The Network’s Response to Racial Injustice
This is Part 2 of a series on The Network’s “Prayer for Black People.” The first part covers a time of prayer that was supposed to be for Black people, at the Summer Leadership Conference in 2019. As discussed there, it was manipulative and problematic for a number of reasons. At times, it rises to a level I would describe as racist, and I don’t use that word lightly. Please read that post first. All of the disclaimers about my apprehensions about talking about race still apply. Thanks in advance for grace and corrections.
Here, I look at the response to the racial injustice in 2020, including how that prayer was referenced and how promises made during it were broken. You will also see echoes of the sentiment from the 2019 prayer.
Reference to the 2019 Prayer
On June 7th, 2020, less than two weeks after George Floyd was murdered, Luke Williams, Lead Pastor of Vista Church in San Luis Obispo, said this in his sermon, which was pre-recorded due to COVID.
Last year at our Network Summer Leadership Conference, the Holy Spirit moved sovereignly and led in an unplanned session of prayer, where all of the leaders in the church prayed for African American, African and other Black leaders and members of the churches. It lasted maybe over an hour, and it was powerful.
Williams is referencing the prayer to indicate the power of prayer (more context below), and also likely to show that The Network had done something to care for Black people. But right out the gate, there’s two problems:
“maybe over an hour”: You can listen to the audio from last week - the time of prayer was approximately 25 minutes. Williams is simply wrong here, about something that could easily be verified.
“Unplanned”: There are two possibilities:
Luke is correct: If so, then this indicates that no one meant to care for Black people, it just kind of happened (though I argued the prayer wasn’t particularly planned).
Luke is incorrect: As I stated in the last post, the session sure seems planned. I present more evidence below that this is the case. If this is true, Williams is, once again, stating something confidently that is false. Is he lying? Or was he just saying something he wasn’t sure of?
How did this happen?
Let’s back up two weeks and start from the murder of George Floyd, on May 25th.
Spring 2020
A “Black Lives Matter” Protest
On Monday, May 25th, 2020, George Floyd was murdered by Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin, in broad daylight, with three other police officers standing by and either helping or keeping would-be heroes from intervening. Chauvin was shown on video to have knelt on Floyd’s neck for 9 minutes and 29 seconds, suffocating him to death while bystanders and Floyd himself begged Chauvin to stop. This sparked protests nationally and internationally.
This followed the killing of Breonna Taylor (March 13th, 2020) and the murder of Ahmaud Arbery (February 23rd, 2020).
All three victims were Black. All three should be alive today.
I wanted to look at how Vista Church responded to these killings, so I listened to the audio from May 31st, 2020 and June 7th, 2020. I had remembered Luke Williams referencing Floyd’s murder in at least one of those, but I do not recall him ever referencing it again after this, except in the vaguest of terms like “division in our country”. He might have, but I’m reasonably confident it was never a primary point in one of his sermons after this. He did repeatedly talk about how hard things were given that we were navigating a global pandemic and a civil rights movement, but this always seemed to just be either:
The world is really out of control, look to Jesus
These are uncharted waters for pastors, and he’s just trying to figure it out
My analysis of these two sermons will be different than normal. Neither sermon is centrally about Floyd’s murder or racism, and so I’ve simply extracted the portions of them that are relevant to that topic. In total, I will share:
Williams’ sermon on Sunday, May 31st, 2020, with brief analysis
Williams’ email to Small Group Leaders on Monday, June 1, 2020, the Network’s Social Media Post, and my email back to Williams.
Notes from my call with Williams on the night of June 2nd, 2020.
Williams’ sermon on Sunday, June 7, 2020, with brief analysis
Sunday, May 31st, 2020
May 31st was the first Sunday after this, and it was national news by this point. Luke Williams mentioned Floyd by name (to my knowledge, he never mentioned Taylor, Arbery, or anyone else by name). There were two clips of his sermon that are relevant, but the sermon itself is mostly just about living for Christ and perseverance during the time of COVID-19 (Vista Church was not meeting in person at this time).
I’ve also shared a transcript, though admittedly I’ve not spent as much time fully cleaning this one up. As always, the audio is the authoritative record.
