WORLD NEWS & PROPHECY
Is There a Better Way? As if a pandemic, a battered economy and soaring unemployment weren’t enough, America has once more been shocked by social unrest and racial strife. Is there a path to a better way? by Victor Kubik
W
Johnnyfrs/iStock/Getty Images Plus
hen it hit, it really, really hurt. America was already exhausted by not just thousands of deaths from Covid-19, but record unemployment and economic catastrophe in reaction to it. Then came the horrible, high-profile killing of an African-American man by a police officer in Minneapolis, fixing the mid-year capstone of a year gone terribly bad. In the days and weeks following, multiple thousands took to the streets in protest of the death of George Floyd, who quickly became an icon of terrible injustice. Rage and riots engulfed many U.S. cities. As time passed, three questions dominated: Why did this happen? What can be done? How can we achieve peace and heal the land?
Asia and Africa—including Malawi, Zambia, Zimbabwe and other predominantly black African nations, some of the poorest in the world. Through all this Bev and I have had the privilege of working alongside people of different colors, nationalities and cultures. We have come to know and love people everywhere, regardless of their stature, economic achievement or place in life. We know firsthand what Paul meant when he stated in the first century: “It doesn’t matter if you are a Jew or a Gentile [nonIsraelite], circumcised or uncircumcised, barbaric, uncivilized, slave, or free. Christ is all that matters, and he lives in all of us” (Colossians 3:11, New Living Translation, emphasis added throughout). (Ironically, in ancient times the term “barbarian” or “barUpfront and personal baric” was initially used by Greeks of “babbling” by anyone who For me, the news felt personal. Like many others, I have expe- didn’t speak Greek—amounting to a cultural slur against anyone rienced my own personal share of injustice and oppression. I had outside the Mediterranean area, the rest of the world. Together with anti-Semitism, it represented an early form of racism.) come to the United States in 1949 with my Ukrainian parents as an immigrant from war-torn Europe. I was born in a refugee camp in Germany. My extended family knows well oppression, Racism condemned To God—who doesn’t show favoritism (Romans 2:11)—skin strife and politically driven upheaval of the first order. Ironically, it was in Minneapolis—the site of the awful death color and ethnic background are not what people are measured by. All have full access to Him through the sacrifice of Jesus of George Floyd—that a selfless sponsor graciously stepped Christ. And as the current president of the organization that forward to bring my family from the twisted rubble of World publishes this magazine, I can declare with authority that we at War II to a new future of promise in America. What seems further ironic to me is the fact that Minneapo- Beyond Today condemn racism. We condemn so-called “white lis and the Twin Cities area hold a well-deserved positive repu- superiority.” Neither has anything to do with God! Referring to the current age, the Bible speaks of the injustice tation for accepting, supporting and including refugees from all over the world! So when I learned of this tragic news in my of people and human governments. It reminds one of what the prophet Amos declared: “You twist justice, making it a bitter adopted American home, I was cut to the heart. pill for the oppressed” (Amos 5:7, NLT). Relieving oppression While injustice is rampant in this world, it is also evident that violence usually achieves nothing in terms of solutions for sociMy background helped fuel a lifetime passion for helping people who are oppressed and disadvantaged. In tandem with ety and most often makes things worse. Many countries struggle today with finding solutions for economic and societal equality. my lifelong service as a pastor, my wife Bev and I have lived Consider this fact: America itself, long a beacon of political and worked all over the world, providing extensive humanitarian work for the children of Chernobyl in Ukraine (my ances- freedom to much of the world, allowed almost a full century to lapse from the time the 13th, 14th and 15th U.S. Constitutional tral homeland) and many relief projects in South America, B Tm a g a z i n e . o r g
•
July-August 2020
21
