How the Enemy Keeps Us Divided
“Then I heard a loud voice in heaven, saying: ‘Now the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God and the authority of His Christ have come, for the accuser of our brothers, who accused them before our God day and night, has been cast down” (Rev. 12:10).
This verse uses the word kategeros, which is the Greek word for “accuser.” It is where we derive the English word “categories” from. We are operating in partnership with the devil when we categorize others and use the “us versus them” paradigm.
In the midst of injustice and racial unrest, we must have a solution that brings peace and wholeness to the hearts of our brothers and sisters. The No. 1 way the enemy fights this wholeness is with division. That division comes when we choose to “accuse” and categorize people groups for the actions of a few. When we let our bias be our blind guide, we are cooperating with the enemy of our souls.
Everyone has bias. Everyone. That’s not an indictment so much as a simple observation. The key is to invite people into our lives who will help us with our blind spots and call us up to something better. It does not matter your ethnicity; you have blind spots. That’s part of being human. Miles McPherson, author of The Third Option, puts it this way: “A blind spot doesn’t mean you don’t want to see something. It means you can’t see what you’re missing.” This is one of the reasons we are meant to live in community with one another. No one person can grow into their destiny alone.
Time to Grow Beyond Our Bias
It’s time to grow beyond our bias and defeat the evils of racism, bigotry and hate. It’s time to see clearly the enemy’s schemes and not be so unaware of how he seeks to divide us. It’s time we brought rest to the racial tension in the United States by refusing to operate in the “us or them” categorization game. It’s time to honor everyone we meet as one who carries the image of God in the very same way we do.
Anything less than honoring the image of God in each other will result in the dehumanization of our neighbor. Whenever you make a people group the enemy, you excuse yourself from the second-greatest commandment to “love your neighbor as yourself.” The devious part of this line of thinking is it makes “them” less than your “neighbor” and tricks you into devaluing them subconsciously.
At its core, the “us versus them” idea ignores the image of God inside “them” in order to dehumanize their person and excuse your hate. This must not be tolerated, and we need to hold one another accountable when we see it.
Don’t do the lazy thing of dehumanizing and degrading someone to excuse your bias; do the hard work of seeing the image of God in everyone—despite their poor behavior at times. I’m sure you would wish the same to be done for you.
It’s never us or them; it’s us for them.
Listen to episode 20 of my podcast on The Faith-Rest Life for more on this conversation.
