Articles
Our Common Humanity
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For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. (Rom. 3:23)
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I am an old white man. The second two attributes are a product of my birth; the first, a function of time. Over none of these characteristics do I have any control. That’s just what I am.
As an old white man, I freely confess that I struggle to understand the experiences of, say, a young black woman; or of a middle-aged Tibetan farmer; or of an elderly spinster living out her final days in care facility in Slovakia; or of billions of other individuals of all sizes, colors, ages, and experiences with whom I share this planet. None of these differences make any one of us superior to or lesser than the others.
But in our eagerness to emphasize the diversity of the human race, we must take care not to overlook the shared elements of our humanity. The failure to appreciate what we have in common has fueled the polarization that is now tearing our world apart. Three traits stand out:
We have a common dignity. All of us are made in the image of God. We have the ability to reason, to reflect, to communicate, and to love. That makes each one of us valuable in the sight of God. We ought to see that same value in each other.
We share common duties. God put us on this earth to love Him and to love our neighbors. We may argue over the particulars of those duties, but at some level we all admit to some ideal higher than ourselves. That's what makes us different from the animals. When we forget that, we become animals.
We share a common sin problem. Prejudice, racism, and genocide are insidious evils, but they are not the source of our troubles. The root problems lie deeper in the human heart, and are shared by all: selfishness, pride, anger, envy, greed, idolatry, lust, and so forth. These are the demons that blind us to the first two commonalities, and drive us into a frenzy of hate and conflict.
Black or white, male or female, young or old, we are all together in this ship we call “life”, and we have to learn how to get along with each other. But the healing process must begin with each one of us individually admitting our personal flaws and taking responsibility to address them--regardless of what identity labels we wear.
Until we can see each other as the fellow offspring of God, we will continue to treat each other as the spawn of Satan.
--David
