Monday, February 9, 2009

To all my blogging friends!

My week has been a little crazy. I drove up to D.C. and spoke with about sixty pastors about How t0 Lead in Difficult Times. It went very well. I returned to speak to Regent University’s Chapel about the Role of African American Christians in American Christianity. (You can take a look at my notes if you like).

After you read, I want to ask you to think with me about how Christians of different races and cultures can best work together to expand the kingdom of God.

Thanks for all your prayers this week. I could feel them lifting me.

7 comments:

  1. Hello bishop,
    Thank you once again for creating a blog forum for people like us who want to interact with our Bishop. It certainly has nothing to do with us thinking that were "all that", but it is nice to be able to express our thoughts and concerns with you so once again, thank you!
    As I think about the question you asked us, different senarios keep popping up, but let me first say I am in no way assuming that I have the answers to the question you asked nor am I in any position of authority to give you any advice especially since I myself hold you in high regards. But I do believe there needs to be an invitation of some sort to the christian leaders from different races and culture to come together and figure out how to set aside their religious differences and come together on this one thing that will change the landscape of christianity. I would say more but I have to get ready for bible study. I hope what was said wasn't too much or not enough.

    love ya Bishop

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  2. Another captivating read Bishop. I feel in regards to how Christians of different races and cultures can expand the kingdom of God that one avenue that will and can be used especially in this generation and the youth around the world is the language and genre of hip hop. I once heard you say Bishop a few years back that it can be used to mesh the cultures and races and young people. I strongly believe God will work and speak through the hip hop voice and raise up some of the most prolific influential and annointed Christian leaders out of that Hip Hop voice connecting reaching and revealing the love of God His saving power and who He is to young generations. We gettin em while they young and impressionable!!! Unorthodox tactics

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  3. Hi Bishop, I believe that Christians of different races and cultures can best work together to expand the Kingdom of God if we genuinely believe that The Holy Spirit is actually doing the work in and through us and not we ourselves. The fact that God uses us can cause us to believe that we are doing it and not Him.There is one Holy Spirit and He is in every believer causing them to be successful.Therefore,if we set self,color,and motives aside, the kingdom of God will expand.Unless God builds a house, we labor in vain. It seems so simple but yet it's so difficult for us.We're nothing without the Holy Spirit. With that settle, we may as well choose to work together for the expansion of God's kingdom because none of us can build or bring increase.

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  4. Hey Bishop,

    The question you ask is indeed a loaded one. I can share with you an experience I had while attending grad school. I was really exciting about being in grad school and was so elated to be at a school with different people from all walks of life, cultures, races, etc. And even better this was a Christian school. However, what I found out later was that the school has some deep seated issues when it came to race relations. I began to pray and I believe I receive the word that the problem with racism isn't just the world it's in the church also. I also shared this with a ministry leader mentor of mine and he said to transfer this from a black white issue to a cultural issue. So, I did. For the next three years, I chose to be an agent of change instead of an agent of complaint. In order for us to come together we must also be agents of change. We must be honest and open with each other about our dislikes regarding the issues of race. We must become transparent with each other and seek God's face for healing. We must purposefully in our churches seek to connect to people who don't look like us. This has truly been a crusade of mine for the last 7 years since I've been in Hampton Roads. It all started back in my home town when I went to a men's retreat called Promise Keepers.

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  5. The Lord is powerful in you. There are no bounds to the power the Lord puts in the Word. I hope now through Easter many are saved by the grace of Jesus Christ.
    Thank you Pastor Courtney McBath for coming to Hampton Roads!!

    Praise Jesus

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  6. Hello from your past Bishop...Grace and Peace. The points that have been made so far are good. I especially agree with the idea of becoming an agent of change. Stating the obvious, is the easy part, but what of seeing past the deep seeded discrimination that is around us all. I believe it to be more culturally than racially. As you know, Bishop, I've had to change the stereotypes that were in my mother-in-law's mind. What I have learned over the years is that she accepted me as her AA son-in-law, but didn't intitially accept the myriad of cultures expressed in the AA community. She has since been more accepting of many diverse cultures, because of one on one introduction through me. Bottom line, change occurs one person at a time. We must intentionally look for opportunities to develop TRANSPARENT relationships with people of other cultures and integrating this personal transparent network. Change and acceptance will become contagious!

    incidently, we are moving from Texas back to Virginia. (DC area, but at least closer to our spiritual birthplace CRC!)

    See you in August!

    Sean Friendly

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  7. I sure am looking forward to the Lord's revelation on this one !
    I'm not very good with written communication so please excuse my typo's/grammar.
    I have faith that children will be the vessel for this accomplishment. They don't carry as much racial baggage as we do at times. Recently we had a spiritual scavenger hunt. Listed 5 people we would remind that Jesus loved them and welcomed them to salvation. On the list among other things was someone latino (they thought it would be a hard find so it was the bonus point).They learned the key words of a short salvation prayer in spanish so they would be prepared, their idea, it never occurred to me. It was so easy for them. Glory to God the latino we came across was fluent in English.. Maybe a diversity seed in the youth could grow into other ministries ..just a thought

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