For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.

Calling wrong right is sin

The new year continues to shift my focus to the word I elected to live out this year: peculiar.

However, I’m in a place now where I’m discovering my limits while meeting new people—people who proclaim Christ. I’m finding that my passion for the Lord is increasing because He is showing me more of Him as I navigate the dark world. I can’t seem to recognize who lives for Christ or who lives for self.

You see, I’ve been suffering from information fatigue. Being online is exhausting. Trying to participate, making time to engage, producing work becomes tiresome.

It’s unpopular to call out sin in the community think-tank and I’m finding I don’t have enough patience when it comes to group-think or the tribalism that permeates the body of Christ. It feels so isolating, and I sometimes I find myself standing alone.

And moreover, it’s tiresome to be perceived to be of a certain political ideology due to my ethnic group. My husband reminded me today of this truth: I am a Christian first, and a writer second, so I don’t need to impress anybody, but Christ.

And yet I’m weary of hearing and reading so many who proclaim Christ call right wrong and wrong right.

And yet I’m weary of hearing and reading so many who proclaim Christ call right wrong and wrong right. I’m tired of seeing influencers with minimum biblical literacy lead so many to the slaughter. It’s important to note that a Christian who cannot discern right from wrong is spiritually dead.

Ecclesiastes 1 verse 18 says: For in much wisdom is much grief: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.

The more we know, the wiser we become; the more grief we carry, the more sorrow we’ll need to bear. That is a certainty. I have seen this time and again this year more than ever.

I’m tired, too, of the long-established set of prerequisites that a woman of color needs to satisfy in order to be a Christian. She needs to be left-leaning—a progressive thinker, or else she’s oppressed. She cannot be complementarian or a Baptist in her doctrine or else she’s ruled by patriarchy.

As I cycle through all these deceptive messages—these darts from the enemy—I realize how liberating Christ’s passion on the cross has been for me. I’m amazed and joyful by His love and my desire is only to serve Him, to point to Him, and to serve Him.

I’m tired, too, of the long-established set of prerequisites that a woman of color needs to satisfy in order to be a Christian.

But I won’t get tired to say this beloved brother and sister: the stakes are too high today for sitting on the bench. We cannot afford to stay seated while Christ tarries. We may not want to proclaim truth and call out sin because this snowflake, lukewarm culture in which we live will get offended. When we do this, we have decidedly turned the hearts of Christians into believing that current causes are more important than proclaiming truth and discipling the saved.

Remember that a biblical gospel is what saves people from an eternity in hell, not ethnocentric virtue, nor social justice.

I’m tired of witnessing my brothers and sisters diminish the gospel with distractions that bear no eternal fruit but only serve to soothe the conscience of our temporary discomforts while blending into the world.