The eight year old girl had just visited her father in his downtown office.  The elevator stopped a floor below her father’s and a gentleman got on.  The young girl got scared.  By the time they reached the lobby she was in full tears and screamed as she ran out.  Those who were in the building lobby that day looked and saw the man standing in the elevator.  They imagined the worse, but the real horror was about to come.

Most likely the black gentleman didn’t do anything to the little girl, but those in lobby held an impromptu court hearing found the man guilty, and sentenced him to an immediate death.  But they didn’t stop there.  Word, their version, of what had taken place quickly spread, and the next thing everyone knew, Black people were being killed.

Today, as I write this post, it is the 100 year anniversary of the worst race riot in America.  Some call it, “The Tulsa Race Massacre”.  Even our own air force was brought in to bomb Black Wall Street and the surrounding area where most Black people lived in Tulsa.  I remember seeing, in one of my early history books, a photo of two flat train cars with bodies stacked high across it.  They took them out of town and buried them somewhere, most likely, in a mass grave.

I was born and raised in Tulsa.  I am proud to call it, my hometown, yet that day in my eighth grade history class, I bowed my head in shame.  Later, when I was in college, my history professor told us the event had been removed from the books, but he told us the above story anyway.

It does no one any good to try to hide the past.  If you do, you and or others can’t learn from it.  The saddest part of this story is how it begin.  That men looked at the skin of another and assumed the worse.  Most will say they aren’t a racist, but aren’t there times when you see someone, who perhaps looks different from you and you adjust your speech, your actions, or at the very least, your thoughts?  Racism, despite the individual generating it, is an ugly thing.  I think it makes God so sick to his stomach.

We were all made by God, and are descendants of Adam and Eve, so honestly, how can anyone be a racist toward their own family member?  And if we all had the love of God within us, there would be no room for racism.  To those who died 100 years ago today, I am so sorry.  It was wrong, and I will never forget.

“Above all continue to love one another fervently, for love throws a veil over a multitude of faults.” 1 Pt. 4:8 (WNT)

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