Woke Church: An Urgent Call for Christians in America to Confront Racism and Injustice Hardcover – October 2, 2018

This is a must read book for every Evangelical Christian. This timely, biblical, and well written work deserves a wide readership and great acclaim. Dr. Eric Mason, founder of Epiphany Fellowship in Philadelphia, PA writes winsomly and persuasively, calling on the church to acknowledge it's sins in it's complacency in not just the racial injustice of our past, but those that continue even today. With whit, class and extreme biblical fidelity Dr. Mason outlines clearly a four part plan for the church to be reconciled and lead the way in racial reconciliation to a deeply divided nation. These parts are 1.Be Aware. 2. Be Willing to Acknowledge. 3. Be Accountable. 4. Be Active.In part one Dr. Mason outlines some of the churches failings currently as well as the biblical basis for being "Woke", a term that designates awareness of the continued forms of racial injustice that still plauge our communities and the historical realities that lead to them. But more than that to be truly "Woke" one also must be aware of how Christ sees each of us, this Christ centered awareness lends depth and urgency to our need to right these wrongs. He also shows just how important Justice is to Jesus and how big a biblical theme it is in general, and how to our discredit many Christians, as did the Pharisees, have neglected these weightier matters of the law.In part 2 Dr. Mason details the Churches response to racial injustice historically in several different time periods. These being the period between the 15th and 19th centuries known as the transatlantic slave trade. The post slavery period from the civil war to the civil rights era. The civil rights era to the modern era, and lastly the modern era. He shows that despite some serious good done by Christian abolitionists and the civil rights movement, that overall the church has failed to speak truth to power, to be a prophetic voice for justice, a light on a hill for our Lord Jesus. Honestly this eye opening and convicting section of Dr. Masons fine work is worth the price of the entire book on its own and needs to become common knowledge for those in the church.Part 3 provides practical advise on how we as a church can reclaim our prophetic voice, as well as providing hope and a vision for change. That we as a church must be biblically informed, must speak clearly and contend rhetorically in order to speak prophetically into the lives of those who are oppressed by racial injustice. There are many today waiting for, and who need to see the church addressing these issues, lest we loose them to the growing threat of ethnocentric ideologies, specifically those that have come to be identified as the "Consciousness Community". To do this Dr. Mason provides 3 different forms of Justice the church must seek to embody, as well as practical steps to be implemented for each form of Justice. First at the individual level there is Intervening Justice, second at the community level there is Preventative Justice, third at the societal level there is Systemic Justice.Part four details more ways in which we can help and Dr. Mason gives many helpful examples from his own work fighting racial injustices such as the school to prison pipeline and redlining in his community through the efforts of his Church. He then ends the book with a looking forward to the eschaton. The coming kingdom of God where all nation's, tribes, tongues and languages will kneel before the throne of God. This multiethnic reality of the kingdom doesn't start at the end of history, but with us, now, today. This as Dr. Mason notes should empower us to reach across the isle and work for reconciliation and justice for our brothers and sisters, that we should begin the hard but rewarding work of loving our neighbors as ourselves.Heavily dependant on scripture and theologically air tight all the way through, this is an urgent wake up call that we as the church cannot afford to ignore. Every Christian should own a copy of this powerful book. Thank you Dr. Mason for this incredibly convicting and empowering work.All I can say is let's get to work, as the apostle Paul says in Ephesians 5:14 "...“Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”let's get Woke Church!

This is an important topic which bears repeating. This was very well written, lots of good implementable ways. Great read.

Well written and outstanding Biblical documentation with a more uplifting and positive perspective on woke religion. And helpful and constructive perspectives on what we all should (and can) do to make things better. Not just a lecture on what is wrong, but a pathway to correction.

