Posted on 11/13/2019 3:56:50 PM PST by CondoleezzaProtege
Much buzz has surrounded the recent profession of faith by hip-hop artist Kanye West. We’re fascinated by his outspoken desire to share that faith with the world. In dramatic fashion, the star announced that grace had totally transformed him. He said that it was now his duty to use his platform to glorify God and bring others to Him. Once defined by his vulgarity and opulence, the star said he will use his widely influential platform for better purposes.
This might shock many. But this star’s Damascus-road experience bears great similarities to revivals and awakenings we’ve seen before. Which raises a question. Are we on the verge of another Great Awakening? A Platform for Praise
Kanye’s use of music to announce God’s kingdom? It’s a blessing we’ve seen before. Larry Norman chose to use his platform for the same purposes during the Jesus Movement of the 1970s. See Greg Thornbury’s gripping account in Why Should the Devil Have All The Good Music?
The message preached in the Great Awakening was at once deeply convicting and radically egalitarian. See Eric Metaxas’ account of the great evangelist George Whitfield in If You Can Keep It. Whitfield crisscrossed a young nation with an ancient message: Every man, regardless of status, stands totally guilty of sin before a righteous God. Each is called to repentance and faith in Jesus as savior.
On Kanye’s newest album we find a collection of theologically deep gospel tracks. Jesus is King admits the hollowness of the hip-hop culture which Kanye has ruled. Its lyrics ask much more of life than driving in fancy foreign cars or boasting of sexual conquests. In “Closed on Sunday” Kanye articulates the importance of rearing a family and guiding a child in godliness. He articulates the brokenness of man in “Use This Gospel.” Track after track focuses on the eternal, instead of the fleeting. No Malice raps: “They give you Wraith talk, I give you faith talk.” Besides evoking ghosts, this alludes to a model of Rolls-Royce, the sort of status marker too many rap songs invoke.
The Church Coming Together
The great revivals of Billy Graham brought the church together across racial and denominational lines. Likewise believers are coalescing around Kanye in his dramatic conversion. A reformed pastor with ties to The Master’s College, Adam Tyson, serves as a mentor and spiritual adviser to the singer. So does Rich Wilkerson Jr., a dynamic young preacher at the helm of the charismatic Vous Church in Miami. Prominent Catholics Lila Rose and Sohrab Ahmari have praised Kanye for his clear articulation of the faith and biblical values.
Saul of Tarsus was hardly a likely convert.
I’m reminded here of how Christian leaders came together through the 1974 International Congress on World Evangelization in Lasaunne, Switzerland. The transformation of one man can show the power of the Gospel to do God’s work for millions. Champion the Cause of Christ
However Kanye’s personal journey proceeds, we must seize this moment. And internalize this truth: Anyone can be made a new creation, raised from death to life by the power of Jesus Christ. Kanye’s conversion surprises us. He’s a provocative figure, in a very public marriage to the erotically provocative Kim Kardashian.
But remember how dramatically God has transformed people for His cause in ages past. Saul of Tarsus was hardly a likely convert. This persecutor of Christians had to fall off his horse and go temporarily blind to begin his devotion to Jesus. Other Christians viewed him suspiciously. But the radical change he endured was proof of God’s limitless power to create us anew in Christ. (2 Corinthians 5:17)
I think your threads are going to wind up with just you and I posting...
All Falls Down:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kyWDhB_QeI
Kanye is coasting on celebrity momentum. People are getting “saved” by their rap hero.
I’ll believe those “conversions” after a few years, if not months.
Revivals/awakenings find their beginnings in unknowns, the obscure, despised of the world. Not in highly popular celebrities.
The only thing that can save this country is revival.
I pray for Kanye, being unequally yoked with a non-believing wife (afaik)...
I just wish he wasn’t appearing at the huckster Joel Osteen’s “church”.
HOORAY Kanye!
Awakening, revival, saving... this is all to be judged with the fullness of time. Let’s just be glad folks are actually, you know, talking about God, considering Him, His works, and His offerings, and His relationship with us. I’m content to let Him deal with the longevity and sincerity of such things of it in His time with His own kids.
Wish him well.
He’s also bipolar and quit taking his meds because it messed with his creativity.
This is one of the very, very oldest of Christian Churches. Armenia was the first nation to ever proclaim itself a Christian kingdom: in 300 AD, before Christianity was even de-criminalized in the Roman Empire.
Kanye is on his way to Joel Osteen’s “church” for a visit.
No thanks. It’s not Your Best Life Now.
“Evangelicals agree with the position of the Armenian Church that genuine faith will produce good works (see James 2:14–26). The primary difference seems to be that Evangelicals stress the work of Christ on our behalf as the sole ground of salvation and that our works are a result of salvation.
The Armenian Orthodox Church seems to emphasize that, although one does not “earn” salvation, it is the final trajectory of one’s life that determines one’s destiny, even though a “deathbed conversion” is a possibility.
It is interesting that on the official website of the Armenian Church (American) there is no mention of Christ paying for sins by His death on our behalf. The emphasis is on union with Christ by faith and the resulting change of life that is necessary for salvation. The difference is subtle but all-important.”
https://www.gotquestions.org/Armenian-Orthodox-Church.html
Where in the Bible does it say that?
I don’t like his traditional music but that’s irrelevant. It seems to me that this is precisely what Christians hope and pray for and should be celebrated.
Kanye appears to preaching a Grace-centric Gospel. Some people deride it as hyper-Grace. But, more and more people are embracing the label. As they should. We can't even conceive of how infinite this Grace is.
People are tired of the guilt-tripping messages they endure. After a long week of working hard, paying bills, parenting and all the other things that go along with being a responsible person, the last thing they want to hear is how much they suck in God's Eyes and the only reason He doesn't smite them into a pile of ashes is because they accidentally did something right that week.
The simple fact is God loves us more than we can even begin to imagine. We are the apple of His eye. In Song of Songs, it says He loves us so much and we are so beautiful to Him He can hardly stand it. Warts and all.
We are not sinners who occasionally do something right. We are saints who occasionally screw up. We have been resurrected IN and WITH Christ. God doesn't hate us, he hates what the sin does to us.
He loves us beyond compare. I think that is the message that is taking root in people's minds and hearts.
Kanye West probably felt that in his own heart and he felt it so strongly he was incapable of keeping it to himself.
He is sure to come under severe attack from his celebrity "friends". Pray for him that he comes to accept that his new Friend is the only Friend he needs. As do we all.
That is all. Commence flaming.
The most true thing I'll read this month.
Amen. Celebrate all of this. Pray for grace for us all.
I’m in.
The unsaved hate the saved.
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