I don’t normally use the phrase “Outpouring of the Holy Spirit” on a common basis because I believe it is used far too often by believers to describe an emotional worship service or event.  Biblically, when the Holy Spirit shows up, there is a noticeable effect and the change that ensues is prompted by Him.  Also, should the Holy Spirit decide to “pour” Himself in a place, it cannot be traced back to a single man, it always must be attributed to Him because no man could be pointed to that would cause, create or bring about such a change.

I had an opportunity to witness this recently.

Located snugly in the middle of grazing fields, cattle and tattered roads was Oak Hill Baptist Church in Booneville, MS.  I had to honor of preaching their DNOW that began on Friday.  Friday night we saw teenagers do business with God and a couple make professions of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.  Super cool stuff.  Saturday night was no different, (if you aren’t in Baptist circles, Saturday night is set up to be the time of massive response by teenagers for Christ.) a few kids trickled to the altar during the time of response.

But Sunday morning was different.

It wasn’t the worship.  My man Daniel Barkley did a great job leading us (despite a young lady passing out in the pew) but it wasn’t him.  I preached on the glory of God and it wasn’t me (cause the sermon was average at best).  The invitation was given and men and women began to trickle to the altar and do business with God. 

That was just the beginning.

Have you ever been in church during an altar call that lasts forever?  You know, the ones where you are looking at your watch kinda upset because you think you are gonna miss the NFL playoff game?  Yea, it was one of those.  But not because the Pastor kept begging.  As the church waited patiently for a young woman and the youth pastor, Austin Kimbrough, to finish, they waited.  And Waited.  And Waited some more.  Finally they got up.

This young woman had come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ.  This is significant because she believed she as saved.  Believed that she had eternal life.  But upon further investigation, she realized she had been resting in a prayer instead of the truth of the gospel.

Here’s where it gets fun.

After the service was over, (notice I said AFTER)  and the church was emptying quickly, the Holy Spirit was still working.  Young men and women were wrestling with their sin and began to fill up the office of the youth pastor.  He spent the next 45 minutes with various students in his office sharing Christ, loving kids and listening to them as they cried out to God for salvation.  At one point, I was called away to pray with a young woman who hated her sin and wanted Jesus. 

But He wasn’t done yet.

As the time waned on, young men came clean with lies they had hidden in the past, women were reconciling relationships and I sat back and watched God move, AFTER SERVICE WAS OVER!! When everyone is scrambling to go eat, the Holy Spirit wasn’t done.  Young men, full of machismo and false bravado were undone and exhibiting a love for one another I have rarely seen.  I believe whole heartedly that last Sunday at Oak Hill Baptist Church I was fortunate to witness a microcosm of revival. 

One of the coolest things that I have had the chance of witnessing.  I pray that what happened in that church happens to all of us today.  We don’t wait and rely for a time of response to get right, but we remain open to the Spirits leading and pray we are ready when He decides to move. 

Grace and Peace 

It was no accident for me to read “Life Together” by Dietrich Bonhoeffer.  It is a book on community and the marriage of the individual’s salvation with the larger context of Christian community.  Within its pages are a plethora of admonishments and teachings on the Christian life within community.  Here is an excerpt from it:

“Sin demands to have a man by himself.  It withdraws him from the community.  The more isolated a person is, the more destructive will be the power of sin over him, and the more deeply he becomes involved in it, the more disastrous is his isolation.  Sin wants to remain unknown.”
 

It is also no coincidence that tonight I heard some troubling news of a dear friend of mine in the faith who is in an incredible battle with sin.  One that has left his indiscretions emblazoned on news papers, websites and malicious blog sites who want nothing more than to discredit his ministry and the work of our Father.

Yet again, coincidence is nonexistent when it comes to the fact that I was able to finally see “Courageous” last night.  A movie that chronicles 5 men and their pursuit of authentic biblical manhood, specifically in the deterioration of the role of the Father.  At one point during the film, one of the father’s is caught involved in some shady dealings (I’ll let you see the movie to figure it out) and sent to jail.  He knew he was in the wrong but never brought his sin to light.  It stayed in the darkness until it was too late.

