Last night, I went to dinner with the leader of the church group under the pretense that he wanted to discuss a question I asked. Things didn’t go so great…
Allow me to begin by laying out the sentiments of Romans Chapter 14. If you read that chapter, the jest of it is how Christians shouldn’t be quarreling over these differences of opinions when it comes to our faith or belief.
Verse 13 says, “Therefore let us not pass judgment on one another any longer, but rather decide never to put a stumbling block or hindrance in the way of a brother.”
What I love about that chapter is that 1) it takes the pressure off of you stronger Christians when it comes to trying so hard to make another Christian believe the way you believe. And 2) it should reduce/eliminate arguments between us as humans since the main person we need to answer to is God.
Last night, I got into a debate with an older woman about waiting till marriage to have sex. I told her about the peer pressure I faced and she sided with my old friends who encouraged me to have sex before marriage, saying, “well, I think they’re speaking to you from a place of practicality and common sense.”
Before I begin, allow me to make some points about faith. What is faith? People have written whole books about it, but for this essay, I want to focus on this notion. “Faith is having a “belief in something not yet seen.” (Hebrew 11:1)” Faith is believing in something that hasn’t happened yet. It’s believing in something that has happened, but you weren’t there to see it for yourself.
Alright…let’s begin.
The older woman I conversed with is a 60-something year old widow I befriended at the gym last year. We’ll call her, Stella. Stella seems to have a good heart. She lost her husband about three years ago. We text from time to time, keeping each other’s spirits up. And while she does claim to be Christian, we’ve had several conversations where it’s made clear that she’s very liberal and loose with her Christianity.
I knew nothing about Hillsong before watching this documentary. That being said, I think I was able to watch it with an open mind with no hard prejudices about prosperity preaching or even the concept of a mega church. I was just curious. What is Hillsong? What happened? Why do so many in the mainstream seem to care?
Food for thought: If a person preaches the word of God and rely on the Bible for their messaging…but they turn out to be hypocrites not living by the standards they preach, does that mean they’re wrong about what they preached? In this case, is Christianity wrong if the people preaching about Christianity don’t live the way they encourage other people to live?
According to the documentary, most of Hillsong’s mainstream appeal, especially to a younger audience in a secular society that’s moving away from the Bible, was due to a charismatic, good-looking speaker named Carl Lentz.
As the face of Hillsong, Carl Lentz had a magnetic gift for oratory. His popularity blossomed due to his association with celebrities like Justin Bieber. He helped Bieber to convert and be Baptized.
However, as is the case with many spiritual leaders, Carl was ensnared by the weakness of the flesh and gave into sexual temptation. He cheated on his wife with some random woman and even had an affair with his nanny. This is terrible. God knows I hate adultery so much, because I know how grateful people should be to have a loving spouse to begin with (some people don’t have that luxury).
Allow me to say a few words of encouragement to all my Single Brothers and Sisters who ARE Christians, who DO live by Christ’s standards, who ARE in good shape, who put yourself in places to meet people and you still haven’t found someone, you still haven’t met someone who’s marriageable. Just a random message to stay strong.
Part of living by Christ’s standards means obeying his Word the Bible. Many people, including those who claim to be Christians, have given into modern times, they’ve given into sex before marriage, engaging in the hook-up culture. Now, those people are in steady relationships, they’re married, or engaged. They have what you’ve always wanted.
My friends…you cannot compare yourself to those people. As far as I’m concerned, they’ve merely cheated by taking a short-cut. Satan’s designed these short-cuts where, if you abandon God’s scriptures, if you disregard what the Bible says about how you should live your life, you will be rewarded in this world, here and now, sooner than later. (Matt 6:16-34)
As a Christian…one of the things I like to think I’m good at, is having the ability to converse with other Christians, disagreeing with them, and yet I’m still able to keep it civil and not insult them. We’re likely to walk away more enlightened with a greater understanding of one another.
This week, I confess I got a little bit heated with this new Church group that I joined this year. It was on the issue of Baptisms and whether or not being Baptized is a requirement for being saved. Meaning, if you’re not Baptized, does this mean you aren’t “saved”?
This isn’t the first time I disagreed with them on something and it’s not something that would prompt me to say, “I can’t hang with y’all.” We just have different interpretations of the Scriptures.
As many of you know, this year didn’t start off the greatest. One of my most cherished cousins was murdered and if that wasn’t bad enough…the proceeding funeral events were almost as painful.
When I came back to Tampa, I spent at least two weeks in unimaginable pain and anguish. To cope, I kept telling myself, “Rock, you’re not that important. You’re not that important. You don’t matter. No one cares about you. It’s just you.”
