[SPEAKER_02]: This episode of True's Table is brought to you by our NAACP Image Award-nominated book, True's Table, Black Women's Musings on Life, Love, and Liberation.
[SPEAKER_02]: Get it where all books are sold.
[SPEAKER_01]: Brothers, y'all all right?
[SPEAKER_01]: If this is your first time at Truth's Table, welcome to the table.
[SPEAKER_01]: And you've been sitting at the table with us all these years.
[SPEAKER_01]: We are so grateful that you have been listening to us through these years.
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[SPEAKER_01]: Now pull up a chair and have a seat at the table with us.
[SPEAKER_00]: This morning, I have the honor and the privilege to introduce our keynote speakers.
[SPEAKER_00]: True's table podcast is hosted by Dr. Christina Edmundson, an ecumeny uan, the midwives of culture for grace and truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: True's table is an influential faith podcast built by black women and four black women.
[SPEAKER_00]: With over eight years of success, True's table has gained significant recognition in the faith and spirituality podcasting segment for its incisive analysis at the intersections of faith, race, politics, and culture.
[SPEAKER_00]: Their thoughtful and theological approach addresses complex issues with nuance and authenticity.
[SPEAKER_00]: Their accolades include awards such as Best Black Religion, Spirituality Podcast, and recognition from prestigious platforms like the Black Podcasting Awards, the Communicator Awards, and the NAACP Image Awards.
[SPEAKER_00]: So will you join me and welcome in them to the stage?
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you very much.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hello.
[SPEAKER_01]: Good morning.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, the mic is on.
[SPEAKER_02]: It is.
[SPEAKER_02]: You never know, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: The mic is on.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, hey, y'all.
[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to Drew's Table.
[SPEAKER_01]: Midwives of Culture for Grace and Truth.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm a community.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'm Christina.
[SPEAKER_01]: This table is built by black women and for black women.
[SPEAKER_01]: So welcome to the table.
[SPEAKER_01]: See how you doing, girl.
[SPEAKER_01]: I am doing good today.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: I've got all my pink jacket.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm feeling... Can you stand up and show to people?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know what?
[SPEAKER_01]: I will.
[SPEAKER_01]: Show to people.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Show to people.
[SPEAKER_01]: Do you see what the back says?
[SPEAKER_01]: Show to people.
[SPEAKER_01]: What does it say?
[SPEAKER_01]: It says sincerely, beautiful.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I mean, true.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so this is my last purchase of the summer until September one, because there are algorithm knows what I like.
[UNKNOWN]: You know.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it comes to me multiple times a day.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'll grow them though.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's like you want this.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then packages appear at my door.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a problem.
[SPEAKER_02]: It needs a stop.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we might accountability room y'all.
[SPEAKER_02]: Make sure that nothing comes until after September 1.
[SPEAKER_02]: How are you today, my friend?
[SPEAKER_01]: Good.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm so glad to be doing a true stable live here at Calvary University for the association of Christian in student development.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hello.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, that's you, well, you know, I actually love the theme, which is come on, rooted and reaching.
[SPEAKER_01]: Come on.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because it actually fits very well with our current theme of the Underground World world.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's what it's about.
[SPEAKER_02]: We need these themes to work with what we're doing.
[SPEAKER_01]: We need them to work, we need them to fuse, you know, and so I love that when they asked us to come and speak, I was like, rooted and reaching, yes, I love that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, Christina, let's talk about that.
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, you just mentioned the current theme that we're resting in within the content that we're putting out for this season, since April, 2026, our 10th season and content.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I know, I know, so lots, you know, we could stop talking, but there's a lot happening.
[SPEAKER_02]: But talk a little bit about first, why you think our season's topic fits with this theme and what are season's topic is?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so for season 10, we knew we needed to do something kind of special, and so for us it was important for us to, in some ways, reclaim our own historical and faith roots by pulling on some of our own matriarchal faith heroes in the faith, like a Harriet Tubman ride, I'd be well as Barnett, mine Mary McLeod with doing who I'll talk about, probably later.
[SPEAKER_01]: in our time together, and so I talk about what does it mean to look for a country that is not yet here, knowing that we are passing through as sojourners, through great diversity, you know, through great turmoil and chaos.
[SPEAKER_01]: What does it mean to have a bedogally determined?
[SPEAKER_01]: and focus and rooted in what and anchored and what God has called us to do, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: It's to be a people that are free from sin, but also free others, right, in the midst of that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's because of our faith that we're rooted, that we're able to do those things, entered traverse through difficult terrain.
[SPEAKER_01]: In order to get to this either promised land or this place we would call freedom land, which is where Harriet Tubman was heading toward when going to Canada, I don't know.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, I think that when I think about rooted in reaching, it's never, we're not rooted just for ourselves, but we're always seeking to reach out.
[SPEAKER_01]: or we ought to be seeking to reach out to poor to lift, as we climb as the old adage says.
[SPEAKER_01]: How about you?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, we think about underground were wrote in.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, through did and reaching.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we deemed it underground were wrote to people.
[SPEAKER_02]: To point out, so that kind of has a bit of a technology reference to it, so it's modernized.
[SPEAKER_02]: But the same principality of oppression.
[SPEAKER_02]: and cruelty and an attempt to be God over other people still persist.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: So what we saw in the 1600s and the 1700s and the 1800s, here we are in 2026 with the same spirit, but a remix.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I am grateful that the same counter and prevailing narrative also exist.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm in.