So why this post?

“Sin will always take you farther than you want to go and keep you longer than you want to stay”

This blog is an urgent warning/call to all Believers.

1.  Vehemently fight against sin through full disclosure

2.  Bring all sin to light, before Satan puts it on display for the world to see

“In confession the light of the Gospel breaks into the darkness and seclusion of the heart.  The sin must be brought into the light.  The unexpressed must be openly spoken and acknowledged.  All that is secret and hidden is made manifest”

It is a great travesty that the place where a struggling believer should be welcomed to confide in and find a safe place for the confession, the church, is a place of compartmentalization, superficiality and ostracision.  We are told in numerous places throughout God’s word to confess sin to our brothers and sisters and walk through that sin with them [James 5:16, Galatians 6:1-2, Acts 19:18] Why then do we not do it?

Shame is a powerful deterrent to spiritual growth and confession.  The attitude that when we slip up and/or are engaged in something this is not befitting of the Name we bear that no one will understand.  No one will love us or be willing to fellowship with us if our sin is brought to light.  Shame and embarrassment lead to guilt, guilt leads to silence and silence leads to lack of freedom and spiritual corruption.  Spiritual corruption is what is going on with many Believers today.  Those possessing a form of godliness on the outside, but inside they are rotting.  Jesus calls those people a white washed tomb.

I have been that white washed tomb.

Last week, I was convicted of a shameful and deplorable habit that I had fallen into.  It had a grip so tight on my life, that it left me battered and bruised on the floor, ashamed and guilt-ridden.  It was in that time I felt I was incapable of receiving love and forgiveness.  I felt others would look upon me and say “Surely, a man in seminary, an Evangelist even, doesn’t struggle with that type of thing! He’s a man of God!”  As I was on my knees praying, after Bonhoeffer so eloquently and bluntly stated through that book, I knew what I had to do.  I had to confess my sin.

“The unexpressed must be openly spoken and acknowledged.  All that is secret and hidden is made manifest”

I went boldly [on the inside timid and sheepishly] to a brother in the faith.  As we talked and confessed sin with one another, the FREEDOM that came from having that sin uncovered was monumental!! We discussed how we were going to hold each other accountable for the sin in our lives and commit to pray for one another.  What an incredible moment!

We rob ourselves of this freedom when we become the type of people who while spiritually rotting on the inside and too proud to confess sin to our brothers and sisters 1)refuse to be honest about our deplorable spiritual condition 2)Talk down or about others who have been so bold to bring the secret to light.   

If you are reading this and have been hurt by “church” people who act as if they have it all together, I am sorry.  I pray for you, often, that the Lord would bring people into your life who would see themselves as God sees them, filthy sinners completely covered in grace who need other believers to rest, depend upon and confess sin to.  

The cases of men and women who fall in the faith as a result of secret and hidden sin is too numerous to account for, as I’m sure you already know.  Why then would we thrust ourselves into the same cesspool of secrecy and undisclosure? 

Satan wants nothing more than to put your sin on blast and make a public spectacle of it.  I pray you would combat this with confession with trusted brothers and sisters.  I have.  And have experience a freedom unlike any other.  I hope you do as well. 

“Always be killing sin, or sin will be killing you” –John Owen “The Mortification of Sin”

Thank you guys so much for your continued support of my ministry through prayer, following on Twitter (@thelowercasejc) and Facebook.  Your prayers mean more to me than anything.  

