The Scourge Of Racism
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By now I am hopeful you have had the opportunity to view the video our Ministry produced and recently uploaded onto the fundraising platform being used in the campaign to raise my full-time 2020 salary. It summarizes in three minutes my thirty-four years of service as Founder/President of Open Door Communication Ministries, Inc.1 Among the photo highlights is one that remains special to me; a photo I was able to take with Tony Dungy, a fellow aspiring strong man of God in Christ’s image I greatly admire--an experience I write about in this edited 2011 post. What God has allowed Tony to accomplish and the incredible platform of influence in sports He has entrusted to him is amazing.
As Tony, I have been a teacher and mentor of men and boys throughout my ministry. Indeed, for this reason, I challenge those I have served to step up and support this Ministry’s campaign to raise my salary; allowing me to continue serving full-time in our cause to restore men, their families and communities among other Kingdom activities!
Originally Posted August 7, 2011
On Saturday, July 30th I was highly blessed of the Lord to be among the several hundred local audience members to hear former NFL Super Bowl winning coach, Tony Dungy speak at a Mentor/Leader event sponsored by The Mentoring Project.2 He did not disappoint. Afterward, I was among the throng who sought pictures and autographs. Tony was gracious to each one of us and stayed until the crowd eventually dissipated. To say I was thrilled is beyond understatement.
Due to space limitations Tony Dungy is one of only two modern men of sports I was led by the Lord to select as exemplary of New Testament era aspiring strong men of God in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics.3 His Christian walk on and off the field of play has been outstanding. He has faced the devastating untimely loss of a son as well as all of the adversities of professional football and through it all, maintained a Christ-like demeanor and outlook. As I gave him a signed Hard Cover copy of my book, I briefly shared my heart with him about what he has meant to me and represented to our whole nation. In genuine humility he was taken aback.
As I write in my book, Jesus Christ is the only Man we are to worship as our enduring Hero and Champion (Philippians 2:9-11). However, we are to admire and look up to men that closely reflect Christ’s image as aspiring strong men of God (1 Thessalonians 1:2-7). Our boys and we men need godly role models--mentors by example--like Tony Dungy to look up to as we run our life race. Thanks, coach!
1 Go to FundRazr Salary Campaign to see the video.
2 Learn more at http://www.thementoringproject.org/.
3 The book is available in print or digital download formats at major internet booksellers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, ChristianBooks.com and Apple (digital only).
You can also get the Hard or Soft Cover print versions of the book in the Strong Man Store.
Palm Sunday is certainly different though, not unusual this year as pestilence goes. The world is under siege by a new strain of microscopic viral elements that is sickening and killing human beings by the thousands across the earth. Right out of a science fiction movie scientists are scrambling to find a remedy and governments to quell panic and effect policies such as social distancing that are hoped will slow the spread of the Coronavirus or Covid-19. Meanwhile, the unsaved “where’s God in a crisis” crowd spew their blasphemy and closely related scoffing professed Christians deny He has anything do with much less to say in the midst of it. Really?
Each year for nearly 2,000 years we Christians have commemorated Palm Sunday as the one and only full on public assertion by Jesus of Nazareth to be Israel’s Messiah. He did so not with words, but the actions of fulfilling the prophet Zechariah’s prophecy of how He as the Messiah would one day enter Jerusalem--“Lowly and riding on a donkey, a colt, the foal of a donkey,” (Zechariah 9:9; Matthew 21:1-11, NKJV). Later in the same week He as the Messiah would be arrested, tried and condemned to death by crucifixion fulfilling yet other prophecies of His action to save His people from their sins. God resurrected Him on the third day after certifying His successful mission (Psalm 22)!
From just the foregoing it is clear God speaks with not just words, but actions past and present as Scripture attests (Psalm 19:1-6; Romans 1:18-23). He is speaking to all the earth right now for those that will give heed! However, as the prophet Isaiah some 700 years prior cried out, “Who has believed our report” in response to Israel and the world’s unbelief at what God accomplished in His Son, Jesus Christ, to save all from sin and eternal death (Isaiah 53, NKJV), so, today, many even among professing Christianity refuse to hear Him speaking not just in the current Coronavirus, but the many foretold latter day calamities occurring in the world (Luke 21:9-11; Revelation 6:1-7).
So, what is God saying? The Coronavirus is a major magnitude “shot across the bow” to the world that God has turned a corner on His forbearance with mankind. As the Lord led me to write in social media posts that began March 15, 2020 blowing the trumpet of warning He gave me in 1986 (Ezekiel 33:1-9; Amos 3:6-8), He foretold “such things as we are experiencing in our world today would occur and uptick in the rhythms of a pregnant woman’s birth pains as Christ’s return nears (Matthew 24:3-8).” “Gracious, merciful and ‘longsuffering,’ God has given mankind nearly two millennia to get saved by Him through the Gospel (1 Corinthians 15:1-4; 2 Peter 3:9, NKJV).”
“Time is about up!” “God has presently humbled the world with microscopic organisms, but worse is coming not because He hates and wants to destroy mankind, but to cause stubborn rebels that refuse to repent to look up and recognize Him as He to whom all must give an account as sinners (Isaiah 45:22-24)!” For He in love “commands all men everywhere to repent” to be saved from His coming set day to judge the world for sin (Acts 17:30-31, NKJV). This is why no God called preacher (Romans 10:14-15) should be refraining from preaching the Gospel or Christian witnessing Christ (Acts 1:8) during this Coronvirus outbreak or any calamity while comforting and helping the affected.1
Because of rampant disobedience to even the most basic commands and instructions of the biblical faith along with overflowing falsehood and apostasy, Christians and their churches are being spoken to by God too!2 Professed Christian pastors and teachers where guilty are called to repent from their own agenda, messaging and false teaching building followings, legacies and church empires.3 With many cancellations and churches not able to meet for services, God in remedial judgment has called a timeout and is making this a time for us to consider our practice of the biblical faith as stewards4 and what the Church is truly about under Christ as Lord; repenting as needed!
In a March 17th social media post I wrote, “Churchmen, this time of righteous social distancing required by governments is also God’s merciful advance look at what not being able to go to church looks like. Will you be instructing your household from the Bible and leading them in worship as God expects or has your exclusive dependence on the local church to do this for you made you clueless about how to do this as the Lord led me to write would be the case for many if there is no church to go to?”5 If not, you need to repent from your dereliction at home and co-dependence on the local church. Likewise I wrote, “Church leaders you know you are guilty and need to repent to whatever extent you have caused men and women to depend more on you and ‘the church’ than on the Lord!”
Moreover, “the world as we have known it is never going to be the same again after this Coronavirus episode. Will you be leading the church you serve to return to what in too many cases is sin in disobedience as it regards not teaching men to lead in their house or allowing them to do so in God’s or will you repent as you ought setting an example (1 Timothy 2:8-3:13; 1 Peter 5:1-4)?” As the Lord Jesus showed, God from the beginning of His Kingdom cause in the Gospel has been reaching and restoring men as His crucial assigned leaders (Matthew 4:17-22); a fact I write about in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics.6 There is much to repent from! The issue is will you hypocritically go into these holy days beginning today refusing His gracious chance to do so?
(There will not be a post on Resurrection Sunday. I will be taking it off to do as I do annually to celebrate the triumphant resurrection of my Lord and His grace to save a wretch like me on the same occasion in 1977--some 1,944 years later! Lord willing, my next post will be on April 19, 2020.)
1 Some falsely teach contrary to Scripture God is not behind this or any other calamity and only seek to comfort and help. See the January 3, 2016 post, The Never
Changing God and Now Is The Day Of Salvation posted December 4, 2016 both under the category, Call To Repent. Preachers, read also my January 10, 2016 post,
God’s Appointed Preacher, under the category, Instruction.
2 Take your pick of the many posts the Lord has had me to make under the category, Call To Repent, looking for reasons rooted in sin and disobedience He is calling
professed Christians and their churches to repentance!
3 Pastor, reflect deeply on the September 27, 2015 post, Empire Building On God’s Program, under the category, Call To Repent. You have no biblical mandate or ex-
cuse to build an empire; only your ego and selfish ambition drive you as those of old (1 Samuel 15:10-12; Daniel 4:28-30; Acts 20:28-30) and God has humbled you.
4 Read my recent two-part post, Torn Between Two Masters that began on March 15, 2020 under the category, Call To Repent.
5 Read the two-part post beginning January 5, 2020 Revelation’s Seven Churches In Time, under the category, Bible Prophecy. Also, the Lord led me to write a free one
sheet resource, Men Leading Family Worship At Home. It is intended to help willing Christian men step up to lead worship in their house during this Coronavirus pan-
demic and going forward as part of their regular spiritual leadership responsibility in the home in addition to leading the family out to participate in a local church when
that option is available. Get this free resource now in the Strong Man Store!
6 Get a print copy or digital download of the book at major internet booksellers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, ChristianBooks.com and Apple (digital only). You can
also get a print copy in the Strong Man Store.
Memorial Day causes us to look to the graveyard or if you will, the fields of the dead to remember with esteem those of the military who gave their lives serving our nation. So, I do with all others again this year. The ‘“cave that is in the field of Machpelah, which is before Mamre’” in Israel is the burial place of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and their respective wives Jews look to remembering the progenitors of their ethnic heritage (Genesis 49:29-33, NKJV). Jacob, God named Israel, fathered twelve sons by four wives, six of them borne by Leah who is buried with him. How this came about and on this Pentecost, the body of Leah’s greatest Descendant not in a tomb concerns this post.
Leah, daughter of Laban and sister of Rachel examined in last week’s post,1 was honored with burial in the patriarchal cave by her husband, Jacob. She had been his first wife through the deceit of her father when he switched her out for Rachel on what was supposed to be her younger sister’s wedding night (Genesis 29:15-30). For whatever all of the reasons including perhaps, the physical issue with her eyes noted in the referenced passage, Leah as the older of the two sisters had not yet married when Jacob arrived on scene. As with most women of her time, marriage and family were the twin aims of her life and surely the reason in part she cooperated with her father’s treachery.2
In the polygamous marriage to Jacob as his first wife, but second to Rachel because he loved her more, Leah found herself “unloved;” literally hated by her husband. Fortunately for Leah and all women in marriages where their husbands do not love them, God was watching and on the case for her. “He opened her womb” out of mercy, but kept Rachel’s shut (Genesis 29:31, NKJV). While His observation of women in marriages where they are unloved by their husbands is a universal reality that should spur them to prayer for help, God’s specific actions for Leah are not. He acts in accord with His sovereign will, wisdom, unique purposes for all who call upon Him and His glory!3
Leah rightly concluded that the Lord had seen her “affliction” of being unloved by Jacob when she bore him a son she named, Reuben, for that reason (Genesis 29:32, NKJV). However, her hopes Jacob would love her because of this son and the next two that followed were dashed (Genesis 29:33-34). From the seed of her third son, Levi, would come her descendants Aaron, father of Israel’s priesthood and God’s great lawgiver, Moses (Exodus 6:16-27). On her fourth son, Leah seemed to get that God should be praised for her fruitful motherhood and declared: ‘“Now I will praise the Lord.’” So, she named him, Judah, which means praise (Genesis 29:35, NKJV).
From the seed of Judah came Israel’s second king, David, and an eternal, royal dynasty terminating in “Shiloh” God foretold first through Jacob and promised several centuries later by the prophet, Nathan, to the king (Genesis 49:8-12; 2 Samuel 7:1-17, NKJV). This Shiloh, is none other than He Jacob had wrestled with and who came to earth to begin to fulfill all that was written of Him forty-two generations after Abraham (Genesis 32:22-32; Matthew 1:1-17). Of the things written of Him were His birth to a virgin also a descendant of Leah through David and the first priority of His work as Israel’s final King embodied in His name, “JESUS,” (Matthew 1:18-25; Luke 3:23-31, NKJV).
Indeed, Jesus Christ, King of the Jews, completed His work to save His people from their sins as foretold (Psalm 22:1-21a; Matthew 27:32-50; John 19:17-30). On the same day before sunset, He was buried in a rich man’s tomb and on the third day after God resurrected Him (Psalm 22:21b; John 19:38-20:18).4 Following that on the fortieth day, “He was taken up” and glorified; seated at God’s right hand to await His return to rule not only Israel, but the whole earth! On the fiftieth day, “Pentecost,” He sent the Holy Spirit to indwell those who believe and enable His apostles to preach the Gospel about as well as “be witnesses to” Him “to the end of the earth,” (Psalm 22:22-31; Isaiah 53; Matthew 28:18-20; Mark 16:14-20; Luke 24:36-53; John 20:19-29; Acts 1:4-2:40, 3:11-26, NKJV).
Leah continued to compete with Rachel for Jacob’s love through childbearing; making the same mistake as her sister in giving him her maid for a wife, but to no avail (Genesis 30:1-21). He did honor her above all at her death. Also, not only did Leah prevail in the fruitful bearing of six to Rachel’s two sons, but unknown to her God’s favor ran much deeper. She bore one from who would come Israel and history’s greatest King; even He who is “the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David,” (Revelation 5:5, NKJV)! From what God did through unloved Leah, both His aspiring strong men and great women in the image of Christ are reminded He has worked and wills to work in us far beyond what we could have ever imagined to His glory (1 Corinthians 1:26-31)!5 Let Him have you!
1 Read the May 21, 2023 post, Lessons From Rachel For Aspiring Great Women, under the category, The Cause.
2 Another reason was the universal reverence given to fathers and modeled by God as the heads over their daughters until marriage only rebelled against in this latter days generation (Genesis 2:18, 21-22, 24:47-51; Numbers 12:14-16) though, Leah out of greater reverence for God and as a matter of character could have objected to being a party to deceit.
3 Christian women please note how the Holy Spirit led me to write broadly of women in marriages with husbands that do not love them. In His perfect will and your obedience to marry “only in the Lord,” such a situation should not exist for you. However, if for whatever reasons you are in a situation like this, you all the more know seeking God in prayer is the first right step followed by doing what His Word teaches in longsuffering while you wait on Him to act as He wills. And yes, the same goes for any Christian man in similar circumstances as it is written (1 Corinthians 7:10-16, 39; 1 Peter 3:1-2, NKJV).
4 Because Christ is risen from the dead, we Christians do not look to tombs or graveyards to remember and honor Him as One still slain in battle. But we exalt and magnify Christ within our hearts as our living Savior, Warrior-King and Lord; fellowshipping with and serving Him who is “alive forevermore” as He promised (John 14:18-24; Revela- tion 1:17-18, NKJV). If as a professed Christian you are not inwardly enjoying the resurrection life of Christ, disobedience in sin may be the reason. Watch our latest Strong Man Of God Online Rally on YouTube, Return To The Lord, to hear His summons!