[SPEAKER_02]: And thus we have the Underground Railroad 2.0.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so we kind of know what to do even though it's hard to do it, which is to stay rooted in what is true, what is righteous, what is holy, what is empowering, and to not be thrown by the winds and waves, although it's highly tempting of our current social and political moment.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so if we wanted to learn how to do that based on people who've already done it before, they have credibility in the game.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's right.
[SPEAKER_02]: And these are people who did not go around the name of Jesus.
[SPEAKER_02]: They stood on the name of Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_02]: For the sake of righteousness and justice.
[SPEAKER_02]: So they went through the text, not around the text, didn't leave out the text, didn't shut the text, but set in the text.
[SPEAKER_02]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_02]: Because God says it's another one of both holiness and justice.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I want to be with God, so.
[SPEAKER_02]: Hello?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's right.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's it.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can try it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Bye, man.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_01]: How are you feeling today?
[SPEAKER_02]: But this idea of rootedness, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're vibing with this conference today, because it's incredibly important to be rooted in something y'all.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, come on, you got to stand for something.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's right.
[SPEAKER_02]: You don't have to have a thousand convictions, but you got to have some.
[SPEAKER_02]: So let's talk a little bit of it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Matter of fact, you can't have too many, because then it's just a bit of nonsense.
[SPEAKER_02]: You can't keep up with it, okay?
[SPEAKER_02]: But you got to have some conviction.
[SPEAKER_02]: So let's talk about what rootedness means to you, and what is the source, the foundation of your rootedness?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you know, so I think about rootedness, and I was, you know, a couple of scriptures were coming up, but you know, I was, I've been thinking about this idea, in second Corinthians five, I've lived 14s, it talks about how Christ love, you know, compels us, because, you know, one died from all, and so, and and just talking about how.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, sometimes we think about love and we think about, oh, love is just like, uh, is without any restrictions and it has no boundaries, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: If it's, if love is to be really love, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: Does this what the world says?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, it's, it's, it's, it's free and it has no, no boundaries, no restrictions.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what it means to really, really, um, love.
[SPEAKER_01]: But when we think about the scriptures, we talk, we're, we're talking about a God who first loved us.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, as we didn't have the ability to love God back, you know, but our God, the Triune God loved us first, you know, and we love God back because God first loved us.
[SPEAKER_01]: And, and that love also requires that we listen.
[SPEAKER_01]: right to God that we delight in God and knowing that God delights in us, you know, and so that's that's beautiful in and of itself, but also thinking about the fact that we cannot have a thriving healthy.
[SPEAKER_01]: Not only relationship with God but with others without boundaries in place, you know, without God's law in place.
[SPEAKER_01]: And we don't, we don't, we don't hear much about God's law and God's
[SPEAKER_01]: God, the truth does not change.
[SPEAKER_01]: Then God.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I think about the fact that you cannot truly have a healthy connection, either in friendships and romantic, you know, partnership in a thriving community without boundaries, right, without laws, right, without anything to guarantee safety.
[SPEAKER_01]: you know, among parties, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I've been thinking about what the and those boundaries to me represent rootedness, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: We have an agreement.
[SPEAKER_01]: We talked about this yesterday.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have an agreement.
[SPEAKER_01]: We all have, we have ascented, you know, to care for one another, to look out for one another.
[SPEAKER_02]: Council contracts.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, not exactly, you know, to covenant with one another, not to bait but betray each other's trust, you know, because when we do, harm happens, trauma happens, drama happens.
[SPEAKER_01]: You can add whatever you want to add.
[SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes law enforcement has to be involved.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I mean, this is serious.
[SPEAKER_01]: When anything, when those covenantal vows or commitments or those contracts are breaking, are broken, it brings about great harm.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so when I think about rootedness, I'm thinking about boundaries.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I've often said this on the show before, but boundaries do protect what is sacred.
[SPEAKER_01]: And our love for one another is sacred.
[SPEAKER_01]: Our trust for one another is sacred.
[SPEAKER_01]: So when I think about, that scripture talks about how Christ love compels us.
[SPEAKER_01]: And some translations will say, Christ love controls us, you know?
[SPEAKER_01]: And so it hems us in, it helps us, you know, to see one another well, by the power of the Holy Spirit, it helps us to honor one another, helps us to enter into,
[SPEAKER_01]: each other's story so that as we're rooted and we are reaching, we are reaching with an understanding, we are reaching with empathy, we are reaching with love, you know, not overreaching to overload on other, not to paternalize, you know, others because there's another kind of reaching.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's talk about overreach, okay?
[SPEAKER_01]: Where we begin to violate the agency of another person where we begin to violate one's humanity, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: And even how God has called them to live and to be and to move and have their being in God, you know?
[SPEAKER_01]: And so there is a way in which we can reach.
[SPEAKER_01]: that can be, that can border on violation, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, but if we are, if it's the love of Christ that is compelling us, if it's the love of Christ that controls us, then God willing we are able to see people as the image bearers that they are.
[SPEAKER_01]: and through the eyes of love and empathy, right, and with compassion so that we can help to reach out and to uplift, reach out in order to uplift.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, what about you, my friend?
