I Can't Breathe

Photo by Taymaz Valley from Ottawa, Canada, 

licensed under CC BY 2.0

May 31, 2020 (Pentecost Sunday) 
Amos 5:18-24; Matthew 25:31-46  
Trinity Baptist Church, Newton, NC 

It is the rarest of weeks in which I alter my plan for the sermon after the order of worship has been printed. But it happened this week. It started Friday night. Actually, it was very early Saturday morning. I woke up about 3 a.m., lying on my stomach. I’m not a stomach-sleeper, so I was surprised to find myself in that position. It felt uncomfortable at first, and then it got worse. The horrible video from Minneapolis that I had seen far too many times during the week began to play in my head. I put my hands behind my back and pressed them together at the wrists. I imagined what it would feel like to be in that position, not in my bed but on asphalt with two men kneeling on my torso and a third with his knee pressing down on my neck. I remembered what was like years ago when I had pneumonia and every breath was a struggle. I imagined that sense of panic coming over me all over again. I imagined myself saying, “I can’t breathe.” And I wondered if among my last words, I would call out for my mother as George Floyd did in Minneapolis on Memorial Day. 

But unlike George Floyd, I was able to roll over in my bed and keep breathing. And as I did, I reflected on the fact that what happened to Mr. Floyd would not have happened to me. If I were suspected of passing a counterfeit $20 bill, I would not end up dead, because the four officers involved in Mr. Floyd’s death would have treated a short, old, white-collar, white male quite differently than they treated Mr. Floyd. And therein lies the problem. And that’s why I felt compelled, even though I didn’t want to, I assure you, to set aside the sermon I had prepared to preach for the sermon I can’t not preach as a servant of the Word and a witness to our Lord Jesus Christ. So here is the Word, as this servant and witness sees it and hears it the Sunday after Memorial Day in Minneapolis. 

In a tumultuous time in the eighth century BCE in the northern kingdom of Israel, the prophet Amos proclaimed in Bethel that even though God’s people were doing all the right religious things—they were giving their tithes and offerings, they were keeping the Sabbath and singing the songs and praying the prayers and giving thanks to the Lord and celebrating the festivals—like Pentecost, that I had prepared to celebrate in this morning’s sermon—even though the people of God were doing all the right religious things, Amos announced God’s judgment on God’s own people because while they went about their business of doing all the right religious things, the head of the poor in the land was being trampled into the dust of the earth, and the afflicted were being pushed out of the way, says Amos 1:7. The poor were being oppressed, and the needy were being crushed, says Amos 4:1. 

Amos’s proclamation in that time and place puts us all on notice in our time and place that no matter how high our standards are for faithfulness and devotion and righteousness in the things of God, if our standards are not equally as high for faithfulness and devotion and righteousness toward our neighbor, especially our afflicted neighbor, that double standard will be the death of us. Right worship without right treatment of all persons under God and under the law is useless in God’s sight. In fact, it’s worse than useless: it’s detestable in God’s sight. 

Listen to how Eugene Peterson’s paraphrase makes Amos 5:18-24 clear in our time and place.

I can’t stand your religious meetings. I’m fed up with your conferences and conventions. I want nothing to do with your religious projects, your pretentious slogans and goals. I’m sick of your fund-raising schemes, your public relations and image making. I’ve had all I can take of your noisy ego-music. When was the last time you sang to me? Do you know what I want? I want justice—oceans of it. I want fairness—rivers of it. That’s what I want. That’s all I want. 

It is as though in the parable that Jesus told in Matthew 25, people said, “When did we see you and we weren’t just?” “When did we see you, and we weren’t fair?” “When did we see you, and we treated you with a double standard?” And the king in the parable would reply, “Any time it happened to one of the least of these it happened to me.” On Memorial Day in Minneapolis, it happened to George Floyd. And when it happened to George Floyd, it happened to Jesus Christ. And when it happened to George Floyd, it happened to us all. It happened to me, and it happened to you. We have sown the wind of double standards, and we are now reaping the whirlwind. And all the right religious behavior in the world will not save us until we make justice and fairness and faithfulness and devotion and righteousness toward our neighbor of every of every race and every station as high a priority in every aspect of our daily lives, our neighborhood, our community, our county, our state, our nation, and our world as our faithfulness and devotion and righteousness toward God. 

