Nuanced Conversations Podcast
Welcome to Nuanced Conversations Podcast, where we dive deep into the complex and often overlooked aspects of today's most pressing topics. Each week, we bring you thought-provoking discussions with experts, innovators, and everyday people who offer unique perspectives and insights. Whether we're exploring the intricacies of social issues, science, culture, or personal development, our goal is to move beyond the surface and engage in meaningful dialogue that challenges assumptions and expands understanding. Join us as we navigate the gray areas and uncover the richness that lies in nuanced conversations.
Nuanced Conversations Podcast
From Track to Pulpit: Dr. Lamonte King's Journey of Faith and Leadership
Have you ever wondered how a life marked by athletic prowess can transform into one of profound faith and community leadership? Join us on Nuance Conversations as we sit down with Dr. Lamonte King, a Christian community beacon who shares his incredible journey from a small town in Arizona to the grand stages of international athletics, and eventually to the pulpit. Pastor Hurt’s narrative is filled with touching anecdotes about his close-knit family, community values, and the athletic achievements that took him to UC Irvine.
Dr. Lamonte King opens up about a pivotal encounter that changed the course of his life—an unexpected job offer from an elderly man that led him to a deeper relationship with God. We explore the heartbreak of the 1980 Olympic boycott, and how this setback steered him from the track field to theological studies at Azusa Pacific and Biola University. Influenced by mentors like Haddon Robinson and Dr. Sanukian, Dr. Lamonte King’s journey is a testament to resilience, faith, and the surprising ways life unfolds.
Throughout this episode, Dr. Lamonte King delves into the art of expository preaching within the African-American tradition, the challenges of balancing tradition with innovation, and the discipline required for effective ministry. We also spotlight his impactful community outreach programs, including a vibrant Vacation Bible School that unites diverse communities. Tune in to gain invaluable insights into Dr. Lamonte King’s life, his preaching philosophy, and his unwavering commitment to nurturing faith and community.
Hey, greetings, welcome to another episode of Nuance Conversations, where we happily operate in the gray space here, right in between the black and white, having real, intelligent, informed conversations about religion, politics, social norms and pop culture. Today my name is George Hurt. I am your creator and curator of this space. Today we have a special guest. We have a dear brother beloved, one of the greatest minds we have in the Christian realm as it relates to preaching, a faithful pastor, lover of God, pastor of the friendly friendship it ain't just friendly, it's friendly friendship Missionary Baptist Church, here in the wonderful city of Los Angeles, in the midst of his very busy, inescapable schedule.
Speaker 1:It is very you have to be very on top of the get them and the grass room and he is here with us today to talk to us a little about himself, a little bit about preaching or else whatever else flows in this conversation. We've got to swear you in first to ensure that you are willing to have this conversation with nuance. Just raise your right hand there, swear in. There it is. You do. Yeah, he swears in.
Speaker 2:He didn't know what to say, All right so just having fun.
Speaker 1:How are you feeling today to say All right, just having fun. How are you feeling today?
Speaker 2:Feeling good, feeling good, glad to be here with my brother and good friend. Yes, sir. Great guy Pastor.
Speaker 1:George.
Speaker 2:E Hurt when are you from? Man, where are you from? I'm from a little town called Surprise, arizona.
Speaker 1:Wow, I'm surprised to hear that. Yeah, okay, yeah, surprise Arizona. Wow, I'm surprised to hear that yeah, yeah, okay, yeah 7,500 people when I left, probably 400,000 now. West of.
Speaker 2:Phoenix, about 25 miles.
Speaker 1:So it started to boom.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it really started to boom as Arizona built from Phoenix to Glendale to Cardinals are Peoria, Elmira, Surprise, all the way out to Wickenburg, Goodyear. All of that area is brand new.
Speaker 1:What's a childhood like, growing up in such a small town?
Speaker 2:It was kind of nice. My grandfather came from Texas and he brought all of his kids, my aunts and my uncles. They all moved into the same little area. He was what they called the field boss, meaning all the people that were working in the field, chopping, cotton, picking or whatever. They'd come to him and he'd let them work. Well, he brought all of my aunts and uncles. They all moved on the same street, george. So if you got in trouble at one end, you got like four weapons, all the way From one street to the next street, a whole block.
Speaker 2:They were selling it for $500. So a couple of them got some property and stuff. But small town, everybody kind of knew each other and that's where it all started.
Speaker 1:Bring Mike in a little bit. Yeah, that's interesting. So what was your migration there? Did you move with your grandparents, with your aunts, uncles?
Speaker 2:My mom, which is, of course, my grandparents' daughter, maternal grandparents, maternal grandparents Grew up there, and that's where I was born, in Phoenix, and just grew up with seven brothers and a sister.
Speaker 1:A lot of cousins too, I imagine. Yeah, a lot of cousins, same block yeah, same area, same block.
Speaker 2:Matter of fact ended up my generation and behind my brother, one of the best wrestlers in the state, cousin Cricket Marshall, one of the best 100-meter 60-meter person, tim football player, cornerback Joe Paterno, came to recruit him and then I was one of the best track people.
Speaker 1:All from the same little family.
Speaker 2:What was your running track? I did the long jump Back. Then they called it the bra jump, but that's not politically correct. Can't be jumping no bras. That's something that turns into the long jump. But when I got out of high school I was the number one long jumper in the nation, had about 40 offers of scholarships from West Point to Tennessee, to Auburn, to Oregon, to ended up at UC Irvine.
Speaker 1:Ended up at UC Irvine, and all of those why.
Speaker 2:UC Irvine Ended up at UC Irvine and all of those. Why UC Irvine? The coach from UC Irvine? There was a coach in Arizona that was a friend of him and told him man, you got to come check out this King guy. And he came to a meet and real personable, lynn Miller. He came to the house and just completely won my mom over. I have him call you every weekend.
Speaker 2:I make sure he stays out of trouble, goes to class and everything. And after he left she looked at me and said you going to that school?
Speaker 1:I said it's not even your choice, Mom.
Speaker 2:You're going to tell me where to go, but I ended up going and great decision because he was instrumental. He actually didn't coach me specifically, he was a distance runner coach, but he was like a father figure, mentor and taught me a lot.
Speaker 1:That's interesting. I remember Isaiah Thomas telling the story of how he ended up in Indiana.
Speaker 2:His mom, yeah, if you get mom, you got it.
Speaker 1:But the way his mom liked him was that you know his brothers were like street guys and so they're all in the house and Bob Mike gets in an argument with his brothers and like street guys it was all in the house and Bob might get in an argument with his brothers. And like he looked at his mom, he's like she liking this, she liking this, and so that's a hilarious story.
Speaker 2:You know, if you get mom, you almost got the athlete, and so he went my mom over.
Speaker 1:And so you were. Did you have some reluctancy, as it was like oh yes, ma'am, no, I just this was the first person you know they give you.
Speaker 2:At that point they gave us four trips. You can take four trips. I went to Kansas. They made a big mistake because they brought me out in winter. Mm-hmm, I'm from Arizona, grew up there. I know it never got me low 60 degrees or, and I get there and it's like 32.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 2:I'm like man, I can't come here. But it was just I didn't know. But then once I came to visit Irvine and Orange County and one of my high school roommates. His brother was on the team. That's how they heard about me. His brother was on the team and that's how they heard about me. His brother was on the team and he lived on Balboa Island. So when I came out for my visit, we stayed on Balboa Island, where there were scantily clad females walking all around the beach.
Speaker 2:And I said this might be my school right here.
Speaker 1:So let's talk about God now. Where was all that in your childhood and your development in these years?
Speaker 2:I went to a small church in the community. It was just one room. It had a wooden floor where when he was singing the song they would stomp on the floor. It didn't have any musical instruments or anything. The pastor, reverend Dunbar, worked on a farm or something. He was bivocational and so we went to church on Sundays. I don't remember anything he said or taught, but I knew we had to go to church because my mom made us go, my grandmother made us go, my grandmother made us go. But what I remember was when it got to the end of the sermon he would pick up his Bible and put it on his shoulder and said they marched him up to Calvary and they hung him on the cross. So when he put that Bible on his shoulder I would hunch my brother Freddie, and say there he go. So he would go by Calvary every week. So I knew Jesus died for my sins. I don't remember Paul was in this jail, none of that kind of stuff. It was always that end of that thing. And so one Sunday, at 10 years old almost 10, 9, he said that he died and all this stuff, and got up early Sunday morning and I found myself coming down forward to the front of the church. They opened the doors of the church, kind of crying, and I really didn't know why. I told him I wanted to be saved, ended up didn't have a baptism, got baptized in an irrigation ditch and so I got saved at 10, almost 10.