[SPEAKER_02]: What creates the rootedness?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, as you were talking, I was thinking about on a practical spiritual discipline's level.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was thinking about what it means to me to have grown up in a home with a parent who could be found praying.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes, yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: And what it means to be a Christian who follows in the narrow way of Jesus, not like in our freestyle, made up way of Jesus, but in the way that Jesus created, then it is a way of deep faith and prayer.
[SPEAKER_02]: It is no prayer, no power, and we need power for the particular moment that we're in.
[SPEAKER_02]: And my, I think rooted in this comes from
[SPEAKER_02]: within my childhood and in my development, being gifted, gifted with praying parents.
[SPEAKER_02]: Such a blusher.
[SPEAKER_02]: And yeah, and again, finding my mother at her bedside praying and stopping at red lights with my dad in the lightest red, which means not just that we stop the car, but that we pray and we get thanks at the red light.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that communication, that conversation, that dependency,
[SPEAKER_02]: in God, in the God who is always listening to his children.
[SPEAKER_02]: Always listening.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, we get on each other's nerves.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, people get nervous, but God is listening to us.
[SPEAKER_02]: God is leaned in to us even now.
[SPEAKER_02]: Here's our hearts, cries, our thoughts.
[SPEAKER_02]: How we feel about ourselves.
[SPEAKER_02]: How we feel about God, how we feel about others.
[SPEAKER_02]: God is always listening.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that can freak people out.
[SPEAKER_02]: looking also deeply comfort you.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you feel like you've not been listened to, if you've not been seen, if you've not been respected, you wonder, did somebody catch that injustice?
[SPEAKER_02]: God is always listening.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so prayer is a part of that rootedness and praying to a God whose ear is ever attending, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's a part of, I think, what is standing up in me, particularly at a time like this.
[SPEAKER_02]: That rootedness, I think, also rests in the knowing the end of the story, the kindness that God has granted to God's people.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's so much that we do not know.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it's a faith for a reason.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's so much that we do not know, but in God's kindness, we actually have an opportunity to see things from the winter circle looking out.
[SPEAKER_01]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so even the ugliness and I would dare I say publicly, unapologetically, that our social political and global moment is ugly.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's marked by great Christian hypocrisy, which will have major consequences for generations.
[SPEAKER_02]: Matters how we treat our neighbors' God is listening.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it won't be easy to clean up because sin doesn't clean up quickly, leaves a heck of a stain, took a man to die for it.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so all of that to say, just want to go a record with you, all of that to say, we know we're still looking at this moment from the winter circle.
[SPEAKER_01]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_02]: That God will prevail.
[SPEAKER_01]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_02]: That God is prevailing, that just this will be done.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so my heart's cry, then, for the injustice that we see happening in our world, in my own heart's corruption.
[SPEAKER_02]: is God is still, God is still at work.
[SPEAKER_02]: So, St. John a truth says the Frederick Douglass in the midst of a moment as we're entering into the Civil War and we have another type of Civil War now.
[SPEAKER_02]: And Frederick Douglass is exhausted because he's about to put his sons in because they're gonna risk their lives for something that church discipline should have fixed.
[SPEAKER_02]: people should have not wanted to own others.
[SPEAKER_02]: We still are trying to figure this out now.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: We still have people who are pro-confederacy and pro-Jim Crow right now.
[SPEAKER_02]: Right now.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's absolutely foolish.
[SPEAKER_02]: Mm-hmm.
[SPEAKER_02]: And yet he says what I think I would say, Frederick Douglass is exhausted.
[SPEAKER_02]: He doesn't want to...
[SPEAKER_02]: He's putting up his beloved sons to fight in this war that should not be if people were not hypocrites.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's right.
[SPEAKER_02]: And he's exhausted.
[SPEAKER_02]: He doesn't know how it's going to work out.
[SPEAKER_02]: And he's speaking not with hope and not from the winner circle.
[SPEAKER_02]: He's speaking with despair as all of us are inclined to speak with.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so, during a truth, who speaks the truth, chimes in, and she says, Frederick, is God dead.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a question that we ask ourselves.
[SPEAKER_02]: He's God dead.
[SPEAKER_02]: When circumstances get hard, when things don't work out, when there are losses that seem like they were guaranteed to us.
[SPEAKER_02]: When there are good things that we pray for, and God is like, maybe no, maybe not yet.
[SPEAKER_02]: We don't know.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: When there's pain and injustice, when there's USA cut and we know there are thousands of children who have died because of it, we can find ourselves thinking like Frederick Douglass, a man of deep faith.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we can wonder, is God dead.
[SPEAKER_02]: But truth spoke then, she speaks now, is God dead.
[SPEAKER_02]: The answer is no.
[SPEAKER_02]: The answer is no, and as though we press on.
[SPEAKER_02]: So that is a part of the rootedness.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I love that.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I'm thinking about, I think part of the rootedness is knowing what our people have been through.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know I'm not exactly a proponent of, we've been here before.
[SPEAKER_01]: We I'm not in the aid that's been here.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's not been here.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's be clear about that I was be clear about the weeds right and who You know, but we have we have the recipes Right, you know, we have the recipe of resistance, you know, that comes From the gospel and I think
[SPEAKER_01]: I think part of the rootedness is knowing that we do fight from victory, ultimately.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I also think as people who are, who either are ministers or as our audiences, people that work directly with students and trying to
[SPEAKER_01]: I pulled them, support them, advocate for them.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think about the fact that we have to be curious about people.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I talked about how curiosity is a love language.
[SPEAKER_01]: You got to ask questions, you know, you have to get into the interior lives.