Let me suggest two places to start. First, every one of us should call on our Senators and Representatives in Washington to revitalize and reinvigorate the oversight and accountability of local law enforcement agencies that was established by Congress in the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994. That act gives the federal Department of Justice the authority and the responsibility to investigate, negotiate, and resolve systemic “patterns and practices” of abuse in policing. There is nothing partisan about that Act, and there is nothing partisan in calling for the Department of Justice to do what the legislative branch of our federal government has charged it to do under the law. Republican and Democratic administrations alike have seen to it that the Department of Justice carried out its role of oversight and accountability for just, fair, and equitable treatment of all persons under the law and under law enforcement. 

The problem in Minneapolis on Memorial Day is not just “bad apples” on a police force who pinned an unarmed, handcuffed man down on the asphalt until he died. The problem is that people in Minneapolis, as in some other cities and towns around the country, have been crying out for years for relief from double standards in enforcement; and in the video of George Floyd’s death, we all saw an extreme example of what some people in and around Minneapolis, among other places, have been seeing and experiencing for years. We can effect change in Washington and in Minneapolis alike, and one change we can effect is the revitalization and reinvigoration of the oversight and accountability that Congress mandated in 1994 and every administration for nearly a quarter century made a cornerstone of the work of the Department of Justice in local communities. That’s the first place to start. 

Here’s the second place to start. Four summers ago, in the aftermath of two police shootings of African American men in one week, one of them outside Minneapolis-St. Paul, by the way, a peaceful march in Dallas, TX, turned suddenly lethal with what amounted to the premeditated assassination of five law enforcement officers. Lorne Ahrens, Michael Krol, Michael Smith, Brent Thompson, and Patrick Zanmarripa were killed while carrying out their sworn duty to serve and protect. On Friday morning of that week, Natashah Howell, a young African-American woman went to a convenience store in Andover, MA, to pick up a few things; and here’s what happened, as she describe it in a Facebook post.  

As I walked through the door, I noticed that there were two white police officers (one about my age, the other several years older) talking to the clerk (an older white women) behind the counter about the shootings that have gone on in the past few days. They all looked at me and fell silent. I went about my business to get what I was looking for, as I turned back up the aisle to go pay, the oldest officer was standing at the top of the aisle watching me. As I got closer he asked me, “How I was doing? I replied, “Okay, and you? He looked at me with a strange look and asked me, “How are you really doing?” I looked at him and said “I’m tired!” His reply was, “me too.” Then he said, “I guess it’s not easy being either one of us right now is it.” I said, “No, it’s not.” Then he hugged me and I cried. I had never seen that man before in my life. I have no idea why he was moved to talk to me. What I do know is that he and I shared a moment this morning, that was absolutely beautiful. No judgments, No justifications, two people sharing a moment.

Her hashtag at the end of the post was #Foundamomentofclarity. Found a moment of clarity. That moment of clarity, that moment of turning to each other instead of on each other, of coming together instead of coming apart, is a model for what must happen in this congregation, in this community, in this state and region and nation and world. Every one of us must come to understand that when it happens to George Floyd, it happens to every one of us—“I can’t breathe.” And when it does, our faithfulness and devotion and righteousness in the things of God are useless, detestable, even, in the eyes of God, as Amos said. What we do or allow others to do to those persons whom we or they consider to be “the least”  among us, we do or allow others to do to none other than our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Every one of us must come to understand that if we do nothing or say nothing, we are Derek Chauvin, with our knee on the necks of other persons until they can’t breathe. There will be no justice and there will be no peace because our knees are on their necks. 

It is time for a moment of clarity to remove the double standards in our lives and in every walk of life. Hear the word of the Lord: “Do you know what I want? I want justice—oceans of it. I want fairness—rivers of it. That’s what I want. That’s all I want.” 

Start with a non-partisan call to your Senator and your Representative. And start by turning to someone instead of on them and coming together instead of coming apart.

Copyrighted © 2020 by Jeffrey S. Rogers. This material may be copied or disseminated for non-commercial use, provided this notice is included. The author can be contacted at jeff@jeffreysrogers.org.