Full Audio
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You look at the news and almost every day there is a new case of injustice, like what happened with George Floyd, that is disturbing to see and read about. It seems like almost every day there are breaking news stories of racism and the divide in our country and our world.
(skip marked by whoosh sound)
The question is, how does the church respond to a very broken world? What role has God called us to in the midst of all of this? As Christians, we believe that only Jesus breaks the chains of sin. And only Jesus can truly set people free. Every single time -- on Sunday, or in small group, or in our personal lives -- we lovingly and truthfully point people to Jesus, we are doing the most significant thing we possibly can to bring change to this broken world. So as a church, our response to injustice is more of Jesus in this world. Our response to evil and racism is more of Jesus in this world. Our response to addiction is more of Jesus in this world.
I’ll start with the phrase, “like what happened with George Floyd.” Floyd had been murdered on the 25th. Chauvin and the other three officers were fired on the 26th. And on the Friday, May 29th, Chauvin was arrested. The rise of #SayTheirNames has been in direct response to language like Williams uses here. To his credit, he uses Floyd’s name. But it’s passive - “what happened with George Floyd.” He says it with assumption that people know, because it was huge news by then. But he should have said “like the killing of George Floyd.” Even the “disturbing to see and read about” is weak - he could have just called it evil. I’m sympathetic to the avoidance of the word “murder” given the legal weight of that term.
I’ll give credit to Williams for using the words “racism” and “injustice.” Those are both good.
In the second paragraph, Luke leans hard into “just preach the gospel” rhetoric. Here’s what Dr. Christina Edmonson has to say about that (excellent podcast - strongly recommend):
But you can say that the gospel has deep implications for the way that we live our lives, that we are gospel witnesses, we are to be salt and light in the earth, we are ambassadors of Christ, we were bought with the price. This is our new designated identity. It’s not just a question that just preached the gospel. We live the gospel. We are gospel people.
Podcast host Justin Holcomb adds:
Because of the gospel, we’re invited to repent and on the faith and works, it was [Martin] Luther who said, “Hey, God doesn’t need your works for salvation, but your neighbor does need your works.” How helpful of a summary from Luther.
Note: The conversation on the sentiment “Just Preach the Gospel” starts at roughly the 30-minute mark, and includes a strong statement for preaching the gospel and doing more. The podcast is the “As In Heaven” podcast, and the title of the episode is “Unhelpful Perspectives on Race and Justice” and it’s fantastic. Published November 5th, 2020.
“Good Works” are praised in the New Testament in at least the following verses. If any were covered as small group topics, I’ve linked them.
Matthew 5:16: “In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.”
John 10:32: Jesus answered them, “I have shown you many good works from the Father; for which of them are you going to stone me?”
Acts 9:36 (Christian Service): “Now there was in Joppa a disciple named Tabitha… She was full of good works and acts of charity.” It goes on to say that she made garments for the women of her community.
Ephesians 2:10: “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” Good works here are literally what we were made for.
1 Timothy
2:10: “women should adorn themselves… with good works.”
5:10: “Let a widow be enrolled if she is not less than sixty years of age, having been the wife of one husband, and having a reputation for good works: if she has brought up children, has shown hospitality, has washed the feet of the saints, has cared for the afflicted, and has devoted herself to every good work.”
5:25: “So also good works are conspicuous, and even those that are not cannot remain hidden.”
6:18: “[The rich] are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share”
Titus
2:7: “Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works, and in your teaching show integrity, dignity, and sound speech that cannot be condemned.”
2:14: “Jesus Christ who gave himself for us… a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.”
3:8: “The saying is trustworthy, and I want you to insist on these things, so that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to good works.”
3:14: “And let our people learn to devote themselves to good works, so as to help cases of urgent need, and not be unfruitful.”
Hebrews 10:24 (Experiencing Small Group - this verse is not the central point of the study): “And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works”
James 2:17 (Christian Service): “So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”
Galatians 6:9-10: “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to everyone, and especially to those who are of the household of faith.”
