I watched an interview with the rapper Snoop Dogg concerning the remake of the movie “Roots”,  that really spoke to me about a mindset of how we view a past that we were never part of. And how that past can affect a culture that is hundreds of years removed. Snoop Dogg goes on to say;

“I’m sick of this. … How the heck they gonna put Roots on Memorial Day?” a subdued Snoop Dogg asks in the selfie video. “They just going to keep beating that stuff into our heads as to how they did us, huh?”

He goes on to say…

“I don’t understand America. They just want to keep showing the abuse that we took hundreds and hundreds of years ago. But guess what? We’re taking the same abuse,” he says. “Think about that part. When you all going to make a series about the success that black folks is having. The only success we have is Roots and 12 Years A Slave?”

Now don’t get me wrong, I in no way thinking that we should be oblivious to our past, in fact I know we can learn many things, both good and bad, from our past. I remember in Orlando Fla., we saw a very great tragedy. Anytime human life is lost, its a travesty against us as a nation. It wasn’t LGBT’s who were lost, it was people, lives, living, breathing, human beings who are now lost because of one man’s inability to see past his own hate, or should I say, his own self taught hate. Look I am not advocating a lifestyle here, I am advocating my belief as a Christian that Jesus views all life as sacred. Again I say, let’s remember what Jesus said in John 3:16-17

16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. 17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

Somehow those words, “For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world” are lost. Jesus reprimanded the disciples for judging wrongly when they wanted to call down fire, Jesus said in Luke 9;

54 And when His disciples James and John saw this, they said, “Lord, do You want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them, just as Elijah did?”
55 But He turned and rebuked them,and said, “You do not know what manner of spirit you are of.

Which to me means, we don’t really have the mind of God and what His purposes are in many area’s of our lives, I know I don’t. Chick-fil-a helped the victims of the Orlando shooting during a time when the light of Christ needed to pierce the darkness. If your conviction is to not associate with people differing from your belief system, and anything associated with them, then I guess your time at Chick-fil-a is done. Again, this isn’t agreeing with a lifestyle, if anything this is being in agreement with the word of God.

Let’s just remember who we are really fighting here. It’s not a people group, it’s not a person, it’s Satan. It’s the accuser of the brethren, it’s the hater of our souls and the who despises our love for God and the love God has for his children. Time to grow up people, we aren’t fighting a natural war here, we are fighting a carnal war, we are fighting a spiritual war, a war that is claiming lives everyday. Doesn’t God have a desire that ALL should be saved? How are you going to do that when condemnation is the first thing we speak when we wake, and the last thing we speak when we sleep?

I for one am not going to put up with it, you want to vomit your hate monger words across your Facebook page, feel free, it’s your page, I will kindly remove you from my feed. Seriously, let go of your hate, we aren’t called to hate, but to love. Stop using the Old Testament mindset to justify your abuse of God’s people. Stop prostituting God’s grace and embrace the cross for what it really means. It’s a sacrifice we can’t repay, an embracing of death that we don’t have to walk through. A gateway to God that we could not find, except through the blood of Christ.

What’s going to happen when the pagans, the witches, the satanist, the LGBT community, the lost in Christ, come banging on the doors of your church, wanting to be saved, wanting to know Jesus. When they are drawn to the power of His blood and are seeking redemption and healing? Will you turn them away? Will you tip your cap of pride and tell them to go away for they are “unclean?” Remember we are being watched as Christians. When you tell someone you are a Christian, or profess that you are a follower of Jesus, you are being watched and observed on how consistent you are to His word.

That big building you go to every Sunday is not a fortress to keep you safe from the world, it’s a place that is suppose to be a city of refuge to the lost and broken who want to find Jesus, and HIS BRIDE WITHIN. Stop holding on to the gift of salvation like it is yours to hold. It’s not. Remember what Peter said in Acts 3:6

6 Then Peter said, “Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.”

Be a light that those in the dark who want to come and see. Thank goodness that Jesus didn’t respond to the lepers, the harlots and the tax collectors like we do to people in today’s world. Who can be saved indeed.