By Jonathan Ho

What is a Kingdom citizen to do? During a time when thousands of people are dying prematurely due to the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, and during a time when more and more injustices are revealed, what does it mean to be a child of God, a member of the Kingdom of God?

As I write this, I have loved ones who are enraged by the injustices seen in the news, recent stories such as those involving George Floyd, a Black man who was killed over $20, and stories coming to light like the story of Elijah McClain, a Black man killed for looking suspicious and struggling when pinned down.

These events bring to mind the story of Vincent Chin, a Chinese-American man who was murdered by two white men on June 19, 1982. During a time of great tension as jobs in Detroit were lost to Japanese automotive companies, Ronald Ebens and Michael Nitz assumed Vincent was Japanese. An argument and scuffle broke out between Ronald and Michael and Vincent’s group at a strip club where Vincent was holding his bachelor party. Later, when they were outside, Ronald appeared again and chased Vincent with a baseball bat. Vincent ran away, but Ronald and Michael both searched for Vincent and when they found him they beat him unconscious with the bat. He was taken to the hospital and his friends were told he was brain-dead. He died four days later. [1]

In the end, Ronald and Michael were ordered to pay around $3,000 and served three years’ probation without any jail time. The judge at the time wrote, “These weren’t the kind of men you send to jail,” in a letter to a Detroit civil rights group that protested his decision. [2]

I remember when I first read this story I grew incensed. I tried finding out what happened to Ronald Ebens and Michael Nitz afterwards and found little to make me feel justice was served.

Yet, imagine stories like Vincent Chin’s occurring with regularity and only now coming to light in the larger public? Think of reports such as the Department of Justice’s investigation of the Baltimore City Police Department. Their report concluded that:

There is reasonable cause to believe that BPD engages in a pattern or practice of conduct that violates the Constitution or federal law. The pattern or practice includes:

1. making unconstitutional stops, searches, and arrests;

2. using enforcement strategies that produce severe and unjustified disparities in the rates of stops, searches and arrests of African Americans;

3. using excessive force; and

4. retaliating against people engaging in constitutionally-protected expression. [3]

Injustice, whether done to people who look like us or people who look different from us, is still injustice.

At the same time, I have other loved ones who are deeply afraid of the fractures seen in the country. There is fear that there are people who will take these revealed injustices, in a time of great vulnerability, to cause great damage to the nation. I feel we may have many readers who share these concerns.

It is here that I want to ask us what it means to follow Jesus. Jesus once said, “Every kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and every city or household divided against itself will not stand” (Matt. 12:25b, NIV) and he prayed before his crucifixion that “all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you” (John 17:21b).

Conversations require at least two people and by virtue of being a magazine, this is only one-sided. Because of this, we are not going to argue political points but we would like to present what we believe God’s call is for us.

Derek writes of our call to lament, and Lou, Hannah, and Lizje share about our call to create. The idea of creating may seem unrelated to the current climate, but I believe this is part of our calling as Kingdom citizens.

The Kingdom of God is not reactionary but proactive in joining the work of God. As some people say, you can be a consumer, critic, or creator. Too many of us have sat on the sidelines as consumers and critics in the world. We point out why this is right and why that is wrong. We sit and enjoy our lives. But let us not forget Jesus’s words in Luke 6:24-26:

But woe to you who are rich,

for you have already received your comfort.

Woe to you who are well fed now,

for you will go hungry.

Woe to you who laugh now,

for you will mourn and weep.

Woe to you when everyone speaks well of you,

for that is how their ancestors treated the false prophets.

In the words of Solomon, there is “a time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance” (Eccles. 3:4). Let us mourn with our brothers and sisters and let us seek our refuge in God. Let us take time to hear God and join him in making something new of the world, not only as caretakers of our possessions and homes, but also as caretakers of our brothers and sisters in the neighborhoods around us.

Sources

[1] White, John, and Wynne Davis. “His Life Cut Short, Vincent Chin Is Remembered For What Might Have Been.” NPR. NPR, June 23, 2017. https://www.npr.org/2017/06/23/533977175/his-life-cut-short-vincent-chin-is-remembered-for-what-might-have-been.

[2] Tseng-Putterman, Mark. “On Vincent Chin and the Kind of Men You Send to Jail.” Asian American Writers' Workshop, June 23, 2020. https://aaww.org/vincent-chin-the-kind-of-men/.

[3] “Investigation of the Baltimore City Police Department.” U.S. Department of Justice, August 10, 2016. https://www.justice.gov/crt/file/883296/download.