Many of you have asked, in response to the last post, about a conversation on interracial dating/marriage.  Before I talk about this issue, this video concerning John Piper and Tim Keller’s new book Bloodlines is more than worth the 18 minutes.

 http://www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/bloodlines-documentary

Interracial dating/marriage has been the proverbial elephant in the room for all of America’s history.  Especially in the South, where race conscious people are found in every demographic, this issue has split families, ruined relationships and been the source for much debate, ostracizing, pain and segregation.  As a black man in the South, I have seen the damages and effects of this issue first hand and I myself have experienced hatred and malice from dating women of another race.

 But this conversation would be completely and totally invalid if it became all about me.  As with anything in my life, which concerns ambiguity, I go to the source of Truth, the Holy Scriptures, to illuminate my misunderstandings and seek answers to tough questions.  Therefore, what follows is what I believe the Bible speaks about interracial marriage/dating.

 The Bible does not prohibit interracial marriage in any way whatsoever.  What the bible does prohibit is the marriage of a Believer with an unbeliever.  If our lives are to be lived for the glory of God, it matters not the skin color of one’s spouse but the salvific condition of an individual’s heart.  Because salvation is not constrained to a particular people group, marriage cannot be either. 

 “The Bible does not even use the word race in reference to people,8 but does describe all human beings as being of ‘one blood’ (Acts 17:26). This of course emphasizes that we are all related, as all humans are descendants of the first man, Adam (1 Corinthians 15:45).9 As Jesus Christ also became a descendant of Adam, being called the ‘last Adam’ (1 Corinthians 15:45), this is why the Gospel can be preached to all tribes and nations. Any descendant of Adam can be saved, because our mutual relative by blood (Jesus Christ) died and rose again.”

                        -Ken Hamm “Interracial Marriage: Is it Biblical?”

 We all descended from one man.  We were all subjected to futility and enmity in God through one man’s disobedience.  Yet we are all reconciled through one man, Jesus Christ, through his substitutionary atonement that was sufficient for all.  Without Jesus, we are all enemies of God, regardless of how much melanin is in your skin or how great a tan you have.  We all will stand before an infinite and Holy God whom we have offended and must give an account for every detail of our lives, down to the motives of our hearts.   

But the beautiful thing is this: With Jesus as our Savior, believing in his life, death and resurrection from the dead we are all reconciled, or brought back into right standing with God, through Jesus.  Once again, race, color, skin pigmentation, Jew, Gentile, Greek matters not.  God’s act of redeeming creation had NOTHING to do with race and everything to do with Him loving all peoples.  The most commonly memorized scripture verse tells us this (John 3:16).

 And here is the MOST beautiful thing: Jesus’ death and subsequent love and betrothal with the church is the greatest picture of interracial marriage ever exhibited! 

 “25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.”

                        -Ephesians 5:25-27

“For I feel a divine jealousy for you, since I betrothed you to one husband, to present you as a pure virgin to Christ.”

                        -2 Corinthians 11:2

“If one wants to use the term ‘inter-racial,’ then the real ‘inter-racial’ marriage that God says we should not enter into is when a child of the Last Adam (one who is a new creation in Christ—a Christian) marries one who is an unconverted child of the First Adam (one who is dead in trespasses and sin—a non-Christian).”

                        -Ken Hamm “Interracial Marriage: Is it Biblical?”

Jesus is the Husband (bridegroom).  The Church, the collective number of individuals globally and throughout history that have declared Christ as Lord and trusted in Him for their eternal salvation, is the Bride.  Last time I checked the Church, as defined, doesn't look exactly like me.  And they sure as heck don’t all look exactly like you.  What they do look like, however, is a beautiful bride, in fine white linen, walking down the aisle to meet her husband who has taken her from the streets amongst muck, mire and shame and clothed her in His righteousness and made her beautiful (Revelation 19:7-9) We, the Church, are bride.  And we are beautiful.

 So here’s the deal: If every race, color, skin pigment, nationality is good enough for Jesus, why then do we discriminate?  If the Asian cook is just as good as the White farmer and the black store owner the same as the Indian college student, why then is a Black man not “good enough” to marry a White Woman or a Black woman a White man?

