THE BLACK CHURCH AND ITS SACRED COW. . . .(This revisiting of my paper on Whooping was brought about by an interesting and inspiring conversation I had the other day with one of my sons in the gospel) Is the Church, and especially the Black Church guilty of harboring a sacred cow in her midst or shall I say, a variation of a sacred cow? Now a sacred cow by definition, is a PERSON who has been unreasonably elevated above criticism. A variation of that definition of course would be the addition of THINGS. A sacred cow then can be persons and things. Now given the vitriol (acidic verbal abuse) coupled with the criticizing and the ostracizing I have received and still do from many of my peers who read my paper, The Whoop and its Potential for Harm in the Black Church, I would say that there is indeed a sacred cow which we are nurturing in our midst. It is called Whooping. Dont anyone dare speak ought against Whooping! Whooping, simply stated, is the unique and engaging MANNER of preaching and presenting the gospel that is peculiar to a particular people who were once exclusively but now only primarily of African American descent! Whites and others are now appropriating this unique style of preaching Whooping however, in nearly all circles, has taken on a life of its own, moving from being a MANNER of presenting the gospel to laying claims to being the MEANS by which the gospel is presented. By that I mean it is fast becoming an inextricable part of the gospel itself! Young men are honing more their skills at whooping than they are at Hermeneutics There was, at one time, being offered at one of our major Institutes, a course entitled Whoopology, where young and not so young pastors and preachers can enter in to learn HOW TO WHOOP! Never mind though that Paul the apostle proclaimed that the gospel (the word of God) is the power of God unto salvation and not how we say it. Now the tragedy in this is not that these negatives which are inherent in Whooping are not known and even agreed upon to some degree by pastors and preachers, many of whom are even great whoopers in their own right. The tragedy is in our holding whooping in such high esteem or regard in the church - a sacred cow to be sure - that no one wants to look at it critically and to see in it, as I have, the possible, and in some areas, present danger it poses! *I attended a Late-Night Service at one of our Conventions a short while ago. The attendance was very good and present were upwards of twenty pastors and preachers. All eyes were on the preacher as he got up to preach. He began with a song, and I must confess, I have never before, nor since, heard anyone sing so beautifully and demonstrated such range and such control of his voice. The preachers and pastors were high-fiving and backslapping each other in typical Black celebration fashion. The people too were on their feet celebrating in grand style. Then the pastor announced his text and began to be about the business of preaching the gospel; of expounding upon the sacred scriptures, or so he thought. Beloved, for the next thirty-five minutes (thank God it was not longer) we were treated to as horrible a demonstration of hermeneutics and biblical exegesis as one can possibly present. It was an absolute shame what this young preacher did and did not do to and with the text. That this was not just my own opinion could be seen in the faces, actions and body language of every pastor and minister in the house as well as in a majority of those who made up the congregation, including his own members. It was indeed a travesty! One could actually have heard a pin drop were they sitting among the pastors and ministers. Their silence was deafening and their assessment of the young mans preaching presentation was definitive - a total flop regarding his rightly dividing the word of truth! Suddenly though, the young man closed his Bible and began to Whoop approaching what we call his first closing. Beloved, I thought this young preacher showed great voice control singing. It was nothing compared to his whooping acumen and prowess. He was indeed electric. So electric in fact, that every pastor and preacher, who only minutes before, sat with their faces in their hands praying that the young man would hurry to a final close, were now back up on their feet high-fiving and back-slapping each other and even those in the congregations who likewise were on their feet in high praise Beloved, the great tragedy in all of the and the harm both, potential and in this case, present which I am alluding to regarding Whooping, is that this young preacher, because of the ENDING CELEBRATORY RESPONSE of the pastors and preachers and of the masses too who unfortunately know the taste of no other diet, sat down believing in his heart of hearts that he had fulfilled the mandate of preaching the Gospel of Christ which is the power of God unto salvation. (Romans 1:16) And an even greater tragedy than that is this; this young man pastors a church with a sizable number of people who sit before him each Sunday! Now, as much as we would like not to admit this to be so, both of these tragedies, in this case - the young man being fooled into believing that he has indeed preached the gospel and the people remaining sitting under him each Sunday gourging themselves on the fleeting fillings of celebration while being denied the nutritious nurturings of inspired information, both of these sad negatives are attributed directly to WHOOPING! Beloved, fight me all you want! Ostracize and criticize me all you want! Call me jealous, envious or angry or misguided or a sell-out all you want. There is a potential for harm in this sacred institution we call Whooping and which has now become a sacred cow within the Black Church. And it is incumbent upon all of us to see it and to address it appropriately. We are to hold nothing so dear that we fail to see in them its Trojan horse capability! Lives are at stake and it is our responsibility to safeguard those lives. I am not advocating throwing out the baby (whooping) with the bathwater (its dangers), by any means. I am though strongly advising that we open our eyes and see that Whooping is floating in some dirty bath water which needs to be changed! Be blessed!
Posted on: Thu, 23 Oct 2014 19:19:53 +0000
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