Speaker 2:That December my birthday is in December 18th, like the 2nd or 3rd or something I got up early one morning on Saturday waiting for cartoons to come on. We had no 24-hour TV, so I'm waiting for cartoons to come on. And I went to the kitchen to get some water or something and my dad was getting ready for work and he was tying his shoe and he fell over. So I went over to him because I didn't know what was going on and he told me to get Norris, who was my uncle. I didn't know what was going on, so I ran and knocked on my uncle's door, lived up the street.
Speaker 2:He said who is that? I said Lamont. He said what do you want to say? My dad wants you. He said well, what's he doing? I said he's laying on the floor. So he figured out what I didn't, which was something was wrong. So he rushed down to the house, saw my dad on the floor or whatever. A policeman was driving by. He flagged him down. They picked up. My dad put him in the car. My uncle drove him to the hospital. That afternoon my mom came back and told me he had had a stroke. Me he had had a stroke 37, had a stroke, wow.
Speaker 2:So I had just gotten saved a month before then. So my first prayer request I'm asking God to heal my dad, because every time I go to church God can do anything but fail. God is a healer, god can make a way. God is, you know, a bridge over trouble. So that's my first prayer request. So I get up probably a week later I see something I'd never seen before. My mom has a tear coming down and I knew what would happen if my dad had passed. So we had the funeral and everything. I'm 10 years old so I really was kind of disappointed in God. I just got saved. This is my first prayer request. It's December.
Speaker 2:I'm not asking for a bike skateboard none of that skates. I'm just saying hear my dad. I'm hearing all these preachers. I can do anything. He doesn't hear my dad, 37. So we had a funeral. So I just kind of stopped talking to him. Then I had kind of nominal religion. I blessed my food and stuff and I ended up. I have what they call an eidetic memory. It's like one step below photographic. So school was never a problem. I'd go to class and they'd say you know, we got a test today and I'd go, what? What chapter? They'd say chapter five. I'd go choo-choo-choo-choo-choo, so I'd get a B-plus. And they'd be like we hate you, king, we hate you all the boys. No dad, raised by a single mother. I didn't know I was smart enough to go to college, didn't know how I was going to go, had these legs and had that track that got me to college. Once I got my degree and graduated, I got a job. I was training for the 1980 Olympics.
Speaker 1:It's possible. Second, you're in college. You're excelling there, right, but your Christianity is nominal at this point.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's nominal.
Speaker 1:You're not going to church, not really going to church.
Speaker 2:Blessing my food. New guy, I would pray before I competed in race and stuff, but no real growth and learning. I knew the basics from Sunday school, when they used to give us a little card with a picture on it and they said this is Daniel. And he was in the lion's den. These are three Hebrew boys. They're in the fire. So I knew a lot of the stories. I knew that last part he died and all that.
Speaker 1:And retrospect is a lot connected to your dad passing a 10 right after you got saved. It's still lingering there, exactly at 10 right after you got saved and still lingering there. Exactly, you're selling and now you're getting ready for the training for the Olympics, right yeah?
Speaker 2:So I do. I go. I get out of school. I got a degree from Arizona State because my coach from Irvine, my sophomore year got the head coaching job at Arizona State when I got out of high school. I'm the best long jumper in the nation. Arizona State was so sure I was coming to them. They didn't even come to the house 30 minutes away to recruit me. They never even visited, they just knew I was going there, so he got the job there. I went back to Arizona. I got my degree in finance. I couldn't find a job. I ended up doing security.
Speaker 1:Wait a minute. You're training for the Olympics, but you're looking for a job as you train for the Olympics. Right, and you moved back to Arizona State because your coach got a job there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he's there. So then I'm running one day from my house to a place called Sun City, del Webb. It's a retirement community, got a wall around it. It's two miles from my house when I grew up. The dirt road I could see Sun City there Ran across the desert with the German Shepherd up to Sun City, got to the wall and I was sitting at the wall looking back where I grew up.
Speaker 2:I hear somebody say hey, you've been running, huh. And I looked up and one of the Sun City men, older white man, was sitting there. He had on the safari hat some silver-framed glasses. He was kind of looking out. I looked up. I said yeah, I've been running.
Speaker 2:He said what do you think of that? Herschel Walker? I said what do you mean? He says. I said he's a pretty good football player. I said I think the fact that he's going pro, he can always go back to school. I think that's good.
Speaker 2:He said you know what his secret? You hear something like that. Now's a good time to witness. So I jump up to talk to him about the Lord and he's gone Now. I might have sat there longer than I thought, but he said that and I registered and I stood right up and I looked over over the fence and the house was probably 30 feet from the fence. He could have ran in the house, I could have sat there longer.
Speaker 2:But I'm telling you I thought he was gone and I looked and the street I used to run on, me and my cousins race from telephone pole to telephone pole was 50 yards. We used to use that government flower to make lanes and we would race every day and I went from there all the way to college, to my summers competing in Europe, all the way to getting a degree. And I'm right back here without a job. And it says, if it opened up, it was God who did that all along. And then the first thing he said to me is you've been running, huh. And I'm saying yeah, I'm thinking running across the thing he's talking about, running from God.
Speaker 2:So I run back to the house, open the mailbox. I get a letter from First Interstate Bank in California offering me a job. That's saying I can work halftime, they'll pay me full time and I can train for the Olympics the other half All that quick. I get ready to come to California to do the interview with them. I have my sister and another cousin who came and the relative here that I didn't know. He didn't have enough room. He said got a cousin, uncle, you can stay at his house. He has a house in Baldwin Hillsview Park. I get there. His name is Dr Lewis. He's a pastor, so I stay at the house, I do the interview. He and I become pretty good friends. He said look, when you first get here it'll be hard for you to find somewhere to stay.
Speaker 2:You can stay with me and I said okay, kind of weird, because I never knew a pastor personally. Like are they weird? What are they like? Do they just praise God all day?
Speaker 1:You know whatever. Yeah, they're pretty weird.
Speaker 2:I move in with him and now I'm going to church. Sunday morning they had 3.30 service, the evening service, tuesday night mission, five-day revival. But he's an excellent teacher, so I'm learning all this stuff that I'd never learned before, picking it up pretty quick. I'm watching him not realizing this whole time. God has kind of set me up to kind of know what it's like to see and to understand and all that. I'm out of college now. So at that point is when my relationship with the Lord really started to grow and to blossom and I started out a little junior deacon. They let me teach a little Sunday school class and that's when I kind of saw I had an aptitude particularly telling the Bible stories and stuff like that. So it was kind of little by little I felt like the Lord was calling me in.
Speaker 1:And that's when.
Speaker 2:I kind of answered my call. Did you ever make the olympics? What happened with that? We boycotted that year with the um, with jimmy carter, so didn't get to go the next season. I pulled a groin muscle so talk to me about that.
Speaker 1:How are you feeling when you hear about the boycott?
Speaker 2:Well, I'm very disappointed because in ancient Greece they used to stop wars to have the Olympics and now we stop in. You know, we stop in the Olympics because they having a war or something.
Speaker 1:Well, give us more backdrop for those who don't know why the Olympics was boycotted, how athletes felt about it.
Speaker 2:Politically we were having some issues with Russia. I don't know what they were doing, but as a way now when they punish they'll do some economic embargoes or don't trade or whatever. So President Carter felt like the best way to punish them was not to allow our teams to go for 1980. Now, all those years they had the limit. We've never done this. So the year I get there, I make it they decide not to do.
Speaker 1:And you made a team.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I'm kind of devastated and disappointing and, like I said, I hurt my leg after that. And sprinters typically Carl Lewis was kind of rare, but sprinters typically have a real short window. The further you run you can run two, three, four Olympics if you run the 10,000, 5,000. But sprinters you usually got a real narrow window. You can make one or two. Maybe Carl made several, which is kind of rare. But very disappointed, I'm getting ready to get on the Wheaties box and everything else and all this is now gone.
Speaker 1:Literally, were you being ready to put on the Wheaties box no?
Speaker 2:I'm that good, I'm world class and I want to do it.
Speaker 1:Was there means of protest? Was there advocacy?
