had induced. I certainly did not want to be anything other than Zambian. If I couldn’t be affirmed in my Zambian origin, I couldn’t be sure of who I was.

The struggle I experienced that day in Sabbath School is what I would term an identity crisis. Not knowing where you are from is unsettling because it makes you question who you are. Origin defines identity. I submit that as young Seventh-day Adventist Christians, we face a similar, yet uglier, spiritual identity crisis. When we lose sight of where we truly belong, we forget who we are as sons and daughters of God.

The results of such a crisis are catastrophic. If you don’t know who you are, you don’t know how to live. Identity often times defines behavior. There are certain things I do because I am Zambian, and other things I would do if I were Swazi. There is a Swazi way of doing things that may differ from a Zambian way. Having grown up in both cultures, there are times when I catch myself thinking, “Am I doing this the Swazi way or the Zambian way?” My national and cultural identity shapes my thoughts and behavior.

The same is true for us as Christians. Our spiritual identity should precede and define our behavior and thoughts. If the reality that our “citizenship is in heaven”—our God-given identity—is not woven into our very beings, we cannot know how to live while on this earth.

It is therefore imperative that we be intentionally and boldly aware of our absolute identity, one that supersedes all other identities. We cannot forget that we are a “holy nation, a peculiar people.” (1 Peter 2:9, KJV). To be peculiar is to be odd, atypical, or unusual—which we should be if we live like true citizens of heaven while on earth. There is no middle ground. We are either completely peculiar before the world or we are not; we are either wholly God’s or we are not. Our identity is absolute.

Like the faithful Abraham, we must be grounded in our heavenly citizenship. At seventy-five years of age, he received a startling command from heaven: “Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house…” (Genesis 12:1). This was not just a simple command to get out; it was a command to get out from his country, a command to leave his family and his father’s house. Abraham was, in essence, commanded to leave behind the country and culture that had defined his life up to that point at which God spoke to him.

Yet, he obeyed. The Bible records in Genesis 12:4 that Abraham “departed, as the Lord had spoken unto him.” Notice however, that Abraham had no idea where he was going. God had not told him how or where. God only said, “Go.” And so Abraham went out “not knowing wither he went.” (Hebrews 11:8)

How could Abraham venture out on a trip without knowing his destination? Or is it possible that he actually did know his destination? Hebrews 11:10 tells us that he “looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.” The word translated into the English “looked” is the Greek word ekdechomai. It means to await, to tarry for, or to expect. As Abraham was sojourning in strange, earthly countries, he looked forward to a city built by God. Heaven was his destination. He was living in view of eternity, literally, because he understood where his true citizenship lay.

In a similar manner, the other heroes of faith mentioned in Hebrews 11 “declar[ed] plainly” that they sought a country. “And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned. But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.” (Hebrews 11:15-16). These valiant men and women of faith were mindful of heaven; it was a tangible reality for them.

Even though they did not literally see heaven in their lifetimes, they saw heaven by faith. They were “persuaded of [the promises of God], and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.” (Hebrews 11:13) They acknowledged that they were only on this earth temporarily as “strangers and pilgrims.” They were a “peculiar people.” It was for this reason that they were called those of “whom the world was not worthy.” (Hebrews 11:38). The world could never be worthy of them because they were not of the world. Worldly things did not matter to them. Their heavenly citizenship shaped who they were and defined how they lived.

As a result of living as citizens of the other world, such men and women of faith were able to influence this world. By faith, they “subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.” (Hebrews 11:33-34)

It would seem then that living in the light of eternity is a necessity for those who seek to impact this present world. C.S. Lewis writes:

If you read history, you will find that the Christians who did the most for the present world were just those who thought the most of the next. The Apostles themselves, who set on foot the conversion of the Roman Empire, the great men who built up the Middle Ages, the English Evangelicals who abolished the Slave Trade, all left their mark on Earth, precisely because their minds were occupied with Heaven. It is since Christians have largely ceased to think of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at Heaven and you will get earth ‘thrown in’: aim at earth and you will get neither.[1]

Just by living as citizens of heaven, by embracing such an identity, we allow ourselves to be effective Christians.

The momentous times in which we live indeed call for effective Christians, Christians who know where they are from. In my final analysis, I am neither Zambian nor Swazi. Nor am I American. I am a citizen of heaven. It is the only identity that counts, the only identity that should possess and drive me.

We must acknowledge our ultimate home. We must be fearless enough to rise above the limitations of our individual cultures and partake in the culture of heaven. There is a world to change, and it will be changed only by those whose identity is bound up in heaven, those whose thoughts are consumed by the glories of the other world, those who have it wrought into their very being that they are citizens of another world.

Nomthandazo Malambo is a recent graduate from Harvard University. While an undergraduate, she pioneered the student ministry on her campus and in the Boston area at large. She serves as the Vice President of Evangelism for ALIVE (Africans Living In View of Eternity).

Racial Segregation References

This list of references is published for the purpose of aiding further research into the subject of racial segregation in the Adventist church. These sources convey a fuller scope of the issue and its historical background.

Publications

General Conference Archives
Telling the Story: An Anthology on the Development of the Black SDA Work
Regional Conference Origins Part I, II & III

Ellen G. White, The Southern Work (1996)
A compilation of articles written by Ellen G. White at the end of the nineteenth century, admonishing the Adventist church to exert effort to reach people in the American south.
Ellen G. White Writings > Search > Go To: Book & Page > Southern Work, The (drop-down menu)

Samuel Koranteng-Pipim
Racism and the Church: The History, Scope, and Nature of the Problem
Racism As a Religion: The Heresy Christians Tolerate
Why Is Racism Wrong?: The Need to Dismantle Structures of Racism in the Church
The Church and Race Relations: Common Myths Defending Separate Black & White Conferences in North America—Part I, Part II
Separate Black and White Conferences: The Sin We Don’t Want To Overcome—Part I, Part II
Is There A Better Way?: Moving Beyond Racism in the Church
“No Hutu, No Tutsi!”: The Testimony of African Believers Who Transcended the Barriers of Racism
Essays on racism in the church.