By contrast, most Christians in the Bible were not missionaries like Paul or apostles like Peter. Evangelism is a rare activity, and it’s not even encouraged broadly to the church. In the ESV, there are only the following references to “evangelism.”
Acts 21:8: Names “Philip the evangelist”, indicating that this was a thing Philip was known for.
2 Tim 4:5: Encourages Timothy to “do the work of an evangelist.” But this is a direction specific to him, similar to the direction to appoint overseers.
Ephesians 4:11: Names “evangelists” as one of five offices that God appointed people to. The others are apostle, prophet, shepherd, and teacher. There’s no more reason to believe that everyone is an “evangelist” than that everyone is an apostle, shepherd, or teacher.
Many churches use a mission statement like “make disciples who make disciples”, but that implies that the call to evangelism is the primary call for each Christian. You have to read it in to the “Great Commission”, which was specifically told to the apostles. Some might say, “But it says that they are to teach people to do everything Jesus said, and that includes the Great Commission!” It’s a problematic argument, because not a single apostle is recorded as then telling the Great Commission to anyone. In fact, not a single NT letter rebukes a church for a failure to evangelize or “reach their neighbors”. Instead, they are far more concerned with instructions on how to live a life pleasing to God, which is one in which they love God and love their neighbor, in ways both practical and spiritual.
I am not against evangelism. And good works can be used to evangelize (Matthew 5:16). But, I am against people making it the primary or only way that each and every Christian serves anyone.
This series by Tim Keller is very long, but speaks extensively on this topic (I don’t agree with all of it).
“More Jesus in this world”
Luke says this phrase three times. But the Bible describes the church as the “body of Christ” and his “hands and feet.” We are to do his work here on earth. “More Jesus in this world” certainly involves people knowing Jesus, but it also involves Christians doing the work that Jesus called them to. It’s a “Both/And”. The Network rightly is skeptical of churches that are only about social justice. There’s no Jesus there, so there’s no foundation. But a church that refuses to do anything other than evangelism (or works with an evangelistic goal) is refusing to do the work of Jesus except for that one thing.
Clip 2: 33:38
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If you're moved by the injustice that you read about in the news, pray that God would move among us and break the chains of sin in people's lives. Every time you invite someone to church, every act of love you show to someone with the hope that they would know God, and that God loves them. Every time you speak truth with love, every time you serve someone in need, with the hope that they would see God's love, you may not see the effect, but it matters. It's doing something.
More “just pray and make disciples.” Williams explicitly says that if you serve someone in need, or show them an act of love, it’s “with the hope that they would know God.” It’s evangelistic, nothing more. Again, I am not saying that evangelism is bad. What I am saying is that neither Jesus nor the rest of the Bible define good works as primarily evangelistic. Can that be a side benefit? Sure. But good works are good on their own. This is a gospel that’s void of any kind of action. What’s ironic is that Luke actually quotes Martin Luther in this sermon, and Luther (for all his faults) actually has a really healthy perspective (at 22:23):
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When Martin Luther was dealing with the bubonic plague, he wrote these wise words that can help inform the way we approach things happening in our world right now. He said, “I shall ask God mercifully to protect us. Then I shall fumigate, help purify the air, administer medicine and take it. I shall avoid places and persons where my presence is not needed in order not to become contaminated and thus perchance inflict and pollute others, and so caused their death as a result of my negligence. If God should wish to take me, he will surely find me and I have done what he has expected of me. So I am not responsible for either my own death or the death of others.” But he goes on and he says it, “If My neighbor needs me, however, I shall not avoid place or person, but go freely as stated above.”
Luther is saying something like: “I will love my neighbor, in action, at risk of my own life. I will do what I can to help them in any way I can. But I will not be foolish and throw my life or someone else’s life away for nothing.” Luther is not focused on evangelism, but rather just loving his neighbor, just like Jesus said to do when he defined “love your neighbor” with his parable of the Good Samaritan. He’s just helping people. This Snopes article contains a link to Luther’s full letter (it’s 14 pages and I have not read the whole thing) and also an excerpt in which he talks about foolishly spreading disease as being murder or suicide.