Speaker 2:Well, really people felt bad but there was nothing organized. We didn't do anything. We just kind of US isn't going this year and it was all across all sports, gymnastics, track, everything. So we didn't get to go and I hurt my leg. So now I'm working at a bank, I'm a banker and I'm living with the pastor. I'm growing quickly. I answer my call and it's.
Speaker 2:Then I look back and see that whole period of God was kind of the memory, the eidetic memory, getting saved at 10. I finally see he's taken an earthly father, but right before that gives me a heavenly father. I got saved like two months before that. So I feel like so what? I'm mad at him. But he took my father and my cousin them. You know, they got their dads teach them how to catch a fly ball, how to hit a curve, how to whatever. I have nobody. So I look back and I say, okay, I, he gave me the Heavenly Father before he took the Earthly Father.
Speaker 2:I never did kind of rebel, stray, just I don't care about school, no more grades, my dad's gone. I never did that. I always got good grades and everything stayed. Um got the degree and was in a position to uh, in a position to um to get into ministry. I'm living with a pastor, I can teach class, I can learn stuff. And um, I was out somewhere and I bumped into oh, I said if I was going to do it, I wanted to be educated. I didn't want to just be a preacher up doing some stuff, I wanted to go to school.
Speaker 2:So I bumped into my college girlfriend from Irvine hadn't seen her in at least 15 years. She was going to school to become a chiropractor out in Whittier. So she said why don't you come? Let's have lunch and catch up. So I go have lunch. When I'm leaving she introduces me to a recruiter from their school and the lady says would you like to come here to go to school? And she said oh no, he just answered a call to be a minister and she said my husband's a minister and so I didn't think anything of it.
Speaker 2:About a month later Penny calls me and says you remember the lady you met? I said yeah. She said her husband was a minister. Well, he's teaching at a school and they got scholarships 80% scholarship for people who want to go. Are you interested? I said yeah. So I called him. 48 hours later I was enrolled at Azusa Pacific with 80, a theological school, graduate school with 80% scholarship from the Lilly Foundation. So the prayer I want to go to school. They're paying for it now, books and everything, and I started going to school there. They're paying for it now, books and everything. And I started going to school there. And then, probably a year later, I'm at another school, Biola in La Mirada, in the bookstore and I bump into Jimmy Washington and John Coleman.
Speaker 2:And of course Jimmy's telling me. I told him I was at the zoo saying and he's telling me well, you need to get your theology at this school. This is solid theology. So he goes through this whole big old thing. Long story short, he ends up at Azusa Pacific because he's in the Methodist denomination and they wanted him to get a degree from a Methodist school. So even though he took most of his classes at Biola, he has to transfer to Azusa to get the Methodist degree. So I ended up getting a degree from Azusa. I worked managing the computer department at Biola so I was getting credits at both schools. I got a Master of Divinity from Azusa Pacific. I got a Master of Art and Bible Exposition from Talbot Biola.
Speaker 2:And at Biola we had a book called Biblical Preaching by Han Robinson. They introduced me and so every time I'm doing a sermon I'm walking through these steps. He has in the book A couple of them. I didn't understand. So I said man, I don't understand. So I Googled his name, found out he was at Denver Seminary, I think. No, gordon Conwell. So I googled his name. Called Gordon Conwell, said I'm trying to reach Haddon Robinson. They said hold on. He says hold on.
Speaker 2:So I said man, I got your book here I'm trying to understand. He said, yeah, there's a problem with books they're not real clear. So we talked for two hours. He said, hey, you sound like a pretty good guy. We got a program here, doctor of Ministry and Preaching you might be interested in. And so 48 hours later I'm enrolled in the Doctor of Ministry program at Gordon Conwell to study with Haddon Robinson, who wrote this book, who said to all of us all things considered, he considered black preaching the best preaching in the world for everything that we inherently instinctively bring to preaching. So I studied with him and I had his protege, dr Sanukian, at Biola Talbot. So between those two I really got pulled into— what's the time frame of all?
Speaker 1:this, this is happening— it sounds like this is back to back to back. No, no, no. But so between those two I really got pulled into it.
Speaker 2:What's the time frame of this? All this this is happening. It sounds like this is back to back to back. No, no, no, there was some time in between, after I got out of school from Arizona.
Speaker 1:State and with my uncle and that that took about.
Speaker 2:How long did you live with your?
Speaker 1:uncle About six years and you finished.
Speaker 2:In that time I got the Masters.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I got the masters From Iowa and from Tabert.
Speaker 2:Exactly I. As part of the program at Azusa they wanted everybody to work in ministry, not to just have a degree and never actually been in a church or anything. So I work at a little church called Delaire in Hawthorne, all white church. I'm working with the youth. The pastor there gets a call to another church. They asked me the pastor. I said, well, I'm finishing up school. If you guys let me finish school, y'all run the church and at the end let's talk about it. We did that. So I became pastor at Delaire Baptist Church. All white church, all white church. One black family at the time of the rodney king rise. So they would bring their friends and their friends would be like there's a, there's a color guy out there and they're like, just hold on, you're gonna enjoy it. So I had, I had a, I had an all-white church, basically at the time of the rodney king rise, in in hawthorne again no family life at this point.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no family at this point. And again, um, God has so orchestrated things that I'm kind of what they call bicultural I. You know, I can, I can function in my culture back in the nineties. Yeah, and but I can function also in the, in the um, you know business world, Also in the in the you know business world, Caucasian world, whatever, so, and I wasn't what they would have called a scary hooper, I didn't scare him or anything, I just kind of talked and used humor and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:So that's how I ended up in ministry full time, and so how long did you stay at the bank before you start working at the school?
Speaker 2:I was. I worked at the bank six years and then I ended up at the school and going to school.
Speaker 1:So simultaneously with your uncle Right, and then you end up working there. Exactly, yeah, how long was your tenure there at the church in Hawthorne?
Speaker 2:I was there eight years.
Speaker 1:How was that?
Speaker 2:That was a good experience. I actually discovered that we probably had more conflict with music than just race. I remember distinctly one Sunday I had Kelly Taylor as my musician. I brought him in because we had a girl from Russia who couldn't speak English and the music was killing me. So I brought in Kelly and Kelly had the Hispanic and Caucasian people. That time Kirk Franklin someone asked the question he had them singing that sounding like they was from the hood, so he was rocking. But anyway, one Sunday I said we're going to sing a song. Everybody knows we can all get together here. By this point I got a mixture of probably 30% African-American, 70% Caucasian. I said we're going to sing Amazing Grace. And so we get ready to sing Amazing Grace. And they took off Bam, amazing Grace. How sweet to sound. Bam Amazing grace how sweet to say on this age, the rest like me and we were on the uh. So that's what I figured out.
Speaker 1:We probably had more conflict with music at age young versus old than we did. Did you ever address race during that time, what we call social justice? You said Rodney King's going on. Did those things ever come up? I know California's a little bit different than Southern and even East Coast cities in that notion.
Speaker 2:I absolutely did and I think I kind of base it on the education I got at Azusa Pacific was far more social activism and social gospel. Walter Rauschenbusch, we actually covered this. They weren't even mentioned at Talbot. They were more we're going to teach you how to exegete the Bible. Know the original language in that, but they and theirs was kind of the privatization of sin. Everybody has individual sin and all the problems in the world come from individual sin. They weren't really addressing racism versus other specific sins. They were just saying all you need to do is get everybody saved and that'll solve all the world's problems, whereas at Azusa we had to work in the inner city with the homeless and with others and they were showing specific manifestations and so I had kind of a pretty good mixture and much of the African-American church tradition. As you know, we deal with all kinds of issues because we're saying the earth is the Lord and the fullness thereof and we can address you know, whatever comes up, right?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I do know that. Pastor Marker was there before me when the Rodney King hit. He wanted to talk about race and they forbid him. They told him you better not say anything about race from that pulpit, and he didn't. He was a white guy, he was a white guy.
Speaker 2:But I would bring up issues, I would bring up concerns, just because that's all I knew and that's what I thought was right. And when I had my grid for application, I might have a single person, a married couple, a retiree, a teenager. One of my little constructs was the poor, the oppressed, racism, stuff like that. So I would apply in all those areas as well, so that people would understand. You know that the gospel has something to say about those things.
Speaker 1:Did you have ministry initiatives that dealt with that? You know you talked about Azusa, how to go feed the poor, and things of that nature. Again, I know we're dealing with LA, dealing with maybe, middle class, upper middle class. Yeah, did you have? Specific outreach last week that you were doing.
Speaker 2:We didn't have a lot of grassroots kind of stuff we were doing, as you said, middle class. We were doing more let's get some scholarships to help some of the kids go to school and things like that. We weren't doing as much the feeding, the clothing of the hungry we were doing kind of scholarships. It was more like you said. The application came out to be probably more middle class than what the church was comfortable with.
Speaker 1:So what's next? You're there eight years.
Speaker 2:I'm there all of that time, I, and I leave there. I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I get a.
Speaker 1:You resign. Yes, I get a. What led you to resign?
Speaker 2:I resigned because at that point I was getting ready to move, I got married, was going to Kansas, so I did ministry in Kansas. Probably I just did an interim. And this was weird for me, george, because I went from a Baptist church to a Disciples in Christ church. What made you go to Kansas? That's where she was from.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:And so we were there. I met a Disciples of Christ church. Doctrine was pretty similar to Baptist, except we did communion every Sunday, okay, every Sunday. They were part of a group with United Church of Christ where they have four different denominations who recognize each other's ordination and that. So from there, the church I was doing interim asked me to be pastor, but I accepted a call from a church in New Orleans that was United Church of Christ. Now this was a completely different world for me.
Speaker 1:I know you're going LA, Kansas, New Orleans, and so I'm in the South.
Speaker 2:So I said, okay, I've heard about the South, let's see what happens. But it wasn't a Baptist church, it was United Church of Christ. Again kind of heard about the South, let's see what happens. But it wasn't a Baptist church, it was the United Church of Christ Again kind of middle class in that and very, very, very much socially involved, socially active, civil rights, voter registration, social gospel, racism. Addressing issues like that was a completely different world for me. But where I think they had their deficit was when it actually came to the Bible and exegesis and knowing the Bible they were not. So I did very well in just preaching expository through the Bible and teaching them to actually understand what the Bible said, because they they were going to do the causes and stuff, regardless as to if they really understood passages. It was like well, we know, we know God is on the side of the poor. So we were out here doing this.
Speaker 1:So what is the D-man play in all this?
Speaker 2:I'm doing the D-man at this point.
Speaker 1:At New Orleans. That's where you started, in New Orleans.
Speaker 2:So I'm doing the D-Min at this point. I'm doing it in preaching, and I ended up doing my project on expository preaching in the African-American tradition Because part of the stereotype was that black preaching was exciting, engaging, interesting, creative, but not necessarily tied to the Bible. Some people thought we took too much freedom and I was contending that we had preachers who retained the best of what we bring creativity, imagination, bringing the stories to life, narrative preaching and stuck with the Bible. And so I did the study, I did the research and then I also included a DVD with examples like Tony Evans, Maurice Watson. There were might have been even RA Williams. I had, from hoopers to straight teachers like Tony, who dealt with the Bible, who retained the best of our tradition, and that's what I ended up focused on.
Speaker 1:In this process, who were some of the pastors and preachers that you looked up to. That kind of mentored you, be it from afar or up close.
Speaker 2:At that time I would say— Throughout the process, throughout the process. At that time I would say Throughout the process, throughout the process. Once I got here with my uncle and I started getting introduced, I loved Manuel Scott Sr. Not because he was a straight expositor, but he had a down-home wisdom, practicality that made a passage come to life and it wasn't simply exegesis, he wasn't talking about the Greek or the Hebrew, but when he finished you knew what the passage mean, you knew what you needed to do and it was very clear. So I put that all into the rubric of biblical preaching preaching the Bible, but in a way that just made sense. So he was one I liked, got introduced to here in LA. Ek Bailey would come every year for Pastor Wade. He was another one that could tell stories and I could follow.
Speaker 2:A pivotal turning point for me, and one I really looked up to, was Bishop Kenny Omer, again with my uncle, small church. He comes in and he preaches. I'm able to follow this guy from beginning to end. He's giving me background, context, culture, all of this stuff. He explained where Paul is, why he's writing context. So afterwards I went up to him I said what did you just do? He said what do you mean? I preached. I said I was able to follow you from beginning to end. He said it's called expository preaching. I said why don't all preachers do that? And he started laughing.
Speaker 2:But I got a college degree and this is the first person I really could understand and so that's what got me on to this. There's a way to preach where people can actually remember, understand and it makes sense. And again, I like the hooping but I'm a little scared of it because you got to go through a learning curve and you can be sounding way pretty bad before you sound good. And I had too much pride. The Lord had not delivered me. I didn't want to sound bad and most of the people I knew practiced when they were young and by the time they ended up preaching they were very good at it. I didn't want to go through that and the other thing that helped me was because I didn't have that gift initially. I had to really study and get into the text and have something to say.
Speaker 2:And that was that helped me because, building my foundation on that as opposed on the celebratory part, I was not using it to bail out because I didn't really have anything to say, so that worked out good for me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, how would you define expository preaching?
Speaker 2:I would say expository preaching is, in its simplest form, exposing the text in its context, bringing it from back then and back there to here and now, with the implications of applying it to my contemporary audience. A good expositor. When they finish you should know more about that passage than when they started.
Speaker 2:I think it's Joe Gregory says he labels some sermons, called them the Star Spangled Banner sermon. He says at the beginning of a football game they played a Star Spangled Banner and for the rest of the game you don't hear any more about the Star Spangled Banner. And he says some sermons start like that they read a text and for the rest of the sermon you don't hear any more about the Star Spangled Banner. And he says some sermons start like that they read a text and for the rest of the sermon you don't hear anything about that text. So for me, expository sermon is letting the Bible speak, being a mouthpiece for the Bible, explaining, applying, proving the Bible, but letting the Bible direct itself rather than preaching over it, under it, around it, letting it speak to again where, when the audience leaves, they should know more about that particular passage than when you started.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think Haddon Robinson uses that illustration in biblical preaching too well, if I remember right, New Orleans. How long were you there?
Speaker 2:I was there five years. I left in November 2004, right before Hurricane Katrina. Matter of fact, where I was living, all that area got wiped out. I had a shed in the back with six 700 books in there. All of that got flooded gone. I had just left right before that hit and I came back to California. Kelly Taylor, my good friend, called and said hey, king, there's a church here I think you would really like. I had three older daughters here in California so I wanted to kind of get back and so I turned in an application for friendly friendship, went through the process. They called me. I preached my first sermon here on Thanksgiving Day 2004. Wow, so I'm back in LA at this point On a Thursday, on a Thursday. On a Thursday, st Augustine Baptist Church on Figueroa Preached there. That was my first sermon back to town. It was a district function and, for whatever reason I guess, the brethren put me up to see who's his brother and can he preach. That happened on that Thanksgiving.
Speaker 1:You hadn't had friendly friendship yet.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I accepted it. I had not actually preached there yet.
Speaker 1:Oh, so they hired you without hearing you preach. No, no.
Speaker 2:I came, I interviewed and everything. I accepted the church. I moved out here and my first time preaching in LA was on Thanksgiving Day. That Sunday I preached at Friendly Friendship.
Speaker 1:Oh. So the following Sunday you preached at Friendly Friendship, but you got to church.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I got to church. I already had to church Without preaching there. No, no, I did preach. I went through the interview process. I preached a couple of times.
Speaker 1:At Friendly, friendship At Friendly.
Speaker 2:Friendship. I did the initial-.
Speaker 1:So your first time preaching backA was as pastor. As pastor Got you as pastor?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I came two times, I think, to preach the first time and then they got the number down to however many. They had three or four and I preached again, they voted and I ended up. Were you excited to be back in LA? Yeah, I was excited to be back in LA, wasn't quite sure. Didn't know the church you know other than the search committee. Didn't know the church. Didn't know you know what I was getting into, where it was. Kelly told me it was a good church. He grew up there and he said they always took pride in their pastor. He said, you know, pretty mixed group, educated and straight from the hood too, but all ages, very demographic, and he was right about that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it was your fourth church.
Speaker 2:Yes, how was it being back in LA? It was nice being back in LA, you know, weather-wise, people-wise, I was closer to my kids, I liked it, I liked, and then my uncle still had his church here on 79th and Broadway so and I knew a lot of people. So it was, it was, it was like being back home and it was comfortable and I had something to compare it with had the all white church in Hawthorne, had the disciples church in Kansas, had the uh uh, ucc church in congregational church in New Orleans and then back to Baptist here. So UCC is United Congregational Church in New Orleans and then back to Baptist here.
Speaker 1:So it's UCC is United Congregational Church. Okay.
Speaker 2:UCC is Disciples of Christ, Congregational, Christian and Reformed. All four of those recognize each other's ordination, Ordination. Together they're called the United Church of Christ. Mm-hmm. Together they're called the United Church of Christ. They have some doctrinal issues a little bit differences, but they're all pretty much the same and is racially diverse racially diverse, extremely religiously, politically very progressive, very progressive.
Speaker 2:It wouldn't be what you call evangelical. They were pushing. The congregationalists were the ones who, when the ship got here, the Amistad, that had slaves on it, they were the Christians who fought to let them go back to their country instead of keeping them here in America. So they had a long history of fighting for the rights of the underprivileged, the oppressed, the poor, all of that.
Speaker 1:Wow, tell me about the integration of coming back west, not back home, because you're from Arizona, right? What are some of the things that are standing out in those early years?
Speaker 2:In the early years.
Speaker 2:What was standing out to me was I was starting to kind of formulate in my own ministry, in my mind, that there was still the very traditional Baptist church with the deacons doing the devotion and leading the church, and that and at this point Fred Price, a couple of other people were coming out with a kind leading the church in that and at this point fred price, a couple of other people were coming out with a kind of teaching style in that and a lot of the younger guys, or the guys my contemporary, were considering, instead of waiting in line with the national progressive or whatever to get a position, they were saying we're going to kind of do our own thing in a different manner. So, coming back, I was kind of wrestling with how traditional do I want to be and how progressive do I want to be in terms of what our church is. And although most of my foundation is in traditional, coming out of banking in the business world I had developed an affinity for, you know, having an agenda, doing things timely, having organized business meetings and you know, not just whenever the spirit moves, we're going to
Speaker 2:start and leave. So I kind of think, merged the business world and pragmatics with the best of church, always been one who's kind of cognizant and concerned about time, because it seemed like we were just doing stuff and could have been done in half the time. But nobody was ever in a hurry and I didn't want to rush. But at the same time I found out there were other people like me out there, who, who, who wish there was somewhere they could go and you know, worship and do and move on. So that's when I started formulating you know my own personal way, but very much so from my upbringing, my uncle in that very much a Pastoral heart. I'm going to go to the hospital, I'm going to pray with you, I'm going to do visitation, I'm going to be pastor.
Speaker 1:There's two aspects of LA that either has changed, evolved or evolving during that time. Your church is on the East side, the migration of a large immigrant population, specifically Mexicans, are taking place, and then there's also the mega church shift that's kind of being dominated in LA. You mentioned Fred Price, but then you have and you correct me, if I'm right Kenny Ulmer, charles Blake, noel Jones, clarence McClendon is going on at the while and some of that is being cherry picked out of the traditional black church for various reasons and full gospel as a movement is taking place as well. That's kind of cherry picking and changing the dynamics of LA. The first part of changing the dynamics of LA and black people in general. The second one is changing the dynamics of LA. Black people and black Baptist churches. Right, and they're married together, and so talk to us a little bit about that.
Speaker 2:Excellent question. As I said, I'm looking at all of this, all the things that you talked about. One of the things, as you know, when it comes to pastoring in its purest sense, you and I don't have the privileges of just picking up a newspaper and saying this is a job, let me go apply for it. Part of what's involved is God has some say so as to where you're going to end up and where you're going to end up ministering, and so you wonder why in the Bible Amos is. You know he's from surprise, he's a country man and God sends him to downtown because the ministerial association is corrupt. And you say, why would you send a farmer downtown? But that's God's sovereignty, where he places ministers and the ministry that they have. So part of it for me, george, has always been yeah, people vote and yeah, you apply and all this, but if God is not involved, you just can't end up certain places. I never felt like I had the calling to be a church planner or start churches, so I felt like he opened the door at Friendly Friendship.
Speaker 2:In South Central there's a transition going on, as you say, where in our neighborhoods and up and down the street I'm watching more and more Hispanic families are moving in and this and that. South America, latin America, you know Central America. And talking to them they said the realtor told them we found a house for you. They didn't know they were in Watts. They didn't know they were in Watts, they didn't know they were in South Central LA. They just said we can afford a house here. And they're moving in. So dynamics, demographic is changing in the neighborhood. My church has a pretty good mixture educated, still going to school, everything else. So I feel like God placed me there.
Speaker 1:But I also felt like some of the traditional things devotion and all that were kind of moving away. Good, good, good, good, good, good, good, good, good. Let's dig deeper here though. Okay, the pros, the cons, the concerns, even looking back from a retro's perspective, of how specifically almost seemingly to me as a newcomer in this area, around the same time as you that the Black Baptist Church either was not ready or refused to react in an appropriate way to maintain the leverage that we had, be it by those spaces on the east side and membership and dominance as the traditional being, because the common factor of all those places I named was charismatic non-traditional being still have the celebratory, except for Word of Faith, fair Price, still have celebratory elements to it.
Speaker 1:But there's seemingly a lot of things that you talked about that you had from your corporate world organization presentation, cutting edge, trying out different things, and even now to see, if we go even deeper to now, to see that most of them now have either plateaued or definitely not excelling in a way that they once were Exactly.
Speaker 2:Excellent, excellent questions and discussions. I was kind of wedded to my uncle who had helped me so much. He's straight to the left traditionalist. He wasn't. He'd get upset.
Speaker 2:Talking about Jesus is more important than the Super Bowl. So we have Church Sunday on Super Bowl Sunday. So you know he's not going to say, well, let's have a Super Bowl party, we can have time, we can talk about the Lord. He's like, oh, they're not competing with my Jesus. You know, you're a bad Christian if you're not in church on Super Bowl Sunday. So I have that part I'm fighting against.
Speaker 2:If I think, if I have been able to really pick out and say, let me go and talk to Dr Omer and see if he'll mentor me, because I could see where he was going and I could see how it was working and I knew him and he was one who, when I said to the Lord, when he really was pulling me in, I'm like I could do that. If I can preach like he does, I'll do it, because everybody I knew weighed and everybody was killing it. They're bringing Jasper and I mean you know. So I said, if I can do like Omer, he's like, hey, be yourself. And Omer was that model and then he was progressive. You know he's meeting in the high school. You know Gary McIntosh, who taught church growth at Biola, still teaches it.
Speaker 1:Great guy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he told me he studied all these churches. He said and I'm dumbing it down but he said, in essence, african-americans don't really believe you've got a real church unless you've got a building, like with a cross on it and stuff. So if you meet at a high school and some of this other stuff, we might deal with you a little bit and the younger generations will, but we need to know you legit with a building with a cross on it and that. So, omar, meeting in a high school Washington High with bleachers or you know people saying that was kind of unheard of Fred Price wasn't really, as you know, for Baptist. He wasn't really walking around with the Bible open teaching, he wasn't really considered, you know, that Baptist flavor and he didn't have the celebration. So I'm looking at all these people, like you said, full gospel starting up, you got some younger people and to me it seemed like it was an individual thing depending on that particular pastor and his vision and the kinds of things he was able to do. I saw it starting to happen. I had the business degree, the business world and those things coming in and there was always something inside of me that to what you were saying.
Speaker 2:Jim Collins had a book called Good to Great and one of the things I had to read it. In business, one of the things he kept saying was the greatest companies and now we're talking even churches to the greatest companies are constantly asking the question how do we improve what we do? And you're even talking about today those top churches that were progressive. Now they're kind of plateauing and we got to ask questions Even after COVID. To my embarrassment, we were still passing the basket. That's the only way you could give. We weren't looking and saying these millennials and others don't carry cash. They have an ATM card. I have young people that pass a king. You knocked it out of the park. I gave you all the money I had in my pocket. I said how much was that? They said $3. If I had more, I would have given you more.
Speaker 2:But Collins said the best companies are always asking the question which the church should be doing how do we improve on what we do? What business are we in and how do we improve on what we do? And his example was you got to get the right people on the bus and then you got to get the right people on the bus in the right seats. We just say who wants a volunteer, who wants to do something. We don't necessarily get the right people on the bus and we definitely don't necessarily get them in the right seat. And I started noticing what he said was true.
Speaker 2:So I would go to Office Depot and buy an ink pen and by the time I got to my car, george, I got a survey that said was the ink pen? And by the time I got to my car, george, I got a survey that said was the ink pen easy to find? Did we have all the colors that you wanted? How was the person who checked you out? Would you recommend to your friends that we buy an ink pen from you? Now, this is a 99 cent ink pen and you and I have a priceless gospel. Why are they more concerned with the best way to get you to get that pen than we are to get the gospel out?