5 Learn more about this by reading my book, The Strong Man Of God; Back To Basics! Get your Hard or Soft Cover or E-Book Edition of the book as well as companion Strong Man Of God Men’s Group Study and Great Woman Of God Women’s Group Study in the Strong Man Store, among internet booksellers and brick and mortar book- stores.
Following up my last post in the Good News and compassion of Jesus Christ who judges and is coming to judge (Psalm 96),1 I see fields of men in our nation still ripe for harvest at this hour!2 The lack of laborers He observed in first century Israel remains valid in our land today as does His remedy to “pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest,” (Matthew 9:35-38; Luke 10:2, NKJV). The Lord immediately appointed laborers He sent out to the harvest (Matthew 10:1-16; Luke 10:1, 3-16). However, in our day not only are the laborers few, but biblically sound churches where men made Christ’s disciples can be sent for proper equipping as men and laborers of God’s design!
This is a great evil! Like the literal fields of ripened produce that rot where they stand because of not being harvested, so, many men in our nation marginalized by secular society and numerous local churches following after it rather than Christ are perishing daily where they stand. Where I live here in Portland, Oregon is no exception. Our city is globally known for lawless streets not just due to a lack of police officers who are doing their best in the situation, but the widespread darkness that fills many hearts separated from the “light of life” in Christ Jesus (Mark 7:21-22; John 8:12, NKJV). This reality is “spiritually discerned” and why unsaved city leaders don’t get it (1 Corinthians 2:14, NKJV)!
I will never be made to understand why so many professed Christian church leaders within the city limits don’t get it either and are powerless in the face of the darkness having its way except to the extent they are afraid or part of the problem. Jesus is Lord of His Church! Since when do those assembled to Him as Lord fear the darkness or look to “an arm of flesh” for leadership to stand against it (2 Chronicles 32:1-8, NKJV)?3 They do not look to the Lord as they ought because they are alienated from Him through their corrupt compromises with the darkness or how is it that the biblical Gospel of repentance from sin and faith in Him is no longer preached for salvation by not a few?
How is it too, what Christ has commanded His followers to do in the Bible is not done (Matthew 28:18-20) or God’s creation of man as male and female and order of mankind in roles He designed abandoned (1 Corinthians 11:1-3; Ephesians 5:22-33; 1 Peter 3:1-7)? I know of not one church in this city that I can safely send men and boys led to Christ that will teach them biblical manhood; their roles and responsibilities in a biblical worldview.4 If you are out there, reach out to me with men for the sake of working together under the leadership of Christ to help deliver men in our city from hearts overcome by darkness through preaching of the biblical Gospel and witnessing of Him!
Using men as laborers to reach men and the world with the Gospel is the example and intended enduring primary methodology of Christ recorded in the Gospels (Matthew 4:18-22; Mark 1:16-20; Luke 5:1-11; John 1:35-51, 20:19-23). He hand-picked no women to represent Him as apostles nor were any displayed in all of the rest of the New Testament. The Lord’s exclusive use of men in the apostolic mission and leadership of those assembled to Him as His Church had nothing to do with chauvinism or any notion of innate male superiority, but their suitability according to His election of order and roles of His design from creation as sovereign Creator (Genesis 1:26-27, 2:7-8, 18-25; 1 Corinthians 11:8-9, 14:34-37; 1 Timothy 2:11-13)!5
While the foregoing offends the rebel feminist men and women in and outside of professing Christianity who have abandoned the Lord’s Word and its purposeful examples during these latter days, it and He remain unchanged (Psalm 119:89; Malachi 3:6; Hebrews 13:8)! Therefore, without repentance by guilty professed Christian leaders and churches, as the Lord led me to write similarly in another post their labor in cooperation with secular allies will continue to be ineffective at diminishing the lawless violence and murder by those with sin darkened hearts prevalent in the city.6 Meanwhile, let any churchless or otherwise interested Christian man in Portland reading this that is zealous for the Lord and His causes reach out to me for instruction, fellowship and ways to serve Him with us!7
1 Read the August 7, 2022 post, Saving Souls Not Nations, under the category, The Cause.
2 My phrase, “still ripe for harvest” reflects all of my Holy Spirit led intentional labor to restore men beginning with preaching the Gospel and witnessing Christ to them since 1998. See the July 9, 2017 post, Laboring To Restore Men, under the category, The Cause.
3 Consulting with and relying on human wisdom, efforts and power to engage the darkness as only the Church of Jesus Christ has uniquely been equipped and empowered by Him to do is a sure sign of spiritual impotency at best, apostasy at worst; either is characteristic of those practicing Christianity as manmade religion (Luke 10:17-20; 2 Timothy 3:1-5)!
4 The subtitle of my book, “Back To Basics” is a summons to return to and gives biblical instruction on God’s mortal order of mankind as well as male and female roles from creation! The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics is available with the companion Strong Man Of God Men’s Group Study and Great Woman Of God Women’s Group Study in the Strong Man Store, at your favorite internet bookseller or brick and mortar bookstore.
5 Read the June 2017 posts presenting the value of men.
6 See the August 12, 2018 repost from 2012, Curtailing Gang Violence, under the category, Call To Repent.
7 We are always on the lookout for Christian men on fire for the Lord that are wanting to serve Him outside of the limiting box of manmade religion that exists in too many churches! Express your Portland area interest in connecting with this Ministry to me using our information e-mail address, info@thestrongmanofGod.org.
How different the messaging of the risen Christ to the churches at the end of the first century and now, nearly twenty centuries later. Seven messages to seven churches of Asia and only two were fully commended back then. Yet, in contrast, if you listen to many Christian media personalities to include mega and other church pastors today, Christ has hardly anything negative to say about what is going on in churches supposedly devoted to His Lordship. The ratio of five messengers and churches called to repentance to two fully commended has amazingly flip flopped in these latter days despite all of the same issues Christ raised being evident and far worse in countless churches!
As the Lord has had me write many times, it is as if He were in fact dead and not risen for all of the effect His written Word and living presence has among churches that profess to be Christian.1 Or else, how can you truly believe Christ is in your midst and sin in disobedience with impunity to His face as many do? Or are you actually believing the lie He has changed since what John recorded in His Revelation in spite of the fact it is written He is “the same yesterday, today and forever,” (Hebrews 13:8, NKJV)? His judgment among the churches is intensifying in these latter days because He has not changed nor abandoned what He inspired His apostle Peter to soberly write (1 Peter 4:17-18).2
Thus, Jesus Christ remains as He spoke to the messenger of the Laodicean church, “the Amen, the Faithful and True Witness, the Beginning of the creation of God,” (Revelation 3:14, NKJV). He is consistently and forever the standard and measure of truth so that those that know Him cannot help but say, “Amen” to whatever He says! Too, Jesus Christ is the standard and measure of faithfulness to God to the death; the ultimate “Witness” to what God requires in those faithful to Him! Finally also, He is positioned at the preeminent Head of creation and His Church as Creator, Savior, and Redeemer to the glory of God as the apostle Paul also declares (Colossians 1:13-18)!
Jesus Christ perfectly knows what a local church is supposed to look like as His design of the Church He assembles that transcends cultures, times and trends; reaching as she does into eternity (Ephesians 5:25-27)! For this reason, knowing the works of the church at Laodicea, He announces because they “are lukewarm,” “I will vomit you out of My mouth,” (Revelation 3:15-16, NKJV). This church was neither “cold” from lack of love for Christ as the church at Ephesus (Revelation 2:4) or “hot” with fervor and activity, but not through the Holy Spirit as the church at Sardis (Revelation 3:1-2) which were both painfully obvious in their need for correction and without repentance, judgment.
However, in being lukewarm the church at Laodicea like many large and suburban churches today are totally oblivious to their indifferent condition and are so sickening to the Lord in the manner of a stomach disturbance, He will violently vomit them out of His mouth! The cause of their lukewarm indifference toward the Lord and the faith is wealth. They were monetarily and materially well off and needed nothing they thought. And while being rich does not have to undercut the typical sense of dependence on Him most believers have who are not rich, the Laodiceans had allowed this to be the case for them. They could not see themselves as Christ did (Revelation 3:17).3
Speaking in the authority and infinite wisdom He presented Himself to this church, the Lord offers them “counsel” to obtain from Him “gold refined in the fire” so they might really be “rich” and other items to reverse their spiritual condition (Revelation 3:18, NKJV). Refined gold represents the faith-filled hard, but abundant life of one of His self-denying, cross bearing faithful disciples (Luke 9:21-26, 12:13-21, 18:18-30; John 10:10; 1 Timothy 6:6-16; 1 Peter 1:3-9)!4 As sick to the point of vomiting them out of His mouth as their self-satisfied indifference has made Him, the Lord acts to “rebuke and chasten” this church in “love” as He does all. He then charges them to be “zealous and repent;” to hear Him outside knocking and open “the door,” (Revelation 3:19-20, NKJV).
Once more too, the Lord speaks to him that would overcome and affirms one of His consistently made promises to reign with Him as a reward for faithfulness; the one who overcomes “granted” by Him to sit on His throne with Him as He “overcame” and sat down with His Father on His throne (Luke 22:28-30; Acts 5:27-32; 2 Timothy 2:11-13; 1 Peter 2:9; Revelation 1:4-6, 3:21, 5:5-10, NKJV). He then issues His standing directive to those in the church at Laodicea and where you attend with “an ear,” “to hear what the Spirit says to the churches,” (Revelation 3:22, NKJV). Clearly, a wealthy church flush in money, but spiritually indifferent does not impress the Lord. The risen, living Christ continues His cry among American churches, "Who is on the Lord's side?"
