A girl invited me to come out to a Bible study, and I said, 'Why not? I don't have anything to lose.' I went, and to my surprise, I saw people that loved God, but they were not square or rigid. They were just people like me.
I'm all about authenticity.
A lot of times, when you don't have to deal with some of the circumstances that affect minority culture, you just don't think they exist. This is a conversation I have with lots of my white friends all the time.
If you subscribe to any moral code that says you should care for humanity, obviously black people will fit into that category.
I've always been the type of person - you know, I kind of am extreme. So you know, I'm not like, 'Oh, let me get one tattoo.' It's, like, my old whole arm has to be covered.
Laying my will down for Jesus was laying my life down for others.
I just don't want to be the artist who's out on the road and has no real perspective of what's happening at home.
Faith is not about serving some tyrant in the sky that says, 'You need to get your act together.' Faith is about having a loving father who says, 'Hey, listen... I'm here with you. I'm going to hold your hand. Just rock with me.'
People have got to form some kind of unified fronts where you know who your allies are, you know who your friends are, and really begin to work together to create different kinds of infrastructures to protect one another and to help one another thrive.
My mom was big on education, big on reading, so she was always pushing books on me: 'The Autobiography of Malcolm X,' like, 'Read these books.' And it was like, man, I'm learning stuff that I just can't get anywhere else.
I know I'm wonderfully made, and nobody can take that away from me. So regardless of what I show you or expose to you, you don't have any bearing on my worth and what I mean.
To realize that I had been living a lie, to realize that I was unsatisfied and I would never be satisfied until I came to Jesus was so revolutionary to me that I wanted everyone to taste it. I wanted everyone to see how awesome God was.
I feel fortunate to have a huge family that is beyond race, creed, culture, and have a Father who shepherds us all. When I think about that, my mind is blown.
When God's hand is on you, there's nothing anybody can do to stop that.
I don't feel any sense of prioritizing white evangelicalism.
College allows you to make better decisions, better friends, and a better future. There's only one catch: when the opportunity comes, you actually have to take it.
My mom had always been big on education. She was the first woman in our family to go to college, and she often reminded me that I needed to go to college if I wanted to really make it in life.
When I hung out with my Uncle Chris, things got real. He was fun, talkative, and loud. He was the life of the party and a magnet for mischief. Since he saw the world through a gangsta's lens, he wanted me to become tough and aggressive.
Growing up in inner-city neighborhoods, there's a particular structure, which I'm sure is true of most social contexts. The type of person you are determines the role you play.
