A Biblical Basis for Reparations
My daughters are quite young, and get in many arguments, mostly with each other. I’ve done the whole “Say you’re sorry” thing, but have now moved (as they have grown) into saying “Make it right!” instead. This normally results in the shuffling forward to give hugs and mumbling “sorry.” While I sometimes doubt the sincerity, they usually move on past it to continue playing. I want them to understand that when you do something that breaks the relationship—you need to do something to fix it. Sometimes they come up with really creative ways to “Make it right” that surprise me.
I think the biggest thing to me to realizing that fixing broken relationships always costs someone something. If Sofia (my older daughter) breaks Jessica’s (my younger daughter) doll, that will cause a break in their relationship. It will cost SOMEONE something to fix it—either Sofia will have to give her a different doll (or use her money to buy a new doll, or try to fix the doll), or Jessica will just have to do without a doll (not normally an option for her). In our relationship with God: even though we broke the relationship with sin—He is the one who paid it all to fix it—and that is an incredible thought and example.
Supercamp taught me well in 2011 with the tool to fix broken relationships:
I think the idea of “Making it right” or “repairing the relationship” or “reparations” is pretty basic and foundational in the Christian faith. Here are some introductary things about reparations, if you haven’t thought about it much. There are two articles (and more I am sure) that share the reasons much better than I do.
The Gospel Coalition article mentions Exod. 21-22; Lev. 5; Luke 19:1-10 and goes into the example of the book of Ezra. The Medium article mentions Deuteronomy 15:12–15 and the example of Zacchaeus., as well as Matthew 5:23, Mark 12:31, Luke 6:31, and Philippians 2:4. This is how I talked about it with my daughters:
As time passed, and a lot of people thought that since THEY didn’t ever have slaves, THEY shouldn’t have to “make it right.” But that isn’t how the Bible talks about it. In the Old Testament, God’s people messed up a lot. And they had to “make it right,” even if it wasn’t them who messed up in the first place: we weren’t the ones who ate from the tree in the garden of Eden, but we all are born broken and away from God in the “Without God” box because of that first sin.
Remember Josiah? He was a good king who worked hard to obey God. But God said that even though he obeyed, so many kings in the past had not, that Israel would still be punished, just not while he was king. One time, king Saul messed up and then while King David was in charge, there was punishment that kept going until David made it right. Daniel prayed for God to forgive his sin—which wasn’t actually him that did it--but his family and past family that had done it.
We can very clearly see the effects of our racist past today in matters of money, and how an average white family has ten times the amount that an average Black family has. We can see it in housing situations, education, prisons, and many other areas. So many of our Black brothers and sisters are hurting and feel wounded: this is not what God wants. It is really overwhelming to think that God has called us to be His little Christs and work to redeem this, but He has. He wants us to invite Him into the process.
Most people are not ready to talk about reparations because it will cost them something, and they either don’t want to pay it, or are scared that it will cost too much. As Americans, we most often think about things costing us being about money, but I think reparations and redemption is about much more than money. Money, most of the time, doesn’t fix big problems: especially not heart problems. Money isn’t the answer (although it may be part of some of an answer). It is also much easier for us to think about how the government can fix things, rather than how we can fix things as individuals, families, and churches. But that is where we need to start. Here are some ideas.
Note: as I was writing “Check the Box,” I realized that there are important steps and responsibilities for the offender and the offended to take for reconciliation to happen:
