The Next Black Evangelical by Edward Gilbreath

smacked me upside the head in a variety of ways-the acceptable worship songs at church, the photos used to illustrate magazine articles and ministry ads, the feeling of always having to reeducate my white friends and colleagues. Looking back on his own experience, Gilbreath adds, 'I got a rude awakening once I began to ascend the professional ranks at white evangelical institutions. Frankly, it is as if they are stunned to find out that their cultural, political, and religious frame of reference is not the only one.' And while he loves that world, he and many of his fellow black evangelicals are troubled by many things they have experienced.Ī black woman who 'works at an evangelical Christian company' once wrote to Gilbreath, 'The white Christians I encounter often display a shocking provincialism-a real naïveté about the world around them. Having spent his life in evangelical churches, colleges, and institutions, he knows the evangelical world inside and out. Gilbreath is editor-at-large for Christianity Today Magazine and director of editorial for Urban Ministries, Inc. The Church, Gilbreath believes, has a lot of thinking and learning to do about black history, and about race relations in general. But a recent book by Edward Gilbreath, titled Reconciliation Blues: A Black Evangelical's Inside View of White Christianity makes me think that maybe we should be thinking beyond that. We often tend to think of it as just being something that schools celebrate every year. Since 1926, February has been known as Black History Month.

The Next Black Evangelical by Edward Gilbreath