That’s just a complex I have, where it’s more comfortable to stay nestled in the belief that I’m on my own. Here, you’d have the common response of, “But Rock. People do love you.” But what good is their love if they never express it? How do you benefit from their love and affection if they don’t show or demonstrate it?
If you knew that getting married to a stable responsible man gave your child the best possible chances for success in life, would you take it? Even IF your child could succeed without having the married father in the household, why wouldn’t you take this route if you knew it gave your child a better chance?
I’ve already written about Single Mothers who were “Tricked and Lied” to, so I don’t want to rehash that angle. But as many of us know, things will only continue to get worse in this secular society where people turn their back on Biblical wisdom.
In this video, I respond to a clip from a woman who lays out her argument about how men are manipulative and why Single Moms should NOT lower their standards. She says that men don’t come with warning signs saying they “ain’t ish”. I wasn’t offended, mainly because I know she isn’t talking about men like me…but at the same time, I do see a pattern that’s constantly repeating itself.
1. I think too many people are comfortable with the notion of, “You gotta make these horrible mistakes to learn and grow.“…as if it’s impossible to simply heed the advice from the older generation and avoid learning from THEIR mistakes.
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2. The lack of shame. I’m not advocating for people to walk around feeling sorry for themselves. But when you have made a mistake and you’re dealing with the consequences of that mistake…Well, part of the reason why Baby Momma Culture is making waves is because ladies who are having children outside of wedlock are bragging about their mistakes. (Jeremiah 6:15)
This is a problem, especially when you’re a celebrity with a degree of influence because it teaches/encourages others to have no shame in following in your footsteps. I break it down in the video.
Recently, Russia passed laws “banning the distribution of materials promoting homosexuality, pedophilia, and gender reassignment.”
In a speech, Chairman Vyacheslav Volodin said the law would help protect the motherland’s traditions and values for her children and the future of Russia from the “darkness spread by the United States and European states.”
But Russia is the bad guy, right? They got all kinds of problems. They’re mean and wicked and evil, right? They invaded Ukraine! Who cares what they think! Right?
Sometimes when more scholarly Christians toss around words like “Redemption” or “Sanctification” it can be a bit difficult to comprehend or understand what that looks like or what it is. What’s so appealing about it? Why should I care?
Seriously…when I was a kid, my parents used to talk about the “kingdom of heaven.” Then, I looked around the church and thought to myself, “No, Thank You!” That’s because I couldn’t understand what the Kingdom of Heaven was. Back then, they made it seem like “heaven” was this place where there was nothing but a bunch of stiff, pious, monks and nuns who don’t really do anything interesting.
It’s like being back in Advanced Algebra. When I asked when I would ever need to use things like the Quadratic Formula in real life? The teacher didn’t have an answer. And since I saw no benefit, I wasn’t motivated to learn. I didn’t care about getting better beyond that which was required to pass the class because…what’s the point?
I think it’s the same with concepts like “Redemption” or “Sanctification”. Now, to be completely honest. I was prompted to write about Redemption and encouraged by another website called, SigmaFrame. You should check it out, because Jack’s an awesome intellectual and the comments sections are always full of thinkers I’ve come to have a tremendous amount of respect for.
But after much reflection and ample prayer…I asked myself, who do I want to reach? Who’s my audience? Other knowledgeable Christians who are already striving to do what’s good in God’s eyes? I don’t think so.
Instead, my aim has always been on those who call themselves Christians but don’t know what Christ taught. I also target the agnostics who are on the fence, and the Christians who are indifferent towards the Truth because of terrible experiences they may have had with Christianity. If my aim is to help the layman to “embrace” the truth, I believe we have to talk to them at their level. So here goes…
We need to talk about what’s happening between Black Men and Black Women. I’m noticing that there seems to be a growing rift between the genders, a great deal of resentment and hostility that’s getting out of control. But don’t worry, I have solutions!
The issues have been going on for years and it’s getting progressively worse. From the “Color Purple” to “What’s Love Got to Do with it” and even in the 2000s with Tyler Perry’s Madea films…it appears we black men are simply not acting right. We’re players. We’re dusty. We hump everything that moves. We’re not making 6 figures. We’re not keeping up with the education and professional careers of women. We shirk out on our responsibilities, making a whole bunch of babies and never sticking around to take care of them. We’re told to do better, do better, do better! And of course, one of the worst things black men do that provokes all kinds of ire…is date and marry women of another race.
Stage In The Sky 