In the midst of a pandemic, there was no call to serve our neighbors. I know one church in town actually organized a service where young, healthy people would pick up groceries for people who were at higher risk. That’s love in action.
June 1st, 2020: Williams' Email
The following morning, Luke emailed all of the Small Group leaders at 11:53 AM, June 1st, 2020. Here is the email, in full.
Hey guys!
I’m sure that all of you are aware of the unrest that has spread across our country in the last few days. I’m emailing you to help you in your thinking about this, and to help you be equipped for how to lead people through this time.
First, it is important to recognize that the death of George Floyd is tragic and the actions that lead to it are evil. The killer has been arrested and charged for the crime. As we know, this is not an isolated incident. Numbers of voices on the national stage are calling on Christians to be vocally involved in the national discussion on the underlying issues of race.
It has made me deeply saddened that many of the peaceful protests that have emerged over a legitimate anger at racism, have been hijacked by people and groups wishing to only cause destruction and harm.
As you all know, we believe that racism, in any of its forms, is sin, is hateful to God, and we resist racism. I have been so encouraged both now and over the last 3 and a half years of Vista to see the unity that Jesus has brought to our church, and overall our network of churches. We have people from many different races, countries, languages, very different life backgrounds, giftings, characters, and personalities who are close friends, love each other dearly, and serve and sacrifice for each other regularly.
Our belief is that the only way people actually get free of sin like racism, addiction, idolatry, anger, pride, and every other sin is by trusting in Jesus and receiving help from him. Therefore, our aim is always for new friends to turn to Jesus and trust him. So how do we respond in times like these?
1. We preach the Gospel to see people saved by Jesus.
2. We tell our stories and we invite friends to services and small groups (even online), so that we might share the hope and faithfulness of Jesus with others.
3. We love new friends by hearing their stories, praying for them, helping them, so that we might share the hope and faithfulness of Jesus with others.
4. We sincerely empathize with those who are hurting and broken, understanding the profound need for God in this world. I would encourage you all to reach out to people you know who may be deeply affected by these recent tragic events to help people know they are loved, cared for and seen during this difficult time. I think of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. who said “In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies but the silence of our friends.” Don’t be passive during this time, be stirred to action to demonstrate God’s love and help build unity in Jesus’ church.
5. We pray that God would bring justice, mercy, help, healing, and salvation. I hope that this stirs us at Vista Church to pray for a move of God in our generation. Julia and I have been paying on and off all day lately, deeply saddened by the state of our world and just how evil sin is. I’m encouraged by Matthew 7:11 “how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him.” We must keep asking - really asking!
6. We teach others to do all of this. Not many of us would be following Jesus if someone else hadn’t taught us these things first. We will be talking more about this in the Sunday teaching this week, but it may be most helpful to address with people in group as we talk through purpose this month and how we respond to a broken world.
Our calling and purpose matters now more than ever. And the calling that Jesus has given us takes time. Often it takes years to see people change. But we are convinced that he has led us in this. Everything that we do: pray, invite, listen, tell our story, prep a discussion, call a friend, love, encourage, help, forgive, follow the Holy Spirit’s nudges, matters. All of it matters!
I am so encouraged by you guys! I can picture your faces as I write this and I know that following Jesus is your life! How good he is to change us. Keep praying, keep loving, keep trusting God.
Love you guys!
Luke Williams
Lead Pastor
Vista Church
www.vistachurchslo.com
Again, “preach the gospel” and “people need Jesus” are the common themes.
Williams says that people are calling on Christians to speak to the moment. But then he doesn’t actually say anything about whether or not that can or should happen.
He also quotes Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s critique of the “silence of our friends” but applies it incorrectly. Williams here seems to mean that Blacks might feel bad that no one reached out to check on them. That’s undoubtedly true, but what King meant was that whites were failing to speak out against racism publicly. That is, in the face of injustice, they stayed silent, just like the Network has. King was talking about white churches like The Network that won’t use their voice to speak against racism.