1 Read my February 9, 2014 post, Is There No King Among Us?, under the category, Call To Repent.
2 See the June 10, 2018 post, God’s Judgment Upon His House, under the category, Bible Prophecy and God’s Creatures.
3 While spiritual indifference may produce the busy works of religion, it never produces righteousness! This is why God can never be pleased with spiritual indifference
as He spoke through the prophet, Amos, to the eighth century B.C. ten northern tribes of Israel including specifically and harshly, wealthy women and judged them
(Amos 3:9-4:5, 5:10-15, 21-24, 6:1-8). It is also why Christ speaks in an attitude of revulsion toward it manifested in the first century A.D. church at Laodicea and all
that would follow them in guilt to the end. Such churches with thousands of dollars in the bank (in many cases for nothing but a rainy day to spend lavishly on them-
selves) have looked smugly at needy ministries like this one from our inception and refused to support us not realizing in their blindness that Christ ever looking and
booking, is going to judge them for this!
4 I write about the way of biblical disciples of Jesus Christ in my book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics. Get a print copy or digital download of the book at
major internet booksellers such as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, ChristianBooks.com and Apple (digital only). You can also get a print copy in the Strong Man Store.
This post was originally made as an illustrative application of a two-part 2012 blog entitled, “The Faith That Saves” under the category, The Faith.1 The faith of my Christian slave forefathers that came forth out and in spite of the mesh of oppressive confusion bound up in Christianity the religion of men practiced American style,2 is a last days marvel of immense proportions. Clearly, the deliberate providence of God was at work to draw them to Himself (John 6:44-45; 12:32), but also in His foreknowledge, the fertile heart ground for the seed of His Word to bear fruit unto faith when preached in truth was in them (Matthew 13:1-9, 18-23; Romans 10:6-17).
My West African forefathers as with all other Gentiles were not punished for having no faith at all, but faith that was misplaced for example, in ancestor worship, idols and other false deities (Acts 17:16-23; 1 Corinthians 12:2; Galatians 4:8). Having been failed by those departed or not gods that could not help and with no hope from any other source, slaves that did, responded to the Gospel and the true God with the same and even greater devotion of faith than they had previously accorded what was false in their native land (Acts 17:24-34). Truly, only God could have orchestrated this marvel since as I have written, the oppressed received the means of freedom from their oppressors!3
Now, in God’s equality, it is time for the Christian descendants of America’s slaves to return the spiritual favor (Matthew 5:43-48; Romans 12:17-21). For we will need to look to and draw encouragement from the legacy of faith our Christian slave forefathers that endured one of the most brutal forms of slavery in history left us, while also urging all other professed American Christians facing a hostile and soon to be oppressively violent nation in rebellion against God to do the same (Hebrews 10:36-39; 1 John 5:4-5).4 Reflectively reading this edited 2012 repost is a good place to get started if you have not already.
Originally Posted June 17, 2012
I extend a heartfelt “Happy Father’s Day” to all the men who have taken that role and responsibility from God seriously. My book, The Strong Man Of God: Back To Basics is an excellent resource for gaining a basic and biblical perspective on being a father. I invite readers who have not obtained a copy to do so for yourself or one of the males in your life that is or will soon be a father.5
On this Father’s Day--as I have done previously through other forums, I write briefly on the celebration of Juneteenth which falls on June 19th each year. Juneteenth is a black American commemoration of the end of slavery by way of celebrating the June 19th anniversary date in 1865 when Texas slaves learned a full two years after that President Lincoln had signed the Emancipation Proclamation setting them free.6 Typical of most American summer holidays there are parades, speeches, concerts, picnics and very importantly in this post-Christian era, worship services. It is here that I briefly join in the celebration and honor the faith of my Christian slave forefathers.
Presented Christianity by colonial whites mostly as a religious means of calming and controlling hearts that were not comfortable with the idea of perpetual servitude, the rigid, high-brow form of religion was not embraced in large numbers by African slaves. However, with the coming of the Holy Spirit fired preaching and worship fervor in the Great Awakenings and Camp Meeting Revivals of the South, conversions by slaves to the Christian faith exploded as the new American nation moved toward Civil War over the trafficking in human souls.
The mostly Western uneducated slave believers in Jesus Christ left their descendants and the world a legacy of persevering faith displayed in songs of hope called “Spirituals.” Embodied in their “Spirituals” was hope in the promise of physical deliverance found in the Bible proclaimed clandestinely by slave and some sympathetic white preachers. Many died waiting for the promise of God in His Word as have many of the saints from ancient times (Hebrews 11:8-16). They waited for physical freedom through faith in the God who did the same for Israel when He brought them out of Egyptian bondage by Moses (Hebrews 11:23-35a).