 The differences, I believe, lie in the individualistic view of the gospel.  If we truly saw ourselves as God sees us, there would be no such thing as racism.  Because of our ethnocentric egoism, we have made race a devious and putrid thing.  We carry our own perspective races in such high regard yet look upon other nationalities in disdain and cultural pity.  I’ve seen this sentiment in the church.  And it’s just as foul and ugly there as it is in the world.  As believers, we are a part of the greatest display of interracial marriage, yet we reject it in our practice. 

 Will two couples of different race, if they are dating or married, have a tough time in their relationship due to difference in race?  Perhaps.  But that undertaking, should they take it, is totally between those two and no one else.  And our role as the church is to undergird them in life, not because they are an interracial couple, but because that’s our call as a community of believers (Philippians 1:27)

 The gospel FORBIDS racism.  Racism has no place with the love of God and his atonement for the nations.  Don’t believe me?  Check out Numbers 12:1-2.  There are many interpretations of this but Dr. Piper believes that Miram opposes Moses because his wife is a Cushite (Yes, ladies and gentlemen, she’s black).  God’s response to Miriam’s seeming racism is to turn her skin leprous, instantly rendering her white! After a week, she was restored but it appears that Yahweh’s response to racism is not a pleasant one.  He hates it.

 So if we are ALL from one man, Adam.  And we have all been reconciled through one man, Jesus.  And there is no distinction between Jew, Greek, Black, White, Indian whatever. And In Christ, we (The Church) are all one Bride who is loved by our Husband (Jesus), Then interracial marriage is not only ‘okay’ but its Biblical! 

 Therefore, interracial marriage and dating glorifies God when outlined in the Holy Scriptures, not by race, but by practice and obedince.  Let’s be a Bride that not just talks the gospel, but lives it.  And in practicing this gospel of love, forgiveness and reconciliation, we are sure we extend grace and mercy and understanding to everyone; even those whom are married or dating someone who doesn't look like you. I pray this thrusts open the door to self-examination and provides hope and clarity to an this issue.

Grace and Peace

Listed Below are a few resources, for anyone interested, that may expound on this subject.  Taught and written by men far more intelligent and wise, they are great places to look for answers to questions or provide defense or affirmation for you if you are in a similar situation.  If you are in this fight, you are not alone.  We, as a body, are with you.

1.     http://www.desiringgod.org/resource-library/sermons/racial-harmony-and-interracial-marriage

2.     http://www.desiringgod.org/blog/posts/the-ethics-of-interracial-marriage

3.     http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/cm/v21/n3/inter-racial-marriage

4.     http://www.ligonier.org/learn/qas/does-god-frown-upon-interracial-marriages/

5.     http://ccp-boys.blogspot.com/2007/11/women-of-bible-miriam.html

I love Seminary.  More specifically, I love the people in Seminary.  Unlike many denominationally based seminaries, Beeson prides itself on being interdenominational.  This means there are many different denominations represented; Methodist, Baptist, Charismatic, Non-Denominational, former Jehovah’s witnesses and even Messianic Jewish!  It truly is a beautiful picture of the kingdom of God.

Unfortunately in the South, most people you meet are Southern Baptists.  And yet again, unfortunately, many other denominations are looked down upon as if “those people” don’t know what they are talking about.  We tend to stick with those who look like us, think like us, act like us, dress like us and worship God in the “style” that best fits us.  This is something that even I have fallen prey to.  I, since a child, have seen other denominations outside of the one that I was currently involved in as erroneous and unnecessary.  I saw their worship “style” as being dull and boring or too over the top.  There was no love in my criticism.  And little did I know, but I was depriving myself of a beautiful growing opportunity by fellowshipping with those who are different. 