Speaker 2:And I think churches and ministries and ministers who don't ask these questions how do we improve what we do? How can we make it better? It may be great Now we don't have to change the message. We don't change the theology, we don't change the Savior, that's Jesus Christ, but is there a way to make it. Mcintosh asked us in the class to guess what the two most important factors at a church are. We guessed a million things and he ended up telling us bathrooms and parking. He said people don't go where they can't park and women won't go where there's a nasty bathroom. And we and those are kind of things we just didn't think about. Most of the churches around me, george, including my church we got a big building but we got four or five parking spots. We didn't think about parking. And now, even if you want to change something at the church, the first thing the city asks is we're not going to let you build anything that doesn't support the parking.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:So these are the kind of things and I think you're very astute to notice that we constantly have to ask the question. It's not enough to say I got the nicest, jamminest, most happening church in LA, because eventually it's going to pass you by If you don't continually ask that question how do we do what we do better, whether it's zoom, facetime, online, whatever. How can I improve it? How can I improve it? How can I do better what we do? We have a camera that we stream on and then people telling us streaming said that people can get fatigued from watching just one view, so you need more than one camera. So these are all things. Again, we've got to constantly ask the question how do we improve on what we do to become a better, a better church?
Speaker 1:You are. I want to revisit that conversation, but I want to kind of add a flavor to it. You're naturally insulated, which I think is a good thing, especially in LA and preaching. What do you say is the reason why you tend to be, from a social standpoint, more insulated?
Speaker 2:I think, george, I think what we do as ministers and what we are, I think you have to protect that and I think you have to continually in some way have to be continually refueling. A pastor can give out a lot in a day, in a week, in a month, between counseling, visitation, praying for the sick, praying podcasts, preaching, preparation, and I think at some point you have to constantly, you have to kind of protect that and I think, again, just the way God is sovereign, it's really to me nothing more than discipline and I developed that with track by the time I got to college. I'm at Arizona State. We're known as the party school. I couldn't be partying every night. We got all kinds of stuff going on every day. I couldn't be a part of that. If I'm working out hard, trying to be the best in the world and what I do in sports, it requires getting up at a certain time, working out a certain amount of hours, being in the, in the lock and in the weight room, getting a certain amount of rest, preparation, getting my mind together, thinking about it psychologically. All of that goes into it.
Speaker 2:And I think developing those patterns from track when I got into ministry, where you don't have a boss boss looking over your shoulder. You got a congregation, but day to day there's nobody really watching what we do. You got to have discipline, and natural ability can carry you a long ways for a long time, but eventually people in the know know they may not say anything to you, but you know what preachers are really putting in the work and which ones aren't. It becomes evident after a while. So I, I, I think I've just learned to try to everything that's flashy and shiny out there that tries to get your attention and distract you. You have to make your decision what you're going to be and what you're going to be about. And, um, I like to tell people a postage stamp is successful because it sticks with one thing until you get there. And you almost got to be like that. If, if, if. Ministry is what you want to do and do it effectively, because you just can't do everything.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. Let's talk about what I believe and anybody that's heard you preach before would share this assessment which is that you're one of the best preaching minds that we have, which is that you're one of the best preaching minds that we have, not black white, not LA, just period. Tell us about your philosophy on preaching. I know we talked about expository preaching a little bit, and a little bit about the process of getting you there and then the practice as it relates to presentation. If we were being, if we were being, elitist, we will say you're hermeneutics and you're homiletics, being, um, we're being elitist, we will say you're hermeneutics and your homiletics.
Speaker 1:Um thank you just your philosophy of preaching first, first and foremost, thank you for the, for the compliment.
Speaker 2:I I uh again, george is kind of tied with me with sports being able to pick up track and field magazine at certain months of the year and see that I'm the number one 200 meter runner, the number one long jumper in the world, and what it took to get to that point and I know you know how much time and energy and everything you have to put in. I brought that when I felt like the Lord was calling me to preach. I brought that to preaching too, that I want to be one of the best who who does it. So that's why my first prayer was let me go to school. And I was able to go to school and then, um, I would listen to um preaching. Now. Back then we didn't have youtube and all that, so you could get a cassette cassettes and I was
Speaker 2:thinking and and and and. Then I would listen to people and they would say, man, back then we didn't have YouTube and all that, so you could get a cassette. Cassettes was a thing. And then I would listen to people and they would say, man, you got to hear EK Bailey, you got to hear Melvin Wade, you got to hear Jasper Williams, you got to hear CAW Clark. And I would listen to all these guys, I would buy the cassettes and I would just listen to see what they did well, and didn't know what I was doing, because at that point I didn't know.
Speaker 1:You didn't have titles. You didn't have hermeneutics. I didn't know hermeneutics Expository, biblical, exactly I didn't know any of that. You just listened for a year and had appreciation of what you were hearing.
Speaker 2:This. Tony Evans has a lot of illustrations. So I'm going. Man, he got strength for everything. I'm watching Dr Clark. There's a wisdom underneath. He's not in a hurry, he's throwing some stuff out there, but he's building and building and making sense. I'm watching Manuel Scott Sr say something that comes out of his mouth and floats over your head and then blows your mind. That was so simple but so profound. So I'm listening to all of these guys. Every chance I got, like with Bishop Palmer, I would ask the guy George, how did you come up with that? That was so creative. You did a first person. First time I saw that I would talk to people, I would study. I got Haddon's book and it helped me to understand a lot of the things about—one of the things Haddon said that most sermons don't have too many ideas. They have unrelated ideas and a good sermon the ideas stick together. So I'm looking at all of these kinds of things. I got a drive and a desire to be the best, not just good. I want to be one of the best.
Speaker 2:I want to be one of the best. Magic Johnson got here to LA and one of the channels on sports on the sports channel here had what they call Turkey of the Week and they would put a athlete up and call him Turkey of the Week and tell you why. So Magic gets Paul Westhead fired and they put him on as Turkey of the Week and said he's a rookie.
Speaker 1:How dare he the?
Speaker 2:next night Magic comes on and says this guy called me Turkey of the Week, said how dare me. And that I'm a rookie and I haven't paid my dues. And he said I used to get up in Lansing, michigan, every Saturday with a pocket full of dimes and me and my best friend would ride to the park and we would play on that court till we took it. And then I would call around Lansing to find the next hottest game and we ride over there and take that court. Then we would call around. He said I've been doing that since I was in high school, so don't tell me about paying dues.
Speaker 2:So that kind of mentality of you're going to put in the work. People see it later but they don't know. You know you're in practicing on dribbling with both hands, shooting with both hands. You put in the work. So I had that kind of mentality. I knew what it took to be world-class and again I want to do this in preaching. So I'm listening to everybody. I can. I'm reading, voracious reading. I'm reading everything that I can. I'm trying to understand. But my goal is to be one of the best and that's what I'm working on.
Speaker 2:I get to go to school, I get exposed to Haddon and his book, I get exposed to Dr Sanukian, and part of what that did for me was it gave me a language and a nomenclature to classify what the black preachers were doing Creativity, imagination, what their idea. Now, we might not have called it that, george, but we were doing it. Good preaching has certain things in common Restatement, a central idea, driving the point home. So we were doing all of this without the technical names and all of that. So I'm now I have a way to talk about it. See what's happening, transitions from one point to another point. Why is it that some preachers, when they go from point to point, it's real easy to follow with them, and others it sounds like one big jump.
Speaker 1:That's interesting because I think when I hear you talk about your philosophy of preaching, it reminds me of what I think the difference in preaching today, and when I say preaching today I'm using it in context of mainstream, popular preaching. Ok, because preaching is eclectic and when you start making these generalizations, you need to put some specificity to your generalization, which is that it's so sped up, it is so a part of the times of speed. Quickly, I got to quickly know where you're going. I got to quickly become excited. I got to, in this crafting that you're talking about, I think Cesar Clark wouldn't be Cesar Clark if he was, if he sped up today if he was in here today.
Speaker 1:Right, he'll still be popular, he'll still be celebrated. They're not at the same level because preaching is so. The cadence is sped up, the argument presentation is sped up. I need to know where you're going as quickly as possible. And there is and I will say this unhealthy being towards celebration. Not hoping, but celebration, meaning.