Honestly, I do not understand the current movement today within the church that suggests that justice is peripheral and actually against the gospel. The Dallas Statement on Social Justice and the Gospel has united many  against it, from Al Mohler to the more traditionally justice oriented progressive Evangelicals. I do not need to be persuaded that seeking justice is an important of what it means to be the church. There is certainly, differences in method and strategy. What types of justice that an individual or church seeks after will matter based on calling, geography, demographics, etc. And, of course, the church should not be partisan in its approach to justice (although it will likely be political). Eric Mason did not need to convince me of the biblical calling toward justice, or of the history of the church being on the wrong side of justice. But I am still glad that I read Woke Church. Woke Church is organized around four themes, 'Be Aware. Be Willing to Acknowledge. Be Accountable. Be Active.'Mason walks through awareness and acknowledgement. Blind spots are real. If we are blind to both injustice and how it works, and has work historically, we cannot even start to right injustice. The early historical and biographical sections of the book were strong. The strongest section of the book for me was the discussion of the prophetic. Mason charges the church with being properly prophetic. He walks through the Old Testament prophets, both how they called the people toward justice and how they were received. Prophetic does not mean unaccountable and it does not separate the concept of prophetic from the proclamation of the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Done rightly, we are proclaiming the gospel and Lordship of Jesus Christ as part of a prophetic call. Woke Church ends with ‘Be Active’. This section is not prescriptive, but descriptive of how Mason leads his church to be active. Different contexts will be active in different ways. John Perkins wrote one of the two introductions to Woke Church and this final section has the finger prints of Perkin’s legacy all over it. In someways, I am not sure there is really anything here that is particular to Woke Church. Good ministry to the community, a ministry that seeks justice and the Shalom of the community will naturally work on racial injustice as well as all other forms of injustice. Mason highlights racial injustice because the Evangelical church as a whole has been largely silent 'during virtually every major wave of injustice in America affecting blacks.’ And that call to racial justice is important. The second introduction to the book is Lingon Duncan. Duncan publicly repented from ‘racial blindness’ during the Together For the Gospel (T4G) conference earlier this year and has written about it in several places. During Duncan’s T4G talk, he says that in 1990 he first taught a course on Pastoral and Social Ethics in Jackson, Mississippi. He said it never occurred to him in the context of the class to discuss racism. I go back and forth about the title. Woke is a controversial term. Jemar Tisby and Tyler Burns on their Pass the Mic podcast had a good discussion about the term in April 2017. Jemar was less interested in the term because it has the connotation of having arrived, and there never is a full completion to ‘wokeness’. Tyler was more supportive of the term because he thought it communicated an important idea that some people have ‘awoken’ from their slumber and realize that they have been asleep to issues of injustice, particularly racial injustice. Somewhat like the term ‘social justice’ the concerns raised by the Dallas statement are not really about justice (because the Dallas statement wants to pursue justice, but only in certain areas like abortion and gay marriage.) Woke has a particular negative connotation for many that need to be convinced of the basic concept. I am not sure there is any getting around the problem. Those that are turned off by the idea of racial justice being particularly important, are the ones that need to read the book and are the ones that are least likely to read it.

This book tackles the question, what does it look like for the church to be both aware, " woke" to injustice, most specifically the injustice that impacts specifically African Americans, yet centered on the gospel of Jesus. If the word woke is a trigger word, still strongly recommend. Even if you don't agree, you'll agree that this Pastor knows the bible, loves Jesus, and yearns to faithfully interpret the word. Books is geared to pastors and church leaders who want to know how their church can be a part of the solution in this divided American church we see.

This book puts being Woke into another realm. We can be awake living day by day but remain the same and indifferent to what's going on around us. Being The Woke Church is being aware and active in what is going on around us. We can march and meet but we need action to make a change. By embracing each other and physically helping and getting to know one another will help us bridge racial divides and make each person or culture less scary and weird. If you want to know how to go about addressing injustice and racism this book will open your eyes. Thia book will show how we are all brothers and sisters and injustice or anything against another person or culture is our problem to address. We are all made in the image of God and are loved by Him. Therefore we need to act like it respect one another and stand in the gap when others are wronged.

The Bible calls in fact expects believers to be spiritually aware (equivalent to woke). Therefore, this is a call on the church to do just that.