“The Gospel is not Right Wing or Left Wing.” That’s John Piper’s tag-line on page 84 of his eye-opening book, “Bloodlines: Race, Cross, and the Christian.” I have read nearly every book that Piper has written but this one truly breaks the mold. If you think that you do not have racist tendencies in your heart, think again; more than you might realize. And if you think that you have a grasp on racism in this country, well . . . he took me to school. His point: any area in your heart and life that you and I are a racist, is an area of sin that has yet to be conquered and changed by the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Piper tells the story of his childhood in a racist baptist church in South Carolina and racism’s effect upon his heart. What follows is a kind of reading that I have not read anywhere in anything. I cannot recommend this book too strongly. Subjects and topics: Bill Cosby, Juan Williams, Civil Rights, Affirmative Action, Anti-Intellectualism, The Audacity of Hope, Martin Luther King, Jr.,Personal Responsibility and Structural Change, Inter-racial marriage, racial diversity, racial harmony, racial prejudice, and the fact that we all came from one man and one woman – the same parents, and the fact that Jesus Christ married a bride who was not of his race, and the fact that the gospel does not take sides in the controversy of racism, and the glorious truth that the gospel accomplishes what is needed, these and many more points of discussion is what makes this book one of Piper’s best.

In his chapter, “Personal Responsibility [advocate Bill Cosby] and Systemic Intervention [advocate Juan Williams],” Piper comes to the conclusion that both sides have merit to be put into action but neither is the full solution to the astounding racism in our hearts, in our churches, in our world, and especially here in America. So what is the solution and how do we apply it? I leave you with a trailer for the book and some of his hope-filled remarks as he glories in the gospel. But buy the book!

“The gospel is not an ideology. It does not come in as one idea alongside some others and make its contribution. The good news that God sent his Son Jesus into the world to die in the place of sinners, and bear their punishment, and become their prefect righteousness, and absorb the wrath of God, and set us right with him through faith alone, and rise from the dead triumphant over every foe – that gospel does not come as an ideology but as supernatural power . . . that creates new people.”                                       pg. 83

“The gospel is not a heavenly demand of what we must do to be saved; it is a heavenly declaration of what God has done to save us. The added good news is that we cannot earn what he has done for us but only receive it as a gift. And even this receiving – this trust – is a gift of God. It is God’s grace and God’s power from start to finish. This is why it is in a class by itself. It does not fit alongside any politics or ideology or philosophy or culture.” pg. 84

“Jesus did not come into the world to endorse anybody’s platform. He doesn’t fit in. He created the world. He holds it in being by his powerful word. He will return someday to judge the living and the dead. And he came the first time to die so that left-wing activists and right-wing talk-show hosts would be broken in pieces for their sin and put back together by the power of grace. He came so that from that day on Jesus himself would be the supreme treasure and authority in our lives. He came so that we would become radically devoted to the glory of God. He came so that the only kind of racial diversity and racial harmony we would pursue is Jesus-exalting, God-glorifying, and gospel-formed.”  pg. 85