He engages in a “both sides” argument by talking about how some protests have turned violent. In fact, he describes himself as “deeply saddened” about the violent turn of some protests, but does not express similar emotion toward racism or racial violence. And he does not recommend that anyone attend a peaceful protest or post to social media in solidarity. Churches in The Network did not post the same black squares to Social Media that were going up online that day, as Williams was sending this. He does encourage love bombing (encouraging everyone to call the Black people in the church).
There is no call to lament. There is no call for those who have held biases to repent of them. There’s no call to learn other than maybe listening to the stories of Black people, but even that is limited to “new friends” and for evangelistic purposes, “so that we might share the hope and faithfulness of Jesus with others.”
My Response to Williams
I was confused by the email, so I emailed him back (see below), asking for clarity on what exactly he was saying we should actually do. Here’s what I wrote to Williams on the morning of Tuesday, June 2nd (italics are the social media post I sent Williams a copy of because I was worried that maybe I’d overstepped and said something wrong). I sent this at 8:08 AM:
Hey Luke - Thanks for the email. I wanted to ask a few clarifiers on this. It's actually related to some stuff that's been on my mind for a while (regarding purpose), so good timing I guess.
Couple questions:
1) Can you share a bit more about what this looks like? "Don't be passive during this time, be stirred to action to demonstrate God's love and help build unity in Jesus' church."
2) On item 3, you mentioned "hearing thier stories, praying for them, helping them" - it sounded like you meant this in the general sense that when we meet new people, we should be engaging relationally? Like helping people move, or learning thier bible, etc? And hearing stories, you meant just understanding where they are from? Or did you mean a more specific trying to hear stories from people with experience in racism and trying to help them overcome that?
3) You included this quote near the top - I'd love your viewpoint on what our answer to this is - I'm guessing it's "no, we shouldn't do that", but how far does that go? Don't go to rallies? Don't post anything with #BlackLivesMatter? Don't mention race on social media, but rather only in 1:1 conversations? Numbers of voices on the national stage are calling on Christians to be vocally involved in the national discussion on the underlying issues of race. [Note: I added italics in this blog post to make it clear that this was a quote from Luke’s email] The King quote you used is good (and unlike a lot of MLK quotes shared yesterday, appears to actually be from him!), helpful - but the end of it is saying, paraphrased, "we will remember that our friends didn't use their voices to speak up for us", right? Not just saying "it would have been great if our friends asked us how we were doing"? Is that how you take it? Or do you mean something else?
And just so you can see it, here's what I wrote on FB - there's parts of it I kind of wish I had worded slightly different, but I'd welcome your thoughts/feedback on the overall sentiment and whether or not I was right to post this. BTW, this is the first time in ~9 years that I've posted anything even remotely political on FB - just in case you're worried about what else I might be writing 🙂
What’s my role in this? That’s what I’m asking myself and, more importantly, God. And right now, I have more questions than answers. But I think we can be clear that as Christians we should love justice. Afterall, one of the core points of our faith is that our God is a just God, so just that Jesus had to die in our place to take on the punishment for our sin. And while the ultimate solution to this is God’s grace overcoming our sin, we are to love justice even now.
In fact, Jesus calls out: “But woe to you Pharisees! For you tithe mint and rue and every herb, and neglect justice and the love of God.” (Luke 11:42). Deuteronomy 1:16-17 (Moses Speaking): “And I charged your judges at that time, ‘Here the cases between your brothers, and judge righteously between a man and his brother or the alien who is with him. You shall not be partial in judgment. You shall hear the small and the great alike. You shall not be intimidated by anyone, for the judgment is God’s.” Then later in 16:19-20 “You shall not pervert justice. You shall not show partiality, and you shall not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds the eyes of the wise and subverts the cause of the righteous. Justice, and only justice, you shall follow, that you may live and inherit the land that the Lord your God is giving you.”
And in considering the death of George Floyd and other similar incidents, I can only say: there seem to me to be few things less just than someone trusted by their community to serve and protect, impartially, killing someone in that community while wearing a badge signifying that trust. While the number of cases like this may pale in comparison to the cases of cancer, traffic fatalities, or other things, this kind of death represents a true betrayal of trust, and thus leads to all manner of brokenness in how our society is to focus*.