[SPEAKER_01]: of the students that you're working with, they're carrying serious burdens.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think a lot about our international students right now, with all of these draconian and death-dilling immigration policies that continue to come forward.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, what are they grappling with?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, what is the turmoil that they are living with, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: And all of that's the stress, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: What's keeping them up at night?
[SPEAKER_01]: What does it mean, you know, for you who is serving, you know, that's student population in particular.
[SPEAKER_01]: And not only them, but those who are in solidarity with them, hopefully we're in solidarity with them, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: I hope we don't just care about our, a me and mine, but also that wouldn't be very Christian.
[SPEAKER_01]: That would not be, you know, but just kind of going around, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, but having, having images.
[SPEAKER_01]: loving not only our cells but loving our neighbors it means entering into their story, entering into their narrative, entering into their suffering, doing what we can, you know, to advocate and to uphold and to resist the mechanisms of oppression and having the courage to do so because of Jesus promised that he will never leave us nor forsake us.
[SPEAKER_01]: That doesn't mean it will always end well for us though.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, that's on the side of course.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, it didn't end well, and this is certainly for the disciples, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, and so in the apostles, I mean, we have to be ready to go all the way, to follow Jesus all the way, even even if it costs us our lives.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's not hyperbole, that's really the times that we are living in now.
[SPEAKER_01]: And if that doesn't feel prescient,
[SPEAKER_01]: As old Saints say, you know, keep living.
[SPEAKER_01]: Unfortunately, I think that's where we are headed.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's going to be even much more prescient on, I think, more salient for people now.
[SPEAKER_01]: But what does it mean for you to really enter in?
[SPEAKER_01]: to their interior lives and to understand what they're going through and I know that universities all around the country are feeling the ripple effects of these policies, these immigration, you know, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um, um
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I think part of the root of this is also quite literally rooting ourselves in the faith of Jesus Christ of Nazareth.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, it's a real place, y'all.
[SPEAKER_01]: Not Y'all.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's not in Nebraska.
[SPEAKER_02]: Nothing's right in Nebraska, but Jesus wasn't from there.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, exactly, Jesus wasn't there.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, Nazareth, in Palestine, okay?
[SPEAKER_01]: A real place, not make believe, like, you know, so it's just, it's really important to be rude.
[SPEAKER_01]: Part of the rudeness and reaching out is, and you know this, you call me a CNN prayer warrior.
[SPEAKER_01]: because part of my rooted this is locating, it literally locating where Jesus would be physically now.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it is there in Palestine.
[SPEAKER_01]: It is there in that whole world.
[SPEAKER_01]: There in Palestine and Lebanon.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, hello.
[SPEAKER_01]: There is a genocide that is happening right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: against Palestinians, and then now the Lebanese people, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: And then not to mention, it was going on in Congo.
[SPEAKER_01]: That has been going on for decades, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: And then not to mention a desableization of Haiti.
[SPEAKER_01]: OK, so I mean, the list could go on and on.
[SPEAKER_01]: I could talk about Yemen, I could talk about Syria, you know?
[SPEAKER_01]: But,
[SPEAKER_01]: of part of that rooted in this for me and reaching is I'm reaching in prayer too interceding right about to power against the powers and the principalities you know a genocide that that's not a new phenomenon Right that has been going on since time but since biblical days you know, but I
[SPEAKER_01]: part of that is being able to see that and to be connected, you know, to one another in the spirit, right, believing that it's an invisible church.
[SPEAKER_01]: The whole global church, y'all, the invisible church that God sees, right, but being able to enter in, to intercede and to pray for those, my neighbors in Palestine, my neighbors in Syria, my neighbors, Lebanon, like, you know, not just worry about
[SPEAKER_01]: Just me, in my little world, in my little black world is not enough and that's not the heart of God.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, our heart, our heart ought to be as much as we can, you know, be aligned, you know, with God's heart for all people, especially for those who are suffering right there in that in Jesus' social location, you know, because Jesus didn't raise as a ghost, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: So we know, we know, there's a bodily resurrection.
[SPEAKER_01]: Sentently embodying.
[SPEAKER_01]: He's intentionally embodied.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so it matters, you know, that Jesus is the God, man, that the Palestinian Jewish God, man, that matters.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's how we reach without overreaching.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's by being able to see Jesus Christ of Nazareth as he truly is.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not making it up.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm in the text.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm not making it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Am I making it up?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, we have a long history.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I can think of, if I can call a famous name, Thomas Jefferson.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: One thing I appreciate about Thomas Jefferson, there are many things I do not appreciate about Thomas Jefferson.
[SPEAKER_02]: One thing that I do appreciate about Thomas Jefferson is that he was blatant with his disobedience.
[SPEAKER_01]: You got to sense symbolally, you know, some of the other things like this, and he was like, I just don't like these parts that is Bible.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm taking it out.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think we all do that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: So he's just was honest.
[SPEAKER_01]: He was honest.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't like these parts of the Bible.
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm taking it out.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so when you say like, do we see Jesus as he is as revealed in the text, you know?
[SPEAKER_02]: When when Jesus is resurrected and he comes back and his disciples are discouraged and they're like, they killed their Lord.
[SPEAKER_02]: Like,
[SPEAKER_02]: We saw him die, like, what are we going to do next?
[SPEAKER_02]: And they're going to come after us and how, you know, filled with fear, filled with hopelessness.
