Speaker 1: 0:01

God bless you. My friend, this is Bishop Eugene Taylor and you tuned into the Storming the Gates podcast, brought to you every Monday at 8 am, and we're here to design to teach the people how to storm the gates and walk on the victory that God has for their life against every attack of the enemy. I'm certainly excited on today with our guest. On today. Our guest is Apostle KJ Mack. He is a native of Birmingham, alabama. He is a powerful man of God. You can find him on social media platforms. He's doing some great, dynamic things in the kingdom of God. He's married to Lady Madra Mack. He has three beautiful children Christopher, kayla and Madison.

Speaker 1: 0:45

He is the founder. He's not just a pastor, and I'm going to tell you something there's a difference between pastoring a church and founding a church. He is the founder of Raymond Word Ministries, located right in Birmingham. He was affirmed as an apostle in 2008. Now he is an educated man. He has a doctrine in philosophy, a doctrine in seminary, a doctrine in divinity. He's also he received the humanitarian award for the heart from the Heart Bible Institute. He is just a man of God and I'm going to welcome on today. God bless you, apostle Max, so blessed to have you all, my brother.

Speaker 2: 1:20

God bless you, sir. Thank you for having me on this broadcast.

Speaker 1: 1:24

Yes, sir, yes sir, I am excited. I've been watching some of the things that you guys have been doing down in Birmingham and y'all got me stirred up. Y'all on fire down there at Raymond Ward.

Speaker 2: 1:36

Man, we're trying to keep the fire lit. We're trying to keep the fire lit. Keep it burning, my brother.

Speaker 1: 1:42

Listen, I gave the bio. You know how you do Give the bio. We talk about the accolades and all these different things, and listen, apostle, doctor, pastor, I respect you in all of those offices, but away from that, I want you to tell the people who is KJ Mack.

Speaker 2: 2:02

Well, I tell you, starting off, I'm a father of three, yes, sir, and I'm a husband of one wife, praise the Lord. And so I'm glad about what God is doing in this season. I'm a down-to-earth guy. I love having fun I love fishing, I love hunting.

Speaker 2: 2:27

I love restoring houses and cars. What do you hunt? Anything that moves. I love deer hunting. I love deer hunting. We have almost 300 acres of land down in my parents' area back in Livingston. That's where I'm from Livingston, alabama, which is about an hour and a half from birmingham okay, okay, yes, okay.

Speaker 1: 2:50

So you hunt right there on the land I hunt on the land.

Speaker 2: 2:53

Yes, can you fish on the land? I fish on the land, fish and hunt on the land I'm from baltimore, maryland city city guy now recently.

Speaker 1: 3:04

over the last years, I've moved down in the rural area in the country and I love it Now, not to the point that I'm doing what you're doing, but I love being in the rural area. I love the peace that comes along with it. So I'm going to tell you you're talking my kind of talk.

Speaker 2: 3:18

You're talking my kind of talk, Right right, yes sir it's very cathartic. Yes, sir.

Speaker 1: 3:24

All right. All right, let's talk a little bit. Can we talk a little bit, apostle, what is your passion for ministry? I want the people to get a feel of you, your ministry where your heart beats. What is your passion? What is the thing?

Speaker 2: 3:41

that keeps you alive. When it comes to ministry, my passion for ministry is leadership. I mean, I love leadership. I literally eat, drink, sleep leadership. You know, a wise saying was said years ago that every church is not called to be mega, but every church is called to be better. And so, with that being said, I think every ministry rests on the back of good leadership, and so, if the leaders can be developed, it pushes every sector of ministry to a better place. And so I love leadership. I love developing leaders, I love seeing them evolve to the next place, the next area in God.

Speaker 2: 4:30

And so many people. We focus on different things in ministry, which is good, but, but I believe the essence of true ministry lies on the back of leadership. And so I love, I love leadership, my wife and I. There's a teaching and I may talk about it later that we do every year in our church. It's entitled Becoming an Asset Leader, and I deal with four sets of becoming an asset leader Having the right mindset, having the right skill set, having the right tool set and then having the right time set. You know, and those teachings actually helped our leaders evolve to a better place, you know. And so I have a heart, a passion for leaders.

Speaker 1: 5:27

Now, if you were to say something about leaders, what do you think the greatest challenge that you see leaders dealing with in this 21st century?

Speaker 2: 5:37

Commitment, commitment, commitment. You know I was talking with a person just last week. You know one of the hardest things for pastors is having a successor. Ok, when Elijah, when Elijah asked Elijah for a double portion of his anointing, elijah said you asked a hard thing, oh.

Speaker 2: 6:03

I think, yes, because Elijah did not have any physical sons, you know, at that time, and generally it'll be passed down to the firstborn. And so you asked a hard thing, and I think the hardest thing for most pastors is who am I going to pass this down to? You see, because in this generation people are not stable, they're not committed. You know they get mad. Stable, they're not committed, you know they get mad, they get upset and then they leave. And so you look at elijah, elijah, when elijah died, he had nobody he can pass it down to. Yes, you know. So all that, all that anointing, went to the grave you know, and so we have a?

Speaker 2: 6:44

uh, a church full of people who are transferers and not transformers.

Speaker 1: 6:49

I like that, I like that.

Speaker 2: 6:52

And so the average, the average people who come down and join church, uh, they just transfer from somewhere else. Right, and so I'm looking for transformers, those who came from the darkness to the marvelous light, you know. And so this is one of the hardest things now is getting people to commit, getting them to to serve through difficult moments. Yes, challenges are going to come. Yes, I told a person years ago Rhema Word was a perfect church. Bishop Taylor, listen, rhema Word, we had a perfect church. I promise you, we had a perfect church until people started joining. Until people started joining.

Speaker 1: 7:40

I already knew where this was going at. I already knew it. I appreciate a church this Sunday passed and this is what I said. I told them, I said I've never had one problem with church, ever In my entire life. I've never had one problem with church, never. I said I've only had a problem with people. Because one of the things we have to understand, even when you talk about the offices, even the fivefold ