ORU Board Chair Leads On Racial Reconciliation
One of the many goals at ORU is to graduate alumni who are passionate about being
lifelong learners; leaders who understand that their education doesn’t stop on Commencement
Day, but continues through the rest of their time here on this earth.
That commitment to leading through lifelong learning is shared by Dr. Mike Rakes, Chair of the ORU Board of Trustees and Co-pastor with his wife Darla of Winston-Salem First Church in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. It is this commitment both to learning and to the fullest possible embrace of the gospel that has led the Rakes to begin addressing racial reconciliation in their congregation.
“You have to educate yourself, and I’m still learning,” Dr. Mike Rakes said. “You’re going to get it wrong, you’re going to make a lot of mistakes, and that’s embarrassing, but you learn as you go. And people will generally forgive if you make a mistake. But when your biases are glaring and stick out, as a spiritual authority, you’re supposed to bring correction.”
With racial reconciliation gaining national attention over this past summer, the Rakes have been quietly laying the groundwork in their church to seize the moment and begin to have honest conversations among their congregation—conversations that will lead to planned action.
“When we came 14 years ago, we made an intentional effort [to demonstrate] that our church was open to all people,” Rakes said. “I did that through hiring… making sure we had diversity in our leadership and at the board level.
“When the Trayvon Martin situation happened, my wife felt compelled on that Sunday to address it and called our church into mourning for Trayvon’s mom and to put ourselves in her skin,” Rakes continued. “And in each subsequent crisis, we would address it, we would mourn. We’ve done foot-washings on a Sunday morning. We’ve done a lot of things trying to reconcile, but what we’ve found is that we’ve been paying closer attention to verbal diversity rather than a deeper discipleship into reconciliation. The Bible really calls you to reconciliation. That was the impetus of what we’re doing now, to say this is the moment.”
Conversations and committees that have been meeting at the leadership level are now being shared with the congregation at Winston-Salem First.
“How can we be about more than just lamenting and mourning with those who mourn? How can we really work for change? It was time for us not to sit on the fence anymore, to just go all-in and declare.”
To that end, Rakes and the other leaders at Winston-Salem First have created a dedicated Reconciliation Team, complete with a pastor hired specifically to lead it. They are also in the midst of putting together tangible initiatives to present to their congregation.
“What can look minor and insignificant can be a process that can really strengthen and help move forward, just little intentional things that can be put into the overall culture,” Rakes said. “We can’t change mindsets overnight, [but] I feel very calm and confident in my biblical understanding that Jesus was a little bit subversive.”
Rakes also sees this as not just a moment in history, but as an ongoing mandate that requires strong, whole leadership.
“This next generation is going to make up their minds about one another, so to go silent is dangerous to the kids in our church,” he said. “They need to hear their pastor talking about things like racial reconciliation.”
And in the end, Rakes is looking to his dedication to lifelong learning as a means of sustaining this movement within his church and the world at large.
“It’s a long journey. I’ll finish my pastoral career having this as a main goal.”
Pictured above: Dr. Mike and Pastor Darla Rakes pray for racial equality at a recent citywide gathering of local spiritual leaders in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.