Speaker 1:There's always got to be some level of good news tied into every statement, even in the introduction, exactly. And so this, which life is, this crescendo is often missing in life. That's how life works. You don't just wake up and have a Grammy. You don't just wake up and be on the box of Wheaties for a long jump. Don't just wake up and be on the box of Wheaties for a long jump. You sign up for the Olympics and then the president of the United States decides you boycott it, but then it shifts to another whole field of work. When you, when I hear you talk about that, I want to for you to respond as well to a type of preaching you're hearing today and what concerns, or you know, your critiques of and again I'm talking mainstream, popular preaching.
Speaker 2:Ok, I would. I would say there's, there's, there's a couple of things. There's a couple of things. One is the preacher, the homiletician, the person who delivers the sermon called by God. And on top of everything else, I'm saying, george, first and foremost, you've got to have that relationship with God. You've got to be praying, you've got to be walking with Him. You've got to be praying, you got to be walking with him. You got to, you got to ask him. You're just giving a speech. If God isn't in the Holy Spirit, you're just talking and giving the speech. So I'm, I'm, I'm operating under the supposition, or the, or the assumption that you know, you got to pray, you got to. God has to breathe on what you're doing. He's crucial in this, but there's some mechanical things we can do, and so forth and so on.
Speaker 1:I find with a lot of popular preaching.
Speaker 2:Everything makes the audience the person in the audience feels like they have no issues at all. People should have recognized you when they had a chance. God is doing something in your life. If they don't recognize you, let them go, and it's never you need to change or anything. It's other people. Other people don't realize who you are and people like hearing that about them and it may be something completely- Almost seeker-friendly preaching yeah.
Speaker 2:Seeker-friendly, telling what you want to hear. Now we have a. We have here's a problem with that, george this kind of preaching. The problem with that is I had surgery on this right knee in high school and I had torn my cartilage. When the doctor came in he didn't say King, what do you think I should do? And how do you think I should do this surgery? Because I'd have been like we need to get another doctor in here.
Speaker 2:If he's asking me, he's the expert. We have allowed the audience to tell us what we're supposed to be doing. So they said speed it up. We speed it up, tell me where you're going right from the beginning. We tell them where we're going right from the beginning. If I'm the expert, I need to be practicing my craft in a way that they catch a hold of it and get blessed by it, not the other way around.
Speaker 2:So I think a lot of our preaching is seeker-sensitive, trying to be friendly with the audience, giving people what they want, which is the very thing Paul warns about. We're going to get to a time where people want to scratch itching ears. They got two problems pathological. They want scratch itching ears. Then they're going to turn their ears from the truth to hear fables. So we got two problems and he told us that's what people don't want to do, and then, for reasons of expedient or to make money, we go right along with that. My problem is I'm a little bit scared of God because ultimately he's going to call me and put on the video and say why did you say that and why did you say I said that?
Speaker 2:So, I'm a little bit scared of him and we have to really, with integrity, look at the text and say is that what it's saying? What God is saying? I think too much of it is kind of smooth. Make you feel good about yourself. The most least taught aspect of the Holy Spirit. The Bible says when he has come, he will convict the sin. We're not preaching that. We're not trying to convict people. We tell the Holy Spirit to bring things to your remembrance. Holy Spirit will give you power. The Holy Spirit convicting you. That's not a sermon that we preach a lot.
Speaker 2:So I feel like a lot of modern day preaching is kind of just, you know, telling people what they want to hear, making them feel comfortable, and not really what the Bible is saying. So I think we have a major problem there. And remember, there's no weights or balances or standard of what a real sermon is. Nobody quite knows. The people in the audience feel like if you finish on time and I can remember one or two of the points of the jokes you did pretty good. You and I know better than that. It's not just about finishing on time and saying something. The Greek word means and the Hebrew word means that it has to be more than that. So if they don't know, then why are we looking to them to set the parameters of what we should be doing? So I think it's a major problem to set the parameters of what we should be doing. So I think it's I think it's a major problem and I think, if you're going to be, I think, being expedient is an enemy to being biblical.
Speaker 1:It's Sunday. Thank you for that. It's Sunday. You finished preaching. You got to preach next Sunday. What?
Speaker 2:what are your? What's your process to get ready for that next Sunday? Well, like you, I like to do series and if I'm doing a little series, I got some momentum going. I know I'm doing the Sermon on the Mount, or I know I'm preaching through James, or I know I'm preaching on the Beatitudes, or I know I'm preaching on you know, whatever it is. So when I start, I'm going to be rereading the book background, everything else I can grab about the subject, and then I'm going to chop up my pieces. And, in addition, any good pastor, George, what do you mean chop up your pieces.
Speaker 2:I'm going to set the limits on how many verses I'm going to preach, or what we call a pericope or paragraph or thought. On the one hand, I'm going to exegete that Bible to know what I'm going to be preaching. And here's for the pastor, very important for the pastor, the pastor, the pastor. I'm also going to exegete my congregation. If I had last month 17 deaths, this month I'm not preaching on the ten toes of the beast in Daniel. I got a whole lot of hurting people dealing with grief who may not know how to grieve, how to grieve biblically. What is God saying? Is he saying something? Through all of this? I got a congregation with at least 17 families affected by this and as I prepare, I need to know what's happening in my congregation because when I was with my uncle and I was a youth pastor and somebody invited me to preach, george, you had three sermons. I had A, b and C and you were going to get one of them. Three sermons. I don't care where your church was and what was going on, I was coming over with my A, b and C. I found out, george, when I became a pastor. God said what are you doing? I said I'm pulling out the A, b or C. He said no, no, no, no, no. I said what do you want me to do? He said put out your hand and I would put out my hand and he would give me food for this flock. If they were low in vitamin C, this was vitamin C fortified. If they low in vitamin D, this is vitamin D fortified. Now, he wouldn't literally tell me to put my hand out, but my point is he would be working on my heart and my mind to say here's what these particular people need.
Speaker 2:And so if that letter from Corinth got confused with the letter of Philippi, it wouldn't make sense. You know, got the joy and all that. Them Corinthians didn't have no joy. They got cliques and they got all kind of stuff going on and they got super apostles and they doing some stuff at Chloe's house. They never would have understood the letter from Philippians and about what was going on there and how this particular church right here got upset with the pastor because he didn't include him in the offering.
Speaker 2:How dare you, rev? You're not stealing our blessing. We ain't got a lot, but the little bit we got we want to give To that church. Paul says and my God shall supply all of your needs. We want to apply it to the Corinthians. He ain't talking to them. They're not doing that. He's talking to people who are generous, who don't have, who still want to give. So I got to exegete my congregation and know what's going on. That's why I like what you do. You have some theology. You have some Old Testament and New Testament. You can give a balanced diet, but if there's a major issue going on in the church.
Speaker 1:you can't keep preaching over here and expect the church to be affected when you're not addressing the issues that are going on right there in the congregation. Talk to us about your use of words, humor, illustration in your presentation. Okay, because when you go to Mount Sinai they find you very hilarious. They laugh and just laugh and just enjoy you so much. But listen yeah then I say a joke, then they pass it and we don't want to hear all that.
Speaker 2:But when you come they get very Well, philip Brooks, who wrote one of his story books on preaching, said that preaching is true through personality. And if God called you to be a preacher, he called you with your personality, your quirks, your idiosyncratic tendencies, whatever they are. He called you with that Joel Gregory's voice and with Ralph West's mind and with Maurice's passion, or whatever he calls you, and that gospel is going to come through you. And so I, early on, I've always had kind of a quick sense of humor off the fly, whatever, and it just kind of works for me. It can be corny or whatever, but it just always worked for me. And so when he called me to preach, I found out again I could do that.
Speaker 2:Now, when Noel Jones got to LA a year later, there was 20 Noel Joneses. Oh, I feel caught in here. And Lord, the ontological presence of the Lord, everybody's. You know all these young guys are trying to copy him. And you knew immediately you hear Donald Parsons. You know tonight it's 10 in the morning, so people copy.
Speaker 2:I found out that when you tap one emotion it's easy to get the other. And what I found out is what I call the difference between a joke teller and a comedian. A joke teller gets this funny joke or story, he tells it and people laugh. A comedian observes life and makes you laugh and then think at the same time. And you're laughing at something. That's a picture and then right before your eyes it turns into a mirror and you see they're actually talking about you and it can convict you and laugh at the same time. So I notice with humor I can have you laughing and at the same time slip truth in there without you getting defensive and not receiving it.
Speaker 2:I love the manual, scots and others. I love the Old Testament because it's pictures and people can see something. They can see and smell the Job sores and sitting in that ash heap. Job soars and sitting in that ash heap If they can notice that over in the corner with a sinister look, as David is running from Saul and he's trying to find something to eat and one of these guys is going to go back and tell Saul. And you can see a picture for people to be able to see. Instead of telling them that when Nabal said I'm not giving any food to David, instead of saying David got mad because Nabal didn't say that, you said. When he said that, david's heart began to pump like a volcano, a vein came up in the side of his neck, fire danced in his eyes. He started to bark out commandments you, 200 men, get your stuff. You get the horses. Everybody load up, full military attire. We're going to see Nabal when you can do that and people see oh my God, hey, David, about to do something. I've always enjoyed that.
Speaker 2:Every Tuesday, typically, I go to the movies because a movie director is just like a preacher he's trying to tell a story. So I just watch how you tell stories, I watch the form, I watch what they do, I watch what they don't do. Cop stories have a similar formula. Comes up, there's a dead body here, there's a. Comes up, there's a dead body here. There's a car there, there's a cop car here. Lights are going on, there's yellow tape everywhere. Somebody pulls up looking like you, get out with a cup of coffee and said Joe, what we got here? We got two down. The shooter was up here. It was a 38 calorie. We have some shells over here. They showed you what happened in the rest of the show. We go back and figure out how did we get to this point? So I can take a sermon and start with David holding.
Speaker 1:Goliath's head and I can go back.
Speaker 2:How did we get to this point? How does a young shepherd boy end up being a hero? I watch, I watch movies, movies. All along. They're giving you little hints that don't make sense until the end. So if I can tell that Bible story and give you those little hints and you go oh my God, he was telling me all along and now I see it at the end. So that the storytelling process is important to me. Words are important because a person can walk across a room, they can shuffle across a room, they can drag their leg across the room. Each one of those is a different picture, and so I'm really thinking and running this film in my head of what it would look like, so I can paint a picture for my, for my audience, and that's why that's why I think I can pull people in and get them engaged and then, in the middle of that, say something funny to relieve the tension. And then we go again.
Speaker 1:Well, give us a couple good jokes you use every now and then.
Speaker 2:Every now and then I talk about the fact that and this isn't a joke, and this isn't a joke. But I have a picture of a guy sitting on the edge of a diesel truck. He has two of those big silver tanks in the back and his head is down like this, george. And the caption says the man who delivers the gas ran out of gas. And I tell pastors all the time you talk about when you stay insulated.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:George, we can be delivering the gas and guess what?
Speaker 1:Ran out, of gas Ran out of gas and I tell pastors all the time you talk about when you stay insulated George. We can be delivering the gas and guess what?
Speaker 2:Run out of gas. Run out of gas and you deliver the gas. I'm constantly looking for things like that. Another thing I do, george I'm going to get to the humor part, the jokes. But another thing I do is a lot of preachers like to give an illustration over here and they're talking about Ivan. The Terrible had gold and he didn't want anybody to steal it, so he put it inside a belt and he was on a ship and the ship was going down. He jumped down. The gold was so heavy he drowned.
Speaker 2:And you say be careful of the love of money. And your audience is saying if my name is ever ivan and I got a gold belt and I'm in the middle of the sea and I drown, I'll remember that. What I would rather do is say if, if I do what this bible truth says or happens in my life, what would it look like if you got out against your brother, go to him privately and tell him and if he accepts you, you won your brother. I want to know, I want my audience to know, how that looks. Hey, man, here's what you ought to do. This verse is saying this you got a problem with somebody. You ought to say hey, george man, let me take you to breakfast. I'll take you to Roscoe's.
Speaker 1:Yes, you say all right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you paying King, yeah, I'm paying King. Okay, we get our stuff. I order the Obama special with the three wings, whatever, you get your stuff. And the waitress walks away and I say, hey, george, you know the Bible says if you got ought against your brother, you should let him know. And I got a little problem. What's up, king? What's going on? I said, man, you remember last year I loaned you $200? He said yeah. I said, well, you remember last Thursday when you showed me the new watch you bought and you said you paid $1,000 for it Made me feel some kind of way, george, because you didn't pay me my money back. He said, oh, king, I'm so sorry, man, I didn't know you paid the money. He said you've won your brother. Now, my, I don't like Roscoe's, I'll go to Denny's.
Speaker 2:It's closer to my house, but King just gave me a talk track and a way to see what this verse means, so I think that's far more effective than just telling a story, if you can paint a picture of what it might look like.
Speaker 1:A real life scenario.
Speaker 2:A real life scenario that can fit your audience. And again, you don't have to be so specific. They're going to do exactly what you say.
Speaker 2:They're thinking the whole time I'm not going to go to Denny's, I'm going to go to my restaurant. I don't get up that early, I'm going to go to lunch. I'm not going to take them to breakfast, I'm going to go to lunch. But I got a talk track. I understand what he's saying. This King James word all against my brother, your brother, whatever. So those are the kinds of things that, for me, not only illustrate but apply to your congregation, to where, week in, week out, year in, year out, you should definitely see some growth in your congregation, because not only do they hear, but they know how to do it. We say stuff like you got to love your neighbor and I got 300 people with their arms folded talking about I love my neighbor.
Speaker 2:And each one has their own definition of what love is. Yeah, until you say the person next door, the single mother that has a kid, and they're going back to school and they don't have a backpack, you need to buy that backpack. That's love, until. And they're going back to school and they don't have a backpack, you need to buy that backpack. That's love, until you tell them that they're going to sit there and say I do love my neighbor.
Speaker 2:Yeah, generic, nothing specific, exactly so those are the things to me that are more effective or most effective when it comes to helping your congregation Because, face it, very few groups of people spend more minutes in a building than us. Yeah, I believe it. In a lot of ways we haven't benefited. So what's going on that we're spending all this time in here and lives aren't changed, lives aren't transformed. We're still acting the same, doing the same. No growth, no maturity. Acting the same, doing the same no growth, no maturity.
Speaker 1:What's some of your aspirations? Yet life ministry.
Speaker 2:I would like to George pastor, maybe a couple more years, and then I would like to find a nice-sized ministry and walk up to you and say, hey, george, I'm going to do you a favor, I'm going to take most of these seniors off of your hands. We're going to take field trips, we're going to do mission. We're going to do this. They're not going to be writing you letters and complaining about stuff. I'm going to keep them busy because I got some background in church, but I don't want to be the senior pastor, but I got enough to somebody and help them out. I would also like to have some kind of a resource to help preachers with preaching.
Speaker 2:I don't know if I would call that mentoring or whatever, but just sharing wisdom and helping people, kind of like a personal coach in terms of stuff like that, and'd be great, and that's about it.
Speaker 1:We're ready for the joke, man.
Speaker 2:We're ready. No jokes today, George. I don't have any.
Speaker 1:You don't have none.
Speaker 2:I can't think of one that's wrong?
Speaker 1:Why would you do our audience like that? You see, y'all got to come in August to Mount Sinai.
Speaker 2:Y'all hear many jokes they To Mount Sinai, y'all hear many jokes.
Speaker 1:They'll be there. They'll be there Whenever you're there at Sinai, which is annually.
Speaker 2:And I love preaching at Sinai because they're a well-taught priest to congregations, so it makes it easy to preach.
Speaker 1:Yeah, man, we appreciate that. Tell us where we can find you, tell us where we can find the church, what time worship services are Friendly.
Speaker 2:Friendship Baptist Church, 10101 South Avalon Boulevard. That's close to Avalon and Century Boulevard. We have service at 9 am on the dot and we try to get you out no later than 10, 15, out the door even on first Sunday. And we're also online on Instagram, on Facebook and YouTube. Coming real soon we are doing some small groups and we're doing some stuff in the community. This coming week we'll be doing our Vacation Bible School, so all ages and we do it with the sister church.
Speaker 2:We have a Hispanic ministry that shares our building. We do our VBS together and that is for most Baptist church and for us that's our largest outreach to young people, children we have a couple hundred children for five days in a row and to introduce them to Christ and give them the opportunity. So we do everything we can for them to have a good time but get the message and have the opportunity, if they would like to, to have a relationship with the Lord.
Speaker 1:Wow, amazing, powerful. Thank you so much. My pleasure For stopping by in the midst of your very busy and insulated schedule. Thank you all so much for tuning in to another episode here of Nuance Conversations podcast. Please be on the lookout for how you can support and for more episodes. We're out, peace.