In the process, my Christian slave forefathers endured being spoon fed a corrupt form of Christianity that attempted to justify the evil brand of bondage they experienced including the demoralization of their souls, brutal whippings, the tearing apart of their families, rape of their daughters and sharing of their wives with slave owners and other white men bent on oppressing them in perpetuity (Hebrews 11:35b-40). Such was their simple, child-like, persevering faith in the God who remembers the oppressed according to His Word (Psalm 103:6; Luke 4:16-19). This faith is also resident in the heart of every aspiring strong man of God in the image of Christ!7
And so, God did in His mercy remember my Christian slave forefathers who had been faithful in their long wait on Him for physical freedom.8 While there would be bitter opposition and battles to secure the reluctant sharing of the rights of citizenship still to come, the day the slaves heard they were free was a day of great celebration; for those who had specifically waited on the Lord--breathless joy! Therefore, it is fitting that black Americans and all the inhabitants of the earth commemorate the day our people were set free lest we ever forget. Moreover, may we always include in our celebration, worship of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who perpetually honors simple, child-like, persevering faith placed in Him.
1 I made an edited repost of part one of this blog on April 6 and part two on April 13, 2014. I stand by every word the Lord led me to write not consciously operating
out of any preexisting theological position or presupposition (there being a resemblance to any unintentional). I am a Biblicist; not caring in the first instance what
sinful, mortal men including myself think, feel or believe, but what God’s Word in totality actually says to inform my doctrine!
2 Read the two-part, August 2016 post, Christianity The Religion Of Men, under the category, Instruction and Christianity The Religion American Style posted Sep-
tember 4, 2016 under the category, Call To Repent.
3 Read the three-part Commentary, The White Man’s Religion in the Journal Archives of the FSTVEP.
4 At whatever point you may choose beyond Scripture to believe the evacuation of living saints by translation occurs, you still must stand and endure by persevering
faith until it happens (Matthew 24:29-31; Mark 13:24-27; 1 Thessalonians 4:16-17).
5 The book is available at all major internet booksellers, by order at your favorite brick and mortar bookstore or in the Strong Man Store.
6 This Juneteenth 2019, be among those that hear the summary retelling of the black American experience from slavery to the present in the roll out of the From Sla-
very To Victory: One Man’s Journey Webcast!
7 Such was Harriet Beecher Stowe’s vilified fictional character, Uncle Tom, in her American Classic, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Read Uncle Tom’s Cabin Revisited on
the FSTVEP Web Site, an article the Lord led me to write restoring Uncle Tom as the actual aspiring strong man of God in the image of Christ the book intends.
8 They waited for physical freedom to follow the spiritual freedom they already had in their souls by salvation through faith in Jesus Christ (John 8:31-36)! Learn more
on the Freedom Page at the FSTVEP Web Site.
Forty years ago today I would have been in the second of seven days the Lord commanded me with specific and detailed instructions to fast without eating or drinking in complete devotion to Him.1 I write in gratitude to glorify the Lord for my experiences with Him those seven days that are still vivid and impacted my life and ministry in profound and lasting ways. Though yet a babe needing to grow spiritually (as are many reading this I also hope to urge on), I was never to be the same again (Galatians 2:20)!2 The command to be totally given over to the Lord came at a critical period in my life and twenty-two months from the time my spiritual journey began on Easter Sunday 1977.3
After my new birth, while I still had a robust interest in living the get high, party and sexually promiscuous lifestyle I had been accustomed to, it had begun to wane in satisfaction (1 Peter 4:1-3). I was becoming more interested in the things of God; occasionally reading a now, well worn New American Standard Bible I was given and a Parachurch ministry magazine that came out of nowhere I would later learn was unbiblical. In the spring of 1978 I had been fired from a department store job for impropriety and was struggling as a student at Howard University. I was not able to focus because my life seemed meaningless and empty; I had lost all sense of purpose and was depressed.
At summer’s end I was about to lose my apartment. So, with two school buddies, I made plans to move into and split the rent at a Takoma Park, MD high-rise that October. Still struggling with school though, I withdrew from classes in late September. I was working in a record shop part-time. In near desperation for change, later in the fall I asked a woman I had met in a club to direct me to the church she attended. My irregular attendance at the Mt. Zion Baptist Church in D.C. after that felt right, but I was still not at the point of total commitment to the God who was tugging at my heart. I ended the year and spent the first nine weeks of 1979 unemployed after being let go from my job.
I had enrolled in spring semester classes, but school still held no compelling interest for me and I went only sporadically. At my lowest, I attended church fairly regular now, reading my Bible more and praying for guidance and help. When I heard the voice of the Lord in my heart again for the first time since that Easter Sunday encounter, He commanded that I fast to Him for seven full days; eating no food or drinking anything. I was to totally withdraw from the world as I was living in it to include not sitting among my friends the first three days and give the Lord my complete, undivided attention in Bible study, reflection on the Word, prayer, listening to Him and my one Gospel tape.4
While I had some fear of the unknown concerning fasting as He commanded, the Lord’s accompanying instructions were reassuring and very importantly, faith building as was my entire experience. For I now understand with all else He had in mind for me5 from midnight Friday morning, February 16, 1979 through midnight Friday morning, the 23rd, my Lord was calling me to surrender all to Him; to die to self and sin for the first time in a major way on this unique occasion leading to what would eventually become in spirit “daily” as I matured in Him (Romans 6:1-14; 1 Corinthians 15:31; 2 Corinthians 4:11, NKJV).6 Indeed, the smell of death radiated from my body and breath (Job 19:17).7
With the intent to read through it all, my Bible study starting from Genesis 1:1 was very instructive. Though I did not finish before the end of the fast, when I did so later in the year, it turns out the fast was the launch pad for the many times I would read through God’s Word over the forty years since. The Lord showed up in my times of reflection not only to illuminate what I had studied, but to acquaint me with His Person--He is love, joy, peace…and power! Oh, the power of God who displayed it in my body such that I never thirsted or hungered (Isaiah 55:1-3; Matthew 4:4); who also stirred me to look closer and see that each flake truly was different as the snow fell gently on my 10th floor window (Job 38:22-38; Mark 4:35-41). I was in awe, but He was not finished yet!