Audio Recordings

David Williams, The Racial Divides (GYC 2009)

Hidden Bias: Why Do So Many Well-Meaning Christians Discriminate Against Others Everyday?
Part 1, Part 2
Presentations on individual stereotypes and biases.

Laodecia 101: Race, Separate Conferences, and the Gospel
Part 3, Part 4
Presentations on the history of Adventism in dealing with the question of race and how we can move forward.

Divided We Fall: Why We Have Failed To Move the World
Part 5, Part 6
A study on John 17 and the Spirit of Prophecy focused on unity and its centrality in the mission of the Seventh-day Adventist Church.

Mindi Rahn, World’s Problems and God’s People (SEYC 2009)
Ethnicity and Nationalism
What roles do ethnicity and nationalism have in Christianity?

Dwight Nelson, An Appeal to the Youth (Pioneer Memorial Church 2010)
The Truth in Black and White
The role of young people in making necessary changes in the Adventist church.

Eric Walsh
Who Stopped the Movement?
A Bible study on Numbers 12.

A man hath joy by the answer of his mouth: and a word spoken in due season, how good is it! (Proverbs 15:23)

The Lord GOD hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary: he wakeneth morning by morning, he wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned.  (Isaiah 50:3)

On a Friday early this April, Christian apologist and writer Dr. Ravi Zacharias visited Boston College Law School in Newton, Massachusetts to give a lecture titled “Justice and Ethics from a Christian Worldview.” I’ve enjoyed reading and listening to Dr. Zacharias for several years now, having been first introduced to his work while doing ministry overseas. Since I am a bit polemic in my disposition, the dismantling of irrational and sometimes absurd atheistic positions, particularly those purporting to debunk Christianity, appeals to me.

Interestingly, I found Dr. Zacharias to be quite winsome when I introduced myself. He had a ready smile and pleasant manner. Like many Christians whom I have come to admire, he appears to possess that, as one preacher put it, “startling coalescence of contraries,” embodied in Christ, who both drove man and beast from the Temple and suffered little children to come unto Him. One need look no further than Christ’s instruction to His disciples to describe such people: “[B]e ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.” (Matthew 10:16, KJV) Dr. Zacharias views himself as one called to engage both the mind and the heart. In short, he is a Christian apologist. Are you?

A Christian is, simply defined, a disciple of Christ.  Apologetics, on the other hand, is not so easily defined.  You could say, hypothetically, that a Christian apologist is one who uses an apologetic to apologize for Christianity, and such a definition could be correct.  But notwithstanding the adequacy of that definition, what is an apology? Perhaps a better starting point would be to look at what compromises the field or practice of apologetics.

In describing apologetics, Christian theologian and apologist Alister McGrath writes,

Apologetics has two major components—one negative, one positive. Negatively, apologetics identifies and responds to objections that are raised against faith. Positively, it works out how best to communicate and commend the gospel to each audience it engages.[1]

Of the two components, Dr. Zacharias’ lecture falls into the latter category. The lecture seemed designed to convince the listener that experientially and intellectually we cannot do without God.[2]

It wasn’t until some time later that a friend and I were talking and he vocalized what I was thinking—“something was missing.” Perhaps it was because I had before heard or read many of the points covered in the lecture, but I was a little disappointed.

The Word wasn’t preached—alluded to—but not preached. Apologetics exists to lead people to a place where they are willing to experience the Word and hear Him preached. Christ said, “And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me.” (John 12:32) The power of Heaven is in the Word of God. It has no equal. He has no equal. I by no means seek to impugn the ministry or the excellent work of Christian apologists like Dr. Zacharias. I instead mean to make a point, especially for those tempted to worship intellect: apologetics is a tool, and like any other tool, there is a time and place for its appropriate use and its effectiveness.

Consider for example, two recent divine appointments that I had. In one instance I had just read a book and in the other an article, both responding to a particular critique of Christianity. In both instances, I was given an opportunity to share what I had read and was able to see the beauty of apologetics in breaking down mental barriers. Ultimately, apologetics exists not to pander to one’s pride or as a way to engage in intellectual banter for its own sake. It “clear[s] the obstacles in someone’s spiritual journey.”[3]

Sister White writes, “The manner in which the truth is presented often has much to do in determining whether it will be accepted or rejected.” (Evangelism 168) But she also tells us,

Wherever the power intellect, of authority or force is employed, and love is not manifestly present, the affections and will of those whom we seek to reach assume a defensive, repelling position, and their strength of resistance is increased. Jesus was the Prince of Peace. He came into our world to bring resistance and authority into subjection to Himself. Wisdom and strength He could command, but the means He employed with which to overcome evil were the wisdom and strength of love. (Testimonies 2 136)

The apostle Peter, a man once known for his verbosity, wrote, “But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear.” (I Peter 3:15)

You would be correct if you guessed that the Greek word, apologia, appears in this verse from I Peter. It appears eight times in the New Testament along with another similar word, apologeomai. Understanding that a combination of apologetics, and more importantly, love, will win hearts adds new meaning to Colossians 4:5-6: “Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man.”

Gregory Burnett is a recent graduate from Boston College Law School and currently serves as a campus missionary. He and his wife reside in Boston, Massachusetts.

[2] He expounds on this argument in his book, Deliver Us from Evil (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 1998).

[3] Zacharias, Beyond Opinion, xvii.