Last year, there were 3 men that I met with occasionally early in the morning for a time of encouragement, prayer and accountability.  One of those men, Anthony “Paw” Forrest said something to me that was so profound and life changing.  It is something that I will never forget:

All that to say is that tonight, while having dinner with some classmates and their spouses, a conversation came up where some of us had some differing viewpoints.  Different, yes, but all very valid.  Through that conversation, one in which I didn’t agree with all the viewpoints given,  I grew.  Not because there were 6 other people who thought just like me, but because they thought differently.  It was beautiful!!  We disagreed, in a loving manner, I heard their heart and was challenged in some of the ways that I think.  Oh, friend, it was glorious.....glorious.

It was a perfect picture of Paw’s statement. We need to all be different in our theology, worship, thoughts and ideas because we can all learn from each other.  I see how narcissistic and closed minded I’ve been in regards from this and Oh, my friend, how I’ve depraved myself of such an enlightening experience!  People love Jesus of all colors shapes and sizes.  As long as they love our Savior with their every being, regardless of how different they may be, we can all learn something from them.

I Challenge you to this:  Spend some time in a context outside of the one you are most familiar with.  Not only will you be blessed with knowing someone’s heart, but you will experience the body as it’s supposed to be.  One that doesn’t look like you.

Grace and Peace.

“Fathers, be good to your daughters.  Daughters will love like you do”

I’m young (relatively). Therefore I cherish the conversations that I have with older people.  I have been attending a community group with Christ City Church, a young church plant in the heart of Birmingham that has a heart to see the city changed.  Tonight, they changed this man.

We were supposed to be discussing “Who is Christ”, covering topics from his divinity to his supremacy and onto the personal relationship that we seek to have with him.  What turned out was a discussion on family and dating.

Yea, dating.

I’m no expert on dating.  Clearly that’s the case because I’m single with no “prospects” (I hate that by the way.  Only white people ask that question).  I have “dated” and failed.  Prompting me to concoct my own formula, if you will, on how its “supposed” to be done.  This formula developed, mainly, from things that shouldn’t be done.  There are various methods of dating.  Arguments for the health of dating, arguments for the unhealthy nature of dating, arguments for not dating until you’re married, group dating, etc.  So OF COURSE my own “formula” is right.

Ha yea, funny I know.

During this discussion, a couple (with 7 kids) discussed a situation with their 16 year old daughter where she was forbidden to talk to a young man because he said some inappropriate things to her. In my mind, initially, I thought, “Where here goes these fundamentalist, super spiritual holy people”.  But throughout the conversation, I saw that the way they handled it came out of a deep love and longing for their daughter to not only find the man that God has for her, but also for her heart to in love with Jesus and desire a man with likewise viewpoints.  She apparently wanted to date this particular young man because he was the “popular and good looking guy” that all the girls desired.  And when asked who she was with, she took great joy in the admiration and awe that resulted in her answer.  This shocked me not because of her answer, but that she was so candid about it.  

But the most amazing thing was what was said by her concerning her father.  “Mom, I’m so afraid that I won’t find a man that will treat me and love me like daddy does.”  WOW!!  If only all of our daughters in America could view their fathers in this way and desire to be loved and pursued and treated with respect as their fathers did them.

I have been guilty of treating women with chauvinistic regard, flippantly bouncing from girl to girl in hopes of satiating my own personal desires.  

After tonight, I have seen the folly of my ways through the words of this father.  Especially after he discussed this issue with the young man himself.  Telling him that he was not mad at him, that he wanted the best for that young man, that he deeply loves his daughter and will not tolerate her to be subjected to any type of treatment not worthy of her having.  He then stated that at some point later on in time if he was still interested in pursuing his daughter to approach him and they would discuss it then, but until then he was to have no contact with her.

There was so much tact, wisdom and love in his words.  Words that I wish someone had said to me when I was a knuckled headed 15 year old succumbing to the pressures of “manhood” in suburban America.

As I look to pursuing a woman, (at some point, definitely not now) I will definitely keep tonight in mind.  Looking to pursue, love, cherish and support a woman the way this father did to his little girl.