John Perkins, one of America’s most prominent Evangelical voices on civil rights and racial reconciliation is dying of Cancer and he is sending a final message to America which is “repent.”. He is 91 years old. He asks Americans to repent of their sins and return to God and the centrality of the Gospel.
In an interview with Christian Post, John Perkins said “Repentance is the only way back to God. Unless you repent, you will all perish. That was the story of Jonah to Nineveh. They repented. They repented.”
Tom Depew defined centrality of the Gospel as “the belief that the Gospel that saved, is the same Gospel that should be made central in every Christian’s life. Meaning, the Gospel is more powerful than we think, and does more than we could ever imagine.”
In his final book, Count it All Joy: The Ridiculous Paradox of Suffering, John Perkins presented a compelling narrative on the essential roles suffering and the centrality of the Gospel play in delivering the United States from social maladies like racism, bigotry, strife and pain.
He wrote “This is the great paradox of suffering! Suffering drives us deeper in Him. Suffering drives the roots of our faith deep, deep into the reservoir of His sufficiency. With each new privilege to suffer, our roots go even deeper in Him,”
“And before you know it we have become like the tree that David spoke of in Psalm 1. We become ‘like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither—whatever they do prospers’ (Ps. 1:3). Not only are we strengthened to ready ourselves for the next storm, we produce fruit that shelters, nourishes, and encourages others,”