Mixed Salad

5 min read

17 Let the priests, who minister before the LORD, weep between the portico and the altar. Let them say, “Spare your people, LORD. Do not make your inheritance an object of scorn, a byword among the nations. Why should they say among the peoples, ‘Where is their God?’ ”

— Joel 2:17

It might be easy to think that this word only applies to pastors today. But the apostle Peter wrote that all believers are a “royal priesthood.” And so what that means for all believers, in part, is that we need to be a people who intercede for our communities.

If the United States is to be a nation that is truly “under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all,” then the people of God have some work cut out for us. And that work is to intercede for this nation.

When I think about this country (my country) when compared with other countries, to me, it’s a miracle that we can even exist. The diversity of the nation doesn’t make us inclined to be “indivisible” but “divisible”—very “divisible.” How can a nation like ours be “indivisible” except by the gracious hand of God through the intercession of God’s people?

When I was young, the United States was thought of as a “melting pot.” But people who believe in critical theory objected, because the image of a “melting pot” assumes that we should be striving for one culture—that is to say, “White culture,” whatever that might mean.

So the idea of the US being a “mixed salad” started to gain popularity, which is nice, but idealistic. That imagery assumes that all the ingredients can live harmoniously in the salad bowl. Today, none of the ingredients want to mix with the other ingredients to make a salad. People want to remain in their own corner of the garden, and no one wants to be “harvested” to become a “mixed salad.”

Like I said, it’s a miracle that this country can even survive. Every once in a while we see communities “explode.” In a way, these “explosions” are the result of “ingredients” reacting negatively to any movement that may seem to be leading to a “mixed salad.”

And we even see these “explosions” happening in churches. Whenever people hold on to their identity culture more than our common Jesus culture, people will fight against anything that threatens their identity culture.

But the Bible shows us over and over that one of the main reasons judgment came upon Israel is because they held on so tightly to their identity culture instead of pursuing God’s kingdom culture.

Any church that fights for identity culture instead of pursuing kingdom culture will die sooner or later.

So what is identity culture? Identity culture is the wall that we build to keep “others” who are different out of our yard. In GCC, there are three main walls—”Korean-ness,” “EM-ness,” and age.

Father, forgive us for these identity culture walls that we put up. Thank You for the diversity that we have in our Canvas community. Help us to embrace our individual uniqueness, as You have created us. But help us also to tear down walls that separate us, and to not rebuild them once they are torn down. In Jesus’s name. Amen.