I remember as a kid having only two crayons to choose from for skin color: peach for white-skinned Caucasians like me, or brown for everyone else.
Today, you’ll find a few more selections. Even better, Sabine Joseph has developed a new crayon color line that celebrates the beauty of all skin tones.
Her company is called All of Us Art, and it all started when she struggled to find a beeswax crayon for her daughter to depict her grandmother’s skin color. Nothing was quite right.
So Sabine made a simple set of beeswax crayons, posted a picture on social media, sold a set on Etsy, and in a year-and-a-half discovered enough demand to launch her own company.
Praise God! Sabine’s crayons are intended to celebrate the diversity of skin colors in our world, and to teach children that every ethnicity matters. God agrees.
I visited a biblical city called Joppa in Israel, where God sent a dream to the apostle Peter with all kinds of different foods. He told Peter to eat these different kinds of foods, some of which Peter had never eaten before because they were deemed unclean.
God was creating a diversity of crayons for Peter to use in sharing the good news of Jesus’ death and resurrection. It’s for everyone! Each person, in every nation, matters! Peter proclaimed, “God has shown me that I should not call anyone impure or unclean” (Acts 10:28).
In our prideful hearts, we quickly and often think of other ethnic groups as inferior. God will not have it.
“God does not show favoritism but accepts from every nation the one who fears him and does what is right. You know the message God sent to the people of Israel, announcing the good news of peace through Jesus Christ, who is Lord of all” (Acts 10:34-36).
As a man, Jesus’ ethnicity is Jewish. As God, he has no ethnicity other than Savior of all people. Be sure that all the different skin colors of people in your life know you believe that about them, and about Jesus. “Everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name” (Acts 10:43).
PRAYER: Teach me, Lord, to see other people for who they are, who you have made them to be. Not to be color blind when looking at others’ skin, but to see their color as beautiful. Amen.
FURTHER STUDY: Do a quick online search for the demographics of the community where you live. Do the numbers align with your weekly experience interacting with others? With your church demographics? If not, is it because you don’t notice, or you isolate yourself in your own ethnic circle? Pray about this and perhaps God will lead you or your church to new places like he led Peter.