[SPEAKER_02]: Jesus shows up and doesn't reveal who he is.
[SPEAKER_02]: And he gives them a Bible study to reveal himself.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: And that is how powerful God's Word is that God himself uses the power of God's Word to heal himself to people.
[SPEAKER_02]: Come on.
[SPEAKER_02]: That away, those who walk with Jesus, literally, don't have anything on.
[SPEAKER_02]: us who didn't physically get to walk with Jesus.
[SPEAKER_02]: We have to come to know him through the same name.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so the temptation, not to love our neighbor, is rooted in snatching out pages of Scripture over and over again.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_02]: Just snatching them out.
[SPEAKER_02]: The temptation to say, you know, I can just do whatever I want to do whenever I want to do it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Because I mean, to be God of our own lives, and you say you follow the way of Jesus, we add that part, and you say you follow the way.
[SPEAKER_02]: I have nothing to say with folks that don't follow the way of Jesus.
[SPEAKER_02]: Do your thing.
[SPEAKER_02]: But if you say you follow the way of Jesus, then you cannot snatch pages out of the text.
[SPEAKER_02]: You have to let it reckon with us.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's right.
[SPEAKER_02]: Doesn't mean that our context and interpretation have been right for generations, but we still got to deal with what is.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so that rootedness, I think, has got...
[SPEAKER_02]: to be centered in God's word, especially when it's uncomfortable, and especially when it tells you who your neighbor is, which is exclusively the person you don't want it to be.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're going to press pause, like we would do on our real show, by the way.
[SPEAKER_00]: Look how it's Segway, like look how it's Segway there.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're going to press pause, and you know, because this is going to give us time in our editorial process to be able to put a little commercial in there.
[SPEAKER_02]: And what you're going to do during the commercial break is you have people who are sitting next to you.
[SPEAKER_02]: You are going to turn to them.
[SPEAKER_02]: You're going to introduce your name because your student development student like people, your reasonably sociable.
[SPEAKER_02]: Some of y'all are just too extraverted, but that's okay, shout out to the entrepreneur.
[SPEAKER_02]: Shout out to the introverts who work in student lives.
[SPEAKER_02]: Hello, I'm right here.
[SPEAKER_02]: Hey!
[SPEAKER_02]: We met at the Saints.
[SPEAKER_02]: We met her.
[SPEAKER_02]: But I do love my extroverted people.
[SPEAKER_02]: I do.
[SPEAKER_02]: OK, so this is what you're going to do.
[SPEAKER_02]: OK, because just because you're introverted, don't mean you don't like people.
[SPEAKER_02]: We love people by the way.
[SPEAKER_02]: We just, you know, we love ourselves and our peace, too.
[SPEAKER_02]: So what you're going to do is you're going to introduce yourself to maybe like a little party of like three or so, and you are going to talk about what your favorite color was.
[SPEAKER_02]: when you were in elementary school and why.
[SPEAKER_02]: Ugh.
[SPEAKER_02]: Reach back, thanks.
[SPEAKER_02]: Reach back.
[SPEAKER_01]: Reach back, thanks.
[SPEAKER_02]: I like that.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we're going to get red on pictures of the audience.
[SPEAKER_02]: You got like two minutes, and then we'll get back.
[SPEAKER_02]: Our NAACP Image Award nominated book, Truths Table.
[SPEAKER_02]: Black women's musings on life love in liberation is making waves and shifting culture.
[SPEAKER_02]: I closed this book feeling like I had just partaken in a multi-course meal, filled with grace and the courage to carry on.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I believe you'll finish this book feeling the same way.
[SPEAKER_02]: Morgan Harper Nichols artists in poet.
[SPEAKER_02]: By truce table, Black women's musings on life love in liberation at our website or wherever books are sold.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we are back, and what was your favorite color when, because we asked this question.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it was a problem answer.
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, it was your favorite color when you were in elementary, I know it is because I do know you were a community.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't even know.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, Ryan, it's so funny, it's a color I made up as a kid.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, I don't know this.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's so amazing.
[SPEAKER_02]: I stand absolutely correct.
[SPEAKER_01]: What I call it, you know the color.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was, I used to call it purplish pinkish.
[SPEAKER_01]: When I was kidding, that was my color.
[SPEAKER_01]: Purplish pinkish is magenta.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's like the big girl name of what it's called, yeah, it's pinkish, so I guess Magenta, but yeah, I literally, I'm a pinky, pinky girly, even when my answer calls me that too.
[SPEAKER_01]: But what was your, your color as a kid?
[SPEAKER_01]: Now I love every, I don't really have a favorite color now.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah, I have been rolling with like orange and yellow for a real long time.
[SPEAKER_02]: Hey, y'all, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y'all in the house, hey, y
[SPEAKER_02]: So, and our first half, we talked about what it means to be rooted in our faith, rooted in God's word, rooted in prayer, rooted in understanding of what's happening, rooted in a love that extends beyond just my own, my important identity and it is and the culture that I'm connected to, which it is quite important, but to see beyond myself because of what Christ has done, the Catholicity of faith, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So, we talked about those types of roots, and now let's talk
[SPEAKER_02]: what they allow you to venture into.
[SPEAKER_02]: How they allow you to connect, the risk they allow you to take.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so, we're rooted, not just to stay there, we're rooted to reach somewhere.