The Almighty God, Creator of the heavens and the earth also brought me outside after the snow stopped the next day and commanded me to look directly into the sun. I hesitated because I had been taught never to do this due to the harm it would cause my eyes. But the Lord directed me to trust Him. So, I peered into the sun and the Lord said to me “Do you see the glory of the sun I created? My glory is greater” (Psalm 136:1-9; Isaiah 40:25-26; Acts 26:12-15)! No harm came to my eyes that day or since. Obeying His directions, I ended my fast with an amazingly good sip of water followed later that morning with juice and fruit. I did not eat a heavier meal until the second day after. Weak in body, but my soul on fire, I rejoiced mightily in church that Sunday and was later baptized!
During the week, the Lord had one more glorious experience for me. As I was driving along in D.C., I looked over to my right and saw a cemetery. Before I could focus good, all at once overflowing joy filled me followed immediately by uncontrollable tears as I understood in that instant the graveyard held no fear for me because in Christ, I overcome even death (Job 19:23-27; John 11:23-27)! I could hardly see through my tears as I drove on thanking and praising God for His great salvation and what was taking place in me as a result of the seven days with Him. The Lord gave the guidance and help I sought. He led me to withdraw from Howard and provided a part-time job at a grocery store so I could pay bills and save to move back home to Seaside, CA that May for what He had planned next. I gave away most of my worldly possessions and when May came, hit the road.
1 I am writing in the Holy Spirit’s illuminating spiritual hindsight about things I did not understand in those days. So, I now understand, for example, fasting in Scripture is
a spiritual discipline involving the subduing of the body in its natural desire for life sustaining food as an act of self-emptying humility before God. Many of the Bible’s
heavyweights fasted for this reason (Nehemiah 1:1-4; Luke 2:36-38) especially related to repentance (Daniel 9:1-19). The Lord Jesus fasted from food to God while
being tempted by the devil (Luke 4:1-2). The ancients also fasted in times of distress and grief such as when mourning those who died. This latter reason gives rise to
seven days being found in Scripture as one of the various number of days to fast (1 Samuel 31:11-13). Seven is a number God uses to signify completion (Genesis 2:
1-3). Fasting without food and drink is the ultimate self-emptying humility before and giving over of oneself to God which Moses did for forty days and nights on the
mountain and the Lord Jesus fully actualized on the cross (Deuteronomy 9:9; Luke 22:19, 41-42, 23:46).
2 Scripture references are added throughout this post I did not know back then as another beneficial aspect to me and the reader of the Holy Spirit’s illuminating spiritual
hindsight and confirmation of things taking place in my fast experiences.
3 This post is an elaboration on one part of my personal testimony found in fullest outline in the midst of a 5-part Journal article entitled, Releasing The Strong Man, be-
ginning in Part IV on the From Slavery To Victory Education Project Web Site.
4 My friends later told me I drove them crazy playing the 1978 Walter Hawkins, Love Alive II Album and especially the song, Be Grateful, over and over again (patched
and moved to a new shell, I still have and listen to it). They did not know that in that song in particular, the Lord was ministering His healing and deliverance from the
darkness of my despair with every tear I shed; hope in Him for better days ahead. Thank you, Jesus!
5 To learn more about other things the Lord was doing with me during my seven day fast read the October 2, 2016 post, Gifted With A Prophet’s Heart, and Pastors As
Developing Christian Men posted on December 17, 2017 both under the category, Call To Repent. See also Serving God From The Heart, posted April 23, 2017 un-
der the category, Glory To God!
6 Yes, I mean exactly as the great hymn, I Surrender All declares and Denise Williams soulfully delivers in her cover of it on her 1994 Greatest Gospel Hits Album. By
the way, among the many great songs on that same album, Ms. Williams also sings one of my standing songs of life devotion and service to the Lord, My Soul Desire.
7 Do not attempt to fast as I was commanded unless you are in fact commanded by the Lord who is able to and does supernaturally sustain the body deprived of its
necessary nourishment. The Lord never commanded me to fast without food and drink for seven days again, but once for three days and several times for one day.
All other extended fasts the Lord commanded me were without food only; the longest being forty days. There was no fast in drawing near to God that I did not have to
come face to face with, confess and repent from biblically defined sins (1 John 1:5-10).
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