So, what do we do? First, to my friends of the African American community, know that I grieve you, and many others do as well. I can’t understand your fear or how deep your anger must go, so I won’t trivialize it by trying to pretend that I do. I just want you to know I’m with you. Second, I could lash out at an unknown target, saying that someone needs to do something better, but then I’m just letting myself off the hook.
So, what’s my role in this? I can listen. I can learn. I can become more informed. In my position at Microsoft I can work hard to root out racism in our processes, particularly in hiring and pay. As a citizen of SLO, California, and the USA, I can let my elected leaders know that I want to see them pushing for proper training for law enforcement and that I will use my vote to hold them accountable to that, while also proactively reaching out to thank law enforcement that I see doing things the right way. And I can consider other ways that I can work to make things a bit better for people who don’t have the positions or advantages that I have. That’s not something I’m done doing, and may never be, but you have to start somewhere, and that at least starts with repenting for the ways that I’ve failed in this so far, and looking for ways to do better.
And again, to those of you of the black community, I’d like to know what I can be doing better – I suspect you have ideas, and I’d love to learn. (Edit - I do not mean to demand answers here, just stating that I would love to hear this viewpoint if you are willing to share it here or with me privately, at any time - it is of course 100% your choice!)
Thanks for your thoughts,
Jeff
* Note: I have no idea what the phrase “is to focus” was there for.
I tried to be careful to respect Williams, and find where the boundaries were, without being argumentative. But, I also felt that I needed more clarity. You can see the social media post I’d already written, how it leans into the need to learn more and do more. I tried to establish a theological basis for caring about justice. Williams’ email does none of that. In fact, it’s void of scripture entirely except for the appeal to the power of prayer.
Social Media
As a reminder, on Monday, June 1st, millions of Instagram accounts posted a black square in protest and solidarity with the Black community. To my knowledge, no Network church participated.
On Tuesday, June 2nd, most network churches put a statement on Instagram, which I have analyzed here.
June 2nd, 2020: Phone call with Williams
I spoke with Williams Tuesday night by phone. He did affirm that my social media post had been fine, as he did not see all of this as a political issue. He also agreed that I could go to protests if I wanted to.
He did say he wouldn’t be attending any protests because of the pandemic and the fear of spreading COVID. He said to me that something like “it would take a PhD in ethics to figure out whether or not going to a protest during a pandemic was the right thing to do.”
As a reminder, Dan Digman said this during the “Prayer for Black People”:
We are with you. We will walk with you. We will listen. We will be there. We will bleed with you. We will suffer with you.
And Williams inaction proves Digman’s statement false. My wife did go to one of the protests in San Luis Obispo, and said at least one Black attendee of Vista Church was moved to tears just by seeing her there.
Sunday, June 7th, 2020: Sermon at Vista Church
On Sunday, June 7th, Luke Williams, Lead Pastor of Vista Church in San Luis Obispo, CA, addressed this again, and at greater length, in his sermon. It was on Philippians 2, the same passage on which Sándor Paull taught his abusive 2018 teaching. Much of the sermon is about other things, but there’s a couple interesting clips, including a reference to the prayer almost a year earlier. The transcript is, as with May 31st, rougher than normal - audio is the authoritative copy.
Full Audio
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Hey, guys, good morning. I'm so thankful that Jesus has led and us working through the book of Philippians. Before we started this series, I felt like Jesus kept saying that we had to go through this book as a church. And I didn't fully understand why. But God kept saying that, and I suspect he has a lot for us in this book. But Monday, I woke up around five and started thinking about the text for the Sunday and was amazed that our text for this morning is one of the most clear texts in the whole Bible on unity, what it is and how it's achieved. I could have never planned that in a million years. And it is exactly what we need to understand at this point in our country. It encourages me greatly that God is with us and is leading us as a church.