[SPEAKER_02]: So in this particular season, you're like how you said church you were in this season, to pin in your tradition, you might know about that.
[SPEAKER_02]: What?
[SPEAKER_02]: That's true.
[SPEAKER_02]: This is what you had tradition, you know?
[SPEAKER_02]: Take that one back.
[SPEAKER_01]: Two of them is a pretty church-coded word.
[SPEAKER_02]: It is church-coded, isn't it?
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, church-lingo.
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, of certain segments.
[SPEAKER_02]: Where are you reaching to in this season?
[SPEAKER_02]: Go at them, I think.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's where I'm reaching.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm like, you just come get a start.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're like any time now.
[SPEAKER_01]: Relax.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm like, you just come get a start.
[SPEAKER_01]: Any time.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, but goodness.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's so funny because it's, I feel like my hands are kind of in a little bit of this and a little bit of that.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're a multi-high-finite.
[SPEAKER_01]: I am.
[SPEAKER_02]: That means that you have tons of jobs.
[SPEAKER_02]: I truly have.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm only going to.
[SPEAKER_01]: In that sense.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm reaching everywhere.
[SPEAKER_01]: But you know, I do, in my own personal work, you know, I do a lot of reparation work.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so that means I work with a lot of people that are not yet believers, actually, to try to accomplish that work, of course it's not easy.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, it has its, it's got its moments, you know, it's definitely, there's been a lot of traction, I'd say, within, within that movement, you know, because I see reparations as actually core to the gospel because Jesus is our reparation.
[SPEAKER_01]: He repaid the magic between us and God.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hello, and so, so this is very core, you know, to the gospel of not only Confessions and repenting, turning and repairing.
[SPEAKER_01]: what's done, you know, come on restorative justice on the fan.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, so I do that, that's global, you know, on type work.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's kind of domestic, you know, a type of work as well.
[SPEAKER_01]: But also, I do some mentoring.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just wrapped up some mentoring for the youths.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, with the youths.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, young people, you're saying you're saying young people, you are not young people.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you're not in the number.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's a high school in Washington, D.C.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was actually really rewarding.
[SPEAKER_01]: Even though it's complaining here and there.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, but it was rewarding in just because there was a small little group, honestly.
[SPEAKER_01]: We thought we would have more girls, but I learned it really is more about impact, you know, and really is more about, see, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y'all, receive that y
[SPEAKER_01]: It really is about the impact, you know, and those girls were able to say, you know, like, oh, I'm sad that this is your last day with us.
[SPEAKER_01]: I first of all know if they're even taking in what you're telling them, they're not enthusiastic the whole time.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then when it's time to go, oh, we don't want you to go really?
[SPEAKER_01]: I didn't.
[SPEAKER_01]: You heard it, you heard a word, I said, I couldn't tell, but all right, yeah, so, so yeah, just no, you're doing it for the load, okay?
[SPEAKER_01]: You don't know how they'll see it, they'll see they're being planted, they're all in the whole experience watering them.
[SPEAKER_01]: But anyways, but that was really cool to be able to kind of reach back in some ways, you know, to go back to, you know, high school, demographic, and it helped to pour into them and talk about, you know, self-esteem, character, all of those very important.
[SPEAKER_01]: inner qualities and things like that.
[SPEAKER_01]: So those are some ways you know if they're reaching back.
[SPEAKER_01]: Of course, we reach through our podcast You know, and we don't even know I honestly we see numbers, but we don't really know, you know The impact you know of the work that we're doing.
[SPEAKER_01]: We'll know in glory When the Lord rolls the tape, you know Y'all do know you know what I'm gonna roll some tape.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, okay
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, but, you know, I think about reaching in those ways and then of course I reach on the pick align, I reach on the pick align, you know, protesting, you know, and resisting oppression, however it shows up and whenever it shows up, as you just did a couple of weeks ago, fighting for voting rights, because we're back here again.
[SPEAKER_01]: In 2020, it's why we're tired.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so I'm reaching in prayer because of tired.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, my, come on, Lord.
[SPEAKER_01]: and just waiting for the Lord, and the Lord is always working, absolutely, or even if we don't see it, the Lord is working.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so those are some ways that I think about actually reaching.
[SPEAKER_02]: How are you reaching my sister?
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, you mentioned recently, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So all roads lead to the south.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes, yes, for the folks who participated in that.
[SPEAKER_02]: And a couple of weeks ago.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, a couple of weeks ago.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so I live in the south.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I'm a descendant of the cell, pillow.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so that was a great opportunity to connect with those leaders.
[SPEAKER_02]: It turned into this really interesting hodgepodge of people that showed up.
[SPEAKER_02]: You never know who's gonna come out to protest.
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, it's very, you know, it's a very complex thing.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's like Walmart or all these.
[SPEAKER_02]: You don't know who's gonna be there.
[SPEAKER_02]: Okay, it's very diverse.
[SPEAKER_01]: I know who's gonna be at all.
[SPEAKER_02]: I know we are.
[SPEAKER_02]: We're all the loyalists.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's for sure.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm just my audio deals today.
[SPEAKER_02]: Hey, hey, hey, there was a student at Calvin who actually side note who introduced me to all these because I got I'm not gonna lie to you.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was incredibly bougie.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was like, oh, days.
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm like, oh, I was like, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.
[SPEAKER_02]: I was like, do they sell food that's brand name, but there's brand name bags.
