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The Color-Courageous Journey

Is there a connection between race and discipleship? What does it mean to move from being color-blind to color courageous? How do these contrasting ideas relate to our Christian faith?

In her book Color-Courageous Discipleship: Follow Jesus, Dismantle Racism, and Build Beloved Community (WaterBrook, Nov. 1, 2022), Michelle T. Sanchez, senior discipleship and evangelism leader of the Evangelical Covenant Church, a vibrant multiethnic denomination of more than 900 congregations, addresses these important questions and challenges readers to push past their discomfort in the pursuit of racial justice as it pertains to their walk with God.

Color-Courageous Discipleship: Follow Jesus, Dismantle Racism, and Build Beloved Community serves as a vital resource exploring antiracism from a Christian perspective and as a means of growing closer with Christ. Race and discipleship may appear unrelated to one another, but Sanchez argues that they are interconnected. She defines color-courageous disciples as people who are on a “courageous, lifelong journey of following Jesus, dismantling racism, and building beloved community.”

“I now understand that one of the most meaningful ways to get to know Jesus better is to go deeper with him in our racial challenges,” Sanchez writes.

Sanchez outlines what color-courageous discipleship looks like in application, addresses engaging questions from a biblical perspective, and explores what it means to ground your antiracism in Jesus Christ. Sharing her own vulnerable and personal stories and providing insights from scripture, Sanchez equips readers for their journey in dismantling racism while being spiritually grounded. Partnered with the Color Courageous Discipleship Student Edition (WaterBrook, Nov. 1, 2022) and children’s picture book, God’s Beloved Community (WaterBrook, Nov. 1, 2022), Sanchez aims to reach disciples of all ages to demonstrate God’s intention for a diverse loving community who is willing to pursue color-courageous discipleship.

Highlights from Color-Courageous Discipleship include:

• How race and discipleship are connected: Throughout the Bible, discipleship and ethnicity have always been linked.  Discipleship entails a dual call to embrace diversity and dismantle racism – both of which are needed to pursue God’s kingdom vision. First, disciples are called to embrace diversity. This is not a call to be PC; it’s a call to embrace God’s own vision. Throughout the Scriptures, we see that God has always delighted in ethnic diversity as a means of bringing glory to himself and enrichment to his kingdom.  Second, disciples are called to dismantle racism. Diversity was meant to be a source of delight, but in our broken world, diversity too often leads to division and inequity. This is why disciples are also called to dismantle racism in the pursuit of equity. “But here’s the part that’s most exciting to me,” says Sanchez, “as disciples embrace diversity and dismantle racism in Jesus’ name, we also have an opportunity to get to know Jesus better.”

• The difference between being color-blind and color-courageous. For a long time, we’ve seen color-blindness as a virtue. Surprisingly, new research demonstrates that color-blindness leads to racial inequity — precisely the opposite of what we want! Those who are color-courageous choose to courageously see color for the sake of dismantling racism and pursuing racial equity.  As a discipleship leader, Sanchez is on a mission to share that God has always called disciples not to be color-blind, but color-courageous.

• We all have inherited biases. Whether we are aware of it or not, where we were raised, went to school, and the communities we immerse ourselves in heavily impact the way we view people of different races and within our own racial groups. The only way to overcome unconscious bias is with Christlike humility.

• Awakening to inequity: “I grew up as a Black girl in a predominantly White community, and I had a great experience,” Sanchez shares. “I did really well, even graduating as the first Black valedictorian. I was sold on meritocracy – that all you need to do is perform well, and you’ll get what you deserve. I even landed a coveted job at Goldman Sachs, one of the most prestigious investment banks in the world. One day while I was at the bank, however, I volunteered to teach finance at a low-income school in a different part of town – and it rocked my world. That day I came to understand my simple formula of ‘work hard and get what you deserve’ simply can’t work for everyone. The truth is that not everyone has the same starting point; resources and opportunities are not fairly distributed.”

• The necessity of healing while on your discipleship journey. Healing is a component of discipleship and has direct effect on the way interact and impact others. Healing, discipleship, and mission are intimately intertwined. Color-courageous disciples will be far more effective in God’s mission to make the world whole to the extent we are whole ourselves—spiritually, emotionally, relationally and in every other way.

• Spiritual practices to boost racial discipleship: 1) Read scripture with cultural insight, 2) Prayer of lament, 3) Pilgrimage, 4) Fasting—the denial of self for the sake of others.

In addition to a foreword from Ed Stetzer, professor and dean at Wheaton College, and an afterward from New York Times bestselling author Jemar Tisby,  this timely, gospel-centered, practical, and thought-provoking book offers interviews from color-courageous leaders, including Esau McCauley, Eugene Cho, Efrem Smith, Sheila Wise Rowe, and more. Included are small group reflection questions and an extensive glossary of terms, making this an ideal resource for Bible studies, book groups, and church-wide reading programs.