Williams is claiming that Jesus told him we needed to go through Philippians. He believes this passage is particularly applicable to the concept of unity, and unity is what is needed in this moment. Once again - disunity is not what led to the deaths of multiple Black people. The issue is injustice, not disunity. I remember thinking at the time that it was so odd that Williams would claim divine inspiration for this. If there’s a book in the New Testament that’s associated with perseverance through suffering, it’s Philippians. I suspect many churches were using it during the pandemic and I also suspect that many churches in The Network were not going through it. Was Jesus not with them?
Once again - prophecy is no joking manner. In the Old Testament a false prophet was to be put to death. In the New Testament, Ananias and Sapphira fall dead as judgment from God for merely lying about what they themselves had done (Acts 5). If a church is going to engage in “Jesus is leading” or “it feels like the Holy Spirit is saying”, they need to keep a record of it as the prophecies are given, test the prophecy by the scriptures, and then enforce proper church discipline (bringing to repentance) those who are found to be prophesying falsely. If an OT prophet was to be put to death, it seems reasonable to assume that even in the NT, someone should be banned from claiming a prophetic word if they’ve found to be prophesying falsely.
Here, Williams is making statements that no one but him would be able to evaluate.
Remarks on Racism
This is getting long already - you can listen and hear Williams make a number of the same points I’ve already addressed. It continues to fail to meet the moment, and continues to fail to challenge people to grow and work against racism. In summary, unlike virtually every other sin, The Network seems to believe that racism or racial bias simply are not a problem for which anyone in The Network needs to repent.
To borrow a phrase from Aaron Sorkin, Williams (and the network) do “a big thing badly.” This was a pivotal moment, and they simply fell short of what was required.
Describing 2019 Prayer (33:24)
And we finally come to Williams description of the 2019 prayer. After all of the above has transpired, Williams says this:
Another thing you may do is call and pray for people. Prayer is powerful. Last year at our Network Summer Leadership Conference, the Holy Spirit moved sovereignly and led in an unplanned session of prayer, where all of the leaders in the church prayed for African American, African and other Black leaders and members of the churches. It lasted maybe over an hour, and it was powerful. You could feel the Holy Spirit in the midst of it moving profoundly. And I believe God was at work during that time bringing healing and restoring hope and unifying the church. There was a lot of tears. And then since it was before COVID-19, there was a lot of hugging. But prayer is powerful. Look for opportunities to pray for one another.
First, the story doesn’t actually make the point that prayer is powerful. The above clip can be summarized: “Prayer is powerful. We prayed for people once. See, prayer is powerful.” The only tangible effect he was able to point to was “tears” and “hugging.”
But he makes three statements of fact that seem to be intended to bolster this story’s value in showing how much he and The Network care for Black people:
Duration: “It lasted maybe over an hour”
Spontaneous: He claims that it was a spontaneous move of the Holy Spirit.
Who it was for: He claims that it was “for African American, African, and other Black leaders and members”
Length
As for the duration, the prayer lasted twenty-five minutes, not “maybe over an hour”. Maybe Williams has a bad memory of it. But as with other confident errors that Williams makes, it was completely unnecessary. The only reason to say that it lasted over an hour is to make it sound better. No one asked him “But Luke, how long did it last.” This was also pre-recorded - he easily could have re-recorded that part. He could have looked it up, listened to the audio (the audio I have is part of the official audio recorded at that conference - surely Williams has access or knows someone who does). But he just states an embellished version. If nothing else, this type of regularly stated falsehood means that those listening to Williams absolutely must remember that his version may or may not match reality, even on things that happened in public and are verifiable.
Consider these words of Jesus in Matthew 6:
“And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites. For they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and at the street corners, that they may be seen by others. Truly, I say to you, they have received their reward. But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
“And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. Pray then like this: [Lord’s prayer]
I cannot imagine a better description of the way that Network pastors pray than exactly what Jesus rebukes here (with the exception of street corners).
Williams is literally doing the opposite - he’s trying to use the length of the prayer as a show of its quality. When in fact, when we look at the actual prayer, it was full of “empty phrases”, just repeating the same phrase over and over. Jesus’ model for prayer is humble, short, and direct. The Network’s is showy, long, and full of overly spiritual language.