[SPEAKER_02]: It's just like gonna be a big bag of cereal with no $2,000.
[SPEAKER_02]: $2,000.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the student was like, no, you need to go.
[SPEAKER_02]: And I was like, okay, and it changed my life.
[SPEAKER_02]: You listen to, you listen to their students.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_02]: Because they know how to save a buck.
[SPEAKER_02]: That's what they know how to do, because they don't have many bucks, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: So.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it was a hodgepodge of people, like Walmart.
[SPEAKER_02]: It was a hodgepodge of people, and what was interesting as people were in reflecting on what it means.
[SPEAKER_02]: Particularly those of us who are directly connected to people who risk their lives for the gains of the civil rights movement.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: who are directly connected to people who not only survive the middle passage, but the great migration to move to go from the south to other parts of the states for greater opportunity and literally running because of the clan and because of these militias and because of the toxicity that sadly the children and grandchildren of that philosophically are still amongst us today.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so those folks were there in the crowd.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then you had folks who have other social compelling causes that were there in the crowd because they see the intersection and connection to all of those things.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then you see folks that are just like, oh, I just want to be a part of something.
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't want to miss this social moment, so they pop up.
[SPEAKER_02]: But in the midst of that, you also heard these cries of despair, because there's this pain of like, look at what this generation did.
[SPEAKER_02]: Look at the people who suffered for it.
[SPEAKER_02]: Think about my grandmother, who just passed not too long ago, almost just shy of a hundred, but I think about what my grandmother lived through, and then I think of the audacity for people to attempt to roll back what she had to survive and bring it back today.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have a painful anger about that.
[SPEAKER_02]: I have sadness and sorrow, but I think I'm living on Anger Street right now.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's something about my grandmother surviving the scars and her legs from dogs.
[SPEAKER_02]: and seeing a black president, whether you like them or not.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then seeing people intentionally prop up people who would highlight racist comedians for jokes.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_02]: There's something about the slap in the face to my grandmother and our mini-gremothers legacy that makes it nearly unforgivable apart from the Lord Jesus Christ.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_02]: So just, you know, you can laugh at it if you want, but it's true.
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's going to take a lot of spiritual grounding for us to walk together and by us, I mean, the racial diversity that is a part of the church, because I do believe my wife brothers and sisters absolutely let us down on that.
[SPEAKER_02]: spit in our faces on that, as a collective, you want to think about it individually, but as a collective, and that is painful, and so I saw in that crowd that day for all roads lead to the south.
[SPEAKER_02]: I saw a mixture of people who had all those feelings, and then some folks that we know who led that movement got on the stage in order to kind of calm the crowd they begin to sing gospel songs.
[SPEAKER_01]: And when I tell you this audience was not particularly Christian, it was diverse, okay?
[SPEAKER_02]: And everyone.
[SPEAKER_02]: begin to sing, because everyone needed hope.
[SPEAKER_02]: Everyone needed hope that God could roll this back, that God could bring us out.
[SPEAKER_02]: And even if it's not there, God, they're like, could your God do it for us?
[SPEAKER_02]: Could your God do it?
[SPEAKER_02]: Ain't that reachin'?
[SPEAKER_02]: And so it was powerful to see that in the moment.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then I don't know if I told you this, there was a dear woman who had been a freedom fighter.
[SPEAKER_02]: Decades ago, who was on the first row,
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, she got sick there.
[SPEAKER_02]: She got sick there.
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so they had to stop the entire program.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it, because it was hot.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it felt like 110 degrees yellow.
[SPEAKER_02]: It was hot.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was under the shade about the whole time, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: And she got super sick.
[SPEAKER_02]: And she was looking really bad.
[SPEAKER_02]: And the symbolism of that.
[SPEAKER_02]: This woman who was a freedom writer in the front row, having to protest again, in our old age.
[SPEAKER_02]: Having to do it again, because selfishness rolled back what she fought for.
[SPEAKER_02]: And there she is feeling the heat of that moment and collapsing.
[SPEAKER_02]: And collapsing.
[SPEAKER_02]: As of the folks on Mike, we're like, we have a problem with the crowd.
[SPEAKER_02]: We need help, we need help, we need help, and then everyone in that audience began.
[SPEAKER_02]: She said, I don't know what you believe in, but I believe in Jesus.
[SPEAKER_02]: And everyone in that audience was called to intercede on that dear freedom fighters behind.
[SPEAKER_02]: That didn't make the news.
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, no.
[SPEAKER_02]: They didn't make the news.
[SPEAKER_02]: These folks from different backgrounds and experiences and political interests that didn't make the news.
[SPEAKER_02]: But that entire crowd of thousands began to cry out and ask God to heal her and he did.
[SPEAKER_02]: And what that showed me in that moment, I know it's amazing, right?
[SPEAKER_02]: God still healed.
[SPEAKER_02]: You better hold God still healed.
[SPEAKER_01]: First of all.
[SPEAKER_02]: And yeah, first of all,
[SPEAKER_02]: What it showed me is symbolically, we're going to be all right.
[SPEAKER_02]: God still has grace for that freedom fighters journey.
[SPEAKER_02]: God still has grace for our journey.
[SPEAKER_02]: So we're going to keep reaching.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I love that.
[SPEAKER_01]: First of all, I love that you went and you were able to go.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I love that it's a demonstration of the gospel.
[SPEAKER_01]: that when we do the work of justice, that when we do it in Jesus' name, you know, when we are doing that, it is, we are reaching.
