By using this site, you agree to our use of cookies. Cookies help improve your browsing experience and provide personalized content.
You can always change your preferences later.
“With the compassion of Christ, the wisdom from God’s Word, humility, repentance, love and grace… I want to seek to understand someone who has had a different experience than me. And I want that understanding to move me to God-honoring actions that help create change. Let the first change be in me.”
Lysa TerKeurst, President and Chief Visionary Officer of Proverbs 31 Ministries
As people of God, we should be marked by our Christ-like kindness, compassion and action. It’s not just a change in our thoughts but also in our words and our actions to better reflect biblical unity amongst all people.
Christ never met us in the middle, withholding mercy until we met Him halfway. He went the entire way for us. For you. For me.
Knowing this, we have the ability to shift our perspective to what the Lord has done for us, compelling us to be active in our response to go all the way in helping our hurting brothers and sisters. Friend, we cannot be passive in our expression of mercy or compassion. We must be active - searching for opportunities to be the hands and feet of Jesus.
We believe in order to make a true and lasting change, we must first seek to understand. So, a few members of our staff compiled the following resources in an effort to provide a trusted place to start.
But friends, we don’t want to only seek to understand. We want fresh understanding to lead to compassion, for compassion to lead to heart-change, for heart-change to lead to home change, for home change to lead to lasting changes in our communities, nation and world.
If any change will be lasting, though, it will be because it’s first based on the biblical Truth we can find only in God’s Word. The Bible is the ultimate resource we can use to prayerfully filter what we’re learning as we ask the Lord to search our hearts (Psalm 139:23-24). We believe only true repentance for what we’ve gotten wrong, humility to not be defensive, living out Biblical wisdom, and the pursuit of authentic relationships with all people made in the image of God will bring about godly actions that result in the lasting change we so desperately need.
We pray these resources are helpful to you, friend.
Love,
Your Proverbs 31 Ministries Family
To read a statement from the ministry on racism, click here.
Proverbs 31 Ministries is committed to leading you to the truth of God’s Word. We pray that these suggested Scriptures would be a starting place for your study and would lead you to the truth of the Gospel.
Specific Scriptures to Read:
Ethnic Reconciliation and Unity in Christ:
unSeminary Podcast with Derwin Gray on Racial Reconciliation as a Gospel Imperative
The Fight for Justice with Dr. John Perkins - Made for This with Jennie Allen
Why & How to Talk to Your Kids About Skin Tone and Race - Dr. Lucretia Berry
The Third Option - Miles McPherson
A House Divided Cannot Stand - Matt Chandler
Equipping the Next Generation to Embrace Gospel Diversity - Jackie Hill Perry
Ligon Duncan Together for the Gospel- 2018
Let Justice Roll Down Like Waters: Racism and our Need for Repentance - David Platt
“Your children are learning about race from you.” - Jackie Hill Perry
Spoken Word on Fear - Gloria Umanah
Woke Church Conference - Eric Mason
Be the Bridge - Latasha Morrison
What Lies Between Us - Lucretia Berry
The Next Evangelicalism - Soong-Chan Rah
The Color of Compromise - Jemar Tisby
The High Definition Leader - Derwin Gray
I’m Still Here - Austin Channing Brown
Disunity in Christ: Uncovering the Hidden Forces that Keep Us Apart - Christena Cleveland
Healing Racial Trauma : The Road to Resilience - Sheila Wise Rowe
Race Matters - Jarvis J. Williams
The Enduring Effects of White Supremacy in American Culture - Jarvis J. Williams
How Can I Teach My Kids About Race and Racial Unity? A Roundtable Discussion - Lindsay Nicolet
From Every People and Nation: A Biblical Theology of Race - Daniel Hays
From Adam and Israel to the Church - Benjamin L. Gladd
Dignity and Destiny - John F. Kilner
A Multitude of All Peoples: Engaging Ancient Christianity’s Global Identity - Vince L. Bantu
One New Man: The Cross and Racial Reconciliation in Pauline Theology - Jarvis Williams
Bonhoeffer and King: Speaking the Truth to Power - J. Deotis Roberts
Free at Last?: The Gospel in the African-American Experience - Carl F. Ellis, Jr.
Redemptive Kingdom Diversity: A Biblical Theology of the People of God - Jarvis J. Williams
Undermining Racism by NT Wright:
These resources are helpful in understanding and learning the historical and sociological perspectives of our nation. In the same way when we study the Bible we take into consideration the historical, social and cultural context. Biblical theologians and scholars do this by referring to the historical works of Josephus and Herodotus. In the same manner, we pray these would be additional resources to give a larger context and framework to this conversation in order to aid in greater understanding and information. As always, as believers we must view these resources through our Gospel lens as Christians.
Divided by Faith - Michael Emerson and Christian Smith
A People’s History of the United States - Howard Zin
The Minority Experience - Adrian Pei
Let Justice Roll Down - John M Perkins
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness - Michell Alexander
Beyond Racial Gridlock: Embracing Mutual Responsibility - George Yancey
The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration by Isabel Wilkerson