Spontaneity
As stated previously, the internal evidence of the prayer is that it was pre-planned. That said, it’s not actually clear how it being spontaneous would be better. Pre-planned at least means some thought and decision was made in prioritizing this at the conference. Spontaneous means it happened just because Steve Morgan felt like the Holy Spirit led in the moment. So if it was spontaneous, that means it just happened on a whim, or even that it was forced by the Holy Spirit. If it wasn’t, that means a member of the Network Leadership Team (Williams), who should have been part of planning it, misrepresented how it came to happen. Neither option is good.
I’ve spoken with someone who says they discussed this with Steve Morgan beforehand. The individual told me that it was, indeed, planned. I know who they are, but they asked to be kept anonymous in this post. They could not present hard evidence for their meeting with Morgan or what was discussed, but presented enough circumstantial evidence to me that I find the story credible, especially given the corroborating evidence in the audio itself.
I find it likely that it was preplanned and either Williams doesn’t know it was planned (and is making one more “confident error”) or he is outright lying.
Who it was for
Finally, regarding who it was for, first note that the language is very similar to Morgan’s language, except Williams uses “other Black” instead of “Caribbean.” This is more accurate, and a good change. However, as I detailed, less than 20% of the prayer time was actually praying helpful things for the Black individuals present.
What we can do (34:16)
Williams then lists a few things that someone could do, but stops short of actually recommending anything, or stating what he planned to do.
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Another thing you may do, look around the church in our community. And those who you know and ask, again, who can I pray for? Who can I encourage, who can I love? Who can I empathize with? Who can I include in my life? Who can I hear and understand. And we do this relationally. This is not a program, this is not forced. This is part of our life, because this is the Christian life laid out in the Bible. Some of you also may feel led to peacefully protest, or write letters to elected officials, and post on social media. All of us must follow our conscience and God's lead in these things.
There are some good things here. Prayer, encouragement, empathy, inclusion, and understanding are all good! No complaints there. But then it gets more problematic. First - note that when it came to prayer, he did not say “follow our conscience.” It was an instruction. But when he gets to any practical action (protest, write letters, post on social media) he, in one of the only times I can remember, backs off and says that it’s a conscience issue. It’s hardly a ringing endorsement. He also doesn’t say what he planned to do, unlike how he normally preaches. He frequently uses his own behavior as an example to be followed, which actually is biblical - 1 Peter 5:3 says that leaders are to lead by example, not domineering.
And that’s it. This is the last sermon in which I can remember him speaking to this topic at length. I do remember one story the following fall about a Black man and white man at Blue Sky Church who had become close friends.
I asked him later if there were good books he could recommend on the topic of racism, and he said he really didn’t know, but he did point me to this excellent viral video by Phil Vischer (of Veggie Tales fame, and now a co-host of the Holy Post podcast). Part 2 of that video will address the most common objections to it. Particularly if you’re white, and conservative-leaning, I can’t recommend those videos enough. Williams never sent this or any other resources out to the church. For the record, here's some excellent resources I’ve learned a lot from:
The Color of Compromise, Jemar Tisby
Subversive Witness, Dominique Dubois Gilliard
Abuelita Faith, Kat Armas (Armas is hispanic, but will touch on a number of similar themes)
Just Mercy (movie/book about the real life Bryan Stevenson, author of the book, which I have not read - but the movie is excellent)
“Grace, Justice, and Mercy” – a talk on YouTube by Tim Keller and Bryan Stevenson (outstanding)
I also asked for resources on Twitter and got… a lot of them - I’ll work on turning them into a well published list.
The rest of this sermon
There are some echoes of Sándor Paull’s “Followers Should Obey Their Leaders in All Matters” sermon from 2018 here, but it’s not particularly attached to the issues of race, so I’m not going to go into that here. But it’s worth noting that at least some pieces of Paull’s 2018 teaching made it into this 2020 teaching by another pastor, so Paull’s teaching had at least some influence here. Williams also repeats a similar argument about the unity of the Trinity as he did when talking about marriage, this time arguing that the Trinity is a model of the unity that church members are to have with each other.
Up next…
There’s one more piece of this story that I will share in the third and final part of this series, hopefully later this week.