Northside Church of Richmond

Racism is sin . People are sinners. I am a person. I am a sinner. I am stained by the sin of racism. I commit the sin of racism. I omit the righteous deeds that undo and push back the sin of racism. I have stayed silent when it benefited me, rather than speaking when it would have benefited my brothers and sisters of color. I have defaulted to judgment rather than sorrow, when an unarmed Black person is shot to death. I remember when Michael Brown was shot and killed, watching the news coverage, the first thing I focused on was what he ‘must have done to cause it.’ I sought for a flaw in Michael Brown’s character as if that should be worthy of death. I engaged with other nationally covered events in a similar way. Embracing a narrative that made me comfortable was functionally more important to me than the God-given lives of image bearers like Eric Garner and Tamir Rice. I have been indifferent, and uncaring. Over the past year I have ignored the increase in violent hate crimes agains

  What, to the Christian, is the Resurrection of Jesus Christ? Is it just another miracle? Is it a legend? Is it too good to be true? Is it just another piece of the puzzle in the Bible? Is it some elaborate trick done by the disciples? Have you ever paused to consider what the Resurrection means? I find that in my faith, sometime I get too comfortable with Hod and His Word. Things that should be foundational and life changing become arbitrary and obscure. If you are reading this, let me encourage you today to never stop let The Resurrection become obscure or arbitrary when it comes to your faith. What is the Resurrection? The Resurrection means that God is faithful. The Resurrection means that all of God’s promises are “yes and amen” in Jesus Christ. If He died and was raised to life, that means God is faithful to do the same for those who are in Christ Jesus. The Resurrection means the beginning of the end of death’s reign over this world. It means that sin is no longer the primary p

  My wife and I finished watching “The Crown” earlier this year. For those who may not be familiar, “The Crown” is a show about the life of the Royal Family in the United Kingdom, and it lived up to the hype (in my opinion). There is one episode in particular that stuck with me. In Season 3, there is an episode that tells the story of Prince Philip essentially having somewhat of a midlife existential crisis around the same time that the crew of Apollo 11 flew to the moon and back. Seeking inspiration, Prince Philip (who loved to fly), wished  men with the hope that what they had seen would spark some kind of fire within him or rekindle some sense of purpose in this world. I will spare you the details of the conversation, but let’s just say they were kind of a let down. I imagine that what Prince Philip was seeking is something along the lines of what these Greeks were seeking when they said to Philip, the disciple, that they wished to see Jesus. Now, Jesus could have said literally any

 Have you ever watched a movie with an ending you didn’t expect? I remember seeing a movie with some friends in high school that left us so confused that we had to debrief immediately in the movie theater once credits rolled. That is what I imagine it felt like to be one of Jesus’ disciples on the day of His death. There they were, watching the crowd take the man who was supposed to change everything, and kill Him as if He were a criminal. I often wonder if there was anyone who understood that it was happening according to plan. The fact of the matter is that this what was supposed to happen. This was part of the greatest victory ever won in history. Up to this point, death has been the debt that all men pay. Up to this point, sin still held man captive. Because of Adam, human nature was defined by sin. Therefore, we needed someone else to come through and redefine it. The only option was to defeat sin and death itself. How exactly do you do that? Well, we learn from Jesus that the fir

 The Ojays once sang,  “All the time they want to take your place The back stabbers (back stabbers) (They smilin' in your face)” I am convinced that no one knew the pain of these words more than Jesus. The events of this passage comes on the heels of the Last Supper, as well as Jesus washing the disciples’ feet AND His high priestly prayer (based on John’s account). For all of the time and love Jesus gave to His disciples, it would culminate in desertion and betrayal on their part. Even worse still, Jesus knew it would happen, and He told them it would happen. We all would probably agree that the main antagonist in this passage is Judas. However, that is fairly obvious. Let us draw our attention to the other disciples . What we have here is essentially another episode in “The Disciples Just Don’t Get It” (see the previous devotional on Mark 14:3-9 for that reference). As I read this passage, I couldn’t help but ask, “when did Jesus ever teach anything that would make any of the d

Dear Tiffanie, One thing I want you (and others reading) to be sure to understand, and to hear as you read this, is that "you" also equals "yours," as in the entire AAPI Diaspora. One, among many wonderful shared cultural mores between Black and Asian people, is that we are a collective people. We use singular and plural personal pronouns interchangeably. That is how it ought to be as followers of Jesus, together adopted into his family, together sharing in his inheritance, and together breaking bread. You bring the chop sticks, I'll bring the hot sauce. My soul is (again) groaning, all the while knowing, That a change is gonna come. It will be missed by some. That "already to the not yet" time will be done. (That simple promise has kept my people from coming undone.) Our Lord Jesus will see to it, That your enemies (who because they are yours are also my enemies) Will get what He sees fit. Sister Chan, please know that y

     Throughout high school and college, I had the opportunity to serve on four mission trips to Nicaragua. It was on these trips that I was exposed to a kind of poverty and neglect that I had never witnessed before. I learned a lot about the corruption that exists within the Nicaraguan government and America’s role in their history and where they are today. However, where I thought I would find despair and hopelessness, I found life, abundant life. During one of these trips at the end of college, one of our leaders (who is now my wife, shoutout Abbey) gave a talk about what she called “the secret of the poor.” Essentially, she was teaching us about how while the people we interacted with were very poor, they had such great joy compared to us in America because they recognized the wealth and inheritance they have in Jesus Christ. Perhaps that is the reality we see played out in this story about the anointing of Jesus by this woman in Bethany.       Mark’s account of this story does not