Oh To Be a Christian Black Woman…

• My pastor drives a luxury car but the church is still paying on the mortgage since 1984.
• My pastor quoted a Chris Brown song in the pulpit but he’s divorced because of an affair.
• The choir director is gay but my church is marching in the anti-homosexual parade this Saturday.
• Oh, my pastor can preach a good word but have you heard him read?
•  My church got a new pastor and some of the singles members have already booked up the counseling sessions for the month.
• Ooh, the first family is so stuck up.
• Have you read that new book or watched that documentary exposing the church pimps. You know I bet they were talking about (insert the name of a popular minister you have heard gossip about). These church folks are brainwashed.
• (Insert a church name) was foreclosed. Sunday is their last service.

Woo!!! I typed those statements and had to break out the gospel. Talk about mind-numbing. So, how many times have you entertained conversations like this? Oh, I know my readers are not the ones starting these conversations. I’m guilty of listening to talk like such as this. I have even called a few ministers & a pastor illiterate. Forgive me, God. But talk like this is so harmful. We keep our mouths on the very institutions we attend. Also, talk about people we listen to tell us the truth.  It gives fodder to those who have all kinds of issues with the church, especially the Black church.

For every blog I have about me being a Christian or talking about church, I get 3 emails suggesting an anti-Black Christian article or a blog post, book, or movie exposing the Black church. I've learned not to take so much of it seriously. Many of it is by people hurt by “church folks” (there is a difference between church folks & Christians) and that is their way of picking a bone with the institution that is full of generalizations and statements based on hearsay and twisted facts with no solutions. I’m not saying any of it is or is not true. I know some were sent and some that just went. I just feel like I have enough sense to watch, fight, and pray for the ones God called.

Christian Black Women are constantly targeted to warn against the intuition of the church, especially the Black church. I get so tired of being called “Brain Washed”, I could cry.  To me, it’s like being told because I decide to listen to a black man (who is just a human as the other humans) tell me about God’s love in his way and decide to donate my 10% (that is mandated by God in the book of Malachi called Tithes) and more sometimes to a place that I expect to be a properly functioning place, I am Stupid. I am tired of the generalized accusations against the black church as a whole. Some make the stories true. I will admit that. But also there are Many, Many which are not. Is the church loving? Though the church speaks against things that are against the Bible, is it still loving as it should be to those who are living against what they are against? Are they issuing loving yet firm sanctions against wrongdoing? Does church function well with paying its bills and is charitable to others. When the church gets hit with hard times, does it have a workable program to handle those times? Is the church getting smart financial planning? People see the pastors driving luxury cars but have you asked the finance committee if that pastor even takes a salary from the church? Did he get the car as an anniversary gift or maybe saved his money and finally bought him a “nice” car? And that first family, that is “uppity”. Have you always been friendly to them or been seen by them being friendly? Oh but as soon they don’t speak… Who said that the first family is the most important people in the church?

I could have sworn God is the most important person there. If we focus on him, all the truths we need to know will be exposed. If we focus on God, we see the bad and the Good. When we focus on God, we don’t complain about faults, we uplift strengths to help the faults. I said we because I'd started writing this post to complain about those always bad-mouthing the church and I need to help them see the God I serve in me and be more understanding that many of those that complain are just as hurt and those they think they are helping. See I have to focus on God more, also. If We All focus on God, “pulpit pimps” won’t have anyone to pimp. As a matter a fact they won’t have time to pimp. People who are Anti-Whatever, won’t be so Anti-whatever. We are working on ourselves and trying to be better in God’s eyes and not trying better others by our “godly” standards. Anything people like to wag their fingers about won’t matter because We All are focusing on God.  Let’s just pray for more focus so this God we claim to serve can be seen. God is not man so he’s not wagging anything. The people who are so against the church won’t have anything to send me articles about because all they see is… I can’t wait for that day, too.

So, I challenge all of us instead of complaining when we see wrong in churches, I understand. Why would you pay tithes to a place that can't pay the light bill or to a man that is backsliding all over the place? Why be a member of a place that says a lesbian can't be over the church Boy Scouts but also didn't find out if the current leader is a pedophile. Pray about what should be said and/or done before you make a move. The statements about would not say if folks were praying about and not talking about it. 

Also to those who are against the church, especially the black church, what are your suggestions (other than don’t go to church)? Oh no, you are bold enough to complain, be bold enough to offer a useful solution or two. You can suggest that I am a mindless sheep following a wayward shepherd, leading me into a better mindset. I believe in God, his son, Jesus Christ, who died for me, and his essence, Holy Spirit, which he left to comfort me until he comes to get me, and those who believe like me to take us to live with him. The human part of me takes offense that you think I am dumb to let my free will participate in such things. But the God in me understands and prays for you to be just as understandable.

Always, Talking to You in Adult Terms