[SPEAKER_01]: It is evangelistic, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, Jesus did not simply just care about our souls.
[SPEAKER_01]: He cares about our whole being.
[SPEAKER_01]: and we are to be imitators of Christ in so doing, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: Go and send no more absolutely, you know?
[SPEAKER_01]: And also do what we can with what we've got in our power to free not only ourselves, because we got, you know, but also freeing our neighbor, you know?
[SPEAKER_01]: So having just the power of just hearing, like, I don't know who y'all believe in, but I believe in Jesus, and I need y'all to pray.
[SPEAKER_01]: You and have the Holy Ghost.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, moves in that place.
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't know how many people that may have come to faith as a result of that.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's the inner work, right?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, the spirit does, we don't know.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, or even just the worship of the living God, like how many people have now had a seed planted, you know, that weren't coming there for all that.
[SPEAKER_01]: They were just coming to be ready to be a part?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I have a Christian, I was like, it was a lot of Jesus talk here.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, and so you don't you I think that I think part of our reaching is in our doing right you know part of our reaching is really in our doing And and you just don't know how the Lord is going to use that you don't know how to spirit of the living God will move in that and we need a supernatural move we need revival so desperately in this land not manufactured
[SPEAKER_01]: Not, not, not, not, you know, not orchestrated, not performing it, not, not for TikTok and for the lives and the, no, we don't know how to work together.
[SPEAKER_01]: We need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need, we need
[SPEAKER_01]: revival and revival doesn't come apart from repentance that part in confession okay you know we need all of those things and so um so I don't know you know it's like we're in a tough we're in a pickle
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's putting it, you know, that's putting it gently, you know, we are in a pickle.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I know, I know the one that can get us out, and I know that in it with us.
[SPEAKER_01]: In it with us, you know, a manual, I would say God with us, in it and God with us through it.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, and so I anticipate.
[SPEAKER_01]: a move of the Lord.
[SPEAKER_01]: I anticipate the work of the Spirit in our hearts.
[SPEAKER_01]: I anticipate many coming into faith, although I also know that there will be some that do fall away.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's hard too.
[SPEAKER_01]: But we must make our calling.
[SPEAKER_01]: an election sure and we do that by remaining rooted in cries and being rooted were also reaching and we have exemplars, you know, in the faith who I've come before, so you have lifted up a, a Frederick Druckless and sojourner-truthed, you know, my, my personal she was Mary McLeod but though, you know, who was, who knew a thing I knew about Christian education.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hello, new a thing or two about Christian education founded a Bethoon Cookman University that still stands for that she is exactly a woman who was very proud about her own roots are great you know grand grandparents being born and getting was very connected you know to her own west African heritage was never shy about that she has built institutions that still lasts today the National Council of Negro women
[SPEAKER_01]: who me and Christina are where members, life members of that institution still stands today fighting for voting rights again.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm just like, I'm most panning to the camera because why are we back here again?
[SPEAKER_01]: We are here again.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, I think about that.
[SPEAKER_01]: But Thun Cookman, you know, and you've received, but this was a woman that was rooted in her faith.
[SPEAKER_01]: To believe that the children really are future.
[SPEAKER_01]: She really believe that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And she's right.
[SPEAKER_01]: And she believed that education was the key and it was her face in Christ, you know, that compelled her, you know, to educate young girls to educate the next generation.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, you know, I'm actually like to read a quote from her before as we wrap.
[SPEAKER_01]: Because I know I know that we try to keep time.
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I'm not looking at it.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I let me read this quote from her because it's actually in her last will and testament.
[SPEAKER_02]: Let's see, and she left this, yeah, this was the words of a Christian educated.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, from her last will and testament, she penned this right before her death at the age of 79, in May, May 1955.
[SPEAKER_01]: So this is what she says.
[SPEAKER_01]: I leave you finally a responsibility to our young people.
[SPEAKER_01]: The world around us really belongs to youth.
[SPEAKER_01]: For youth will take over its future management.
[SPEAKER_01]: Our children must never lose their zeal for building a better world.
[SPEAKER_01]: They must not be discouraged from aspiring to our greatness.
[SPEAKER_01]: For they are to be the leaders of tomorrow.
[SPEAKER_01]: Nor must they forget that the masses of our people are still under privilege.
[SPEAKER_01]: It'll house, impoverished and victimized by discrimination.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have a powerful potential in our youth, and we must have the courage to change old ideas and practices so that we may direct their power toward good ends, faith, courage, brotherhood, dignity, ambition, responsibility.
[SPEAKER_01]: These are needed today as never before.
[SPEAKER_01]: If I have a legacy to leave my people,
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you, Mrs. Mary McLeod, Bethoon.
[SPEAKER_01]: May we go off and be more like her.
[SPEAKER_01]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_01]: And that thing.
[SPEAKER_02]: And thank y'all for hearing us out today.
[SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_02]: And stay tuned.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Listen.
[SPEAKER_02]: And we can.
[SPEAKER_02]: If you have any plucky feelings about the content, don't send letters to the conference, send them right to Jesus Christ.
[SPEAKER_02]: Amen.
[SPEAKER_02]: Ask in the search your heart by a dead serious by the power of the Holy Spirit and ask him in my trippin' or I'm not.
[SPEAKER_02]: Who start there, amen?
[SPEAKER_02]: Amen.