I was born

a southerner. I will die a Christian. I was born a Georgian. I will die

a Christian. I was born a Baptist. I will die a Christian. I was born

in the segregated south. I will die in Christian unity. The question,

however, is which identity will I carry as I live? Which identity will

identify me as I walk in the environs of Fayette and Clayton and Fulton?

As a southerner

I like fried chicken, collards, grits, and country ham. In no way can

pickled herring, hash browns, or raw beef compare, as I try these kinds

of fare up north where my sister lives, a la, Wisconsin. Yet, as a Christian,

while visiting in Uganda three years ago, I gladly ate roasted grasshoppers

as they were served to me as a sign of a royal welcome into a native's

home (what do they taste like: combine the taste of fried bacon with Fritos

and you've got the idea--really a great taste. It was just a mind thing

you had to get over). You see, Christians don't turn up their noses as

if to say something is common and unclean.

As a Georgian,

I am proud of the state and love to talk about our red dirt (as opposed

to red clay). I understand "redneck" to be a sign of a hard

worker, not a dumb teenager (a redneck was a farmer who worked up a sweat

and would wipe his neck with his hands colored by the red soil). I like

to talk about the time we had two governors and proud that one of our

governors became President of all the states. Yet, as a Christian, I would

rather lift up the royal banner of my Savior and Lord Jesus Christ than

any state flag. Yet, because I am a Christian, I would be proud if our

state flag were represented of all our people, a sizable number who are

African-Americans.

As a Baptist,

I like to hear all the jokes about other denominations. One of my Methodist

brothers told the one that the draught was so bad in Texas that the Baptists

were sprinkling and the Methodists were using a damp rag. Baptists were

so predominate in my family that when my sister was marrying a Catholic

and our family heard that the groom's father was a Lutheran, the question

was asked, "What's a Lutheran?" To which my older sister responded,

"It's another one of those outlaw religions." Why, to a backward

Baptist raised in the Deep South, Methodists were almost a cult.

The Pentecostals

have longed joked about us Baptists. They say that the Bible declares

that Baptists will be the first in heaven. After all doesn't the Scripture

say, "The dead in Christ will arise first."

But, thank

God, I have learned that Lutherans, Catholics, Pentecostals, and Baptists

will all sit on the same pew in Heaven's Church not because we were right,

but because we are Christians and were made right by grace through faith

in Jesus Christ.

Yes, I was

born in the segregated south. I got up and moved to another seat when

a young Black girl plopped down beside me during the days when Rosa Parks

had taken her seat against bus segregation. God has forgiven me and my

Black brethren have forgiven me for that act of blatant racism. But my

misbehavior came from my culture and my ignorance. Since, I have read

the Book of Books and it says, "In Christ there is neither..."

The Book declares

that if the Son of God has set you free, you are freed indeed. Good friends,

I am a free man thanks to that great Palestine liberator, Jesus Christ.

And nobody can take that away from me.

Rev. Dr. John Hatcher is pastor

of River's Edge

Community Church in Fayetteville.

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