{"id":55680,"date":"1997-08-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"1997-08-01T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/racism-still-alive\/"},"modified":"1997-08-01T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"1997-08-01T00:00:00","slug":"racism-still-alive","status":"publish","type":"sermon-illustrations","link":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/racism-still-alive\/","title":{"rendered":"Racism Still Alive"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I recently went to the Smoky Mountains with some friends to do some rock climbing. We came to a small town near Knoxville, Tennessee, and pulled into a little country store.<\/p>\n\t\t<p>I walked in. Three white guys sitting there gave me, a black guy, looks I&#39;ve never seen before. One of them said, &quot;You don&#39;t belong around here&#8211;boy.&quot;<\/p>\n\t\t<p>At first I couldn&#39;t believe he was talking to me. Then I couldn&#39;t believe my ears when he said, &quot;Stick around here after dark and we&#39;ll hang you.&quot; I was thinking, Man, we&#39;re sending rockets to Mars and there are still people living in this kind of blind racial ignorance. Suddenly, I was experiencing hatred, the kind of bigotry I&#39;d only read about or seen on TV. I&#39;ll never forget how I felt in that little country store. Less than human. Alone.<\/p>\n\t\t<p>Fortunately, I didn&#39;t lash out; I knew Jesus wouldn&#39;t have. I knew God wanted me to keep my anger under control. So I calmly explained to that man that racism is a thing of the past. I even surprised myself at the restraint I showed.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tax_ctp_audience":[],"tax_ctp_authors":[],"tax_ctp_categories":[165],"tax_ctp_format":[171],"tax_ctp_illustration_types":[411],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[],"tax_publications":[140],"tax_ctp_tags":[3492,3798,4123,4276,4397,4693,4759,4761,4826],"tax_ctp_topics":[378,382,384],"class_list":["post-55680","sermon-illustrations","type-sermon-illustrations","status-publish","hentry","tax_publications-ct-pastors","tax_ctp_tags-bigotry","tax_ctp_tags-discrimination","tax_ctp_tags-hate","tax_ctp_tags-intolerance","tax_ctp_tags-love-for-enemies","tax_ctp_tags-prejudice","tax_ctp_tags-race-relations","tax_ctp_tags-racism","tax_ctp_tags-restraint"],"acf":{"scripture_references":[{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null}]},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Racism Still Alive - CT Pastors<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/preaching\/sermon-illustrations\/racism-still-alive\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Racism Still Alive - CT Pastors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I recently went to the Smoky Mountains with some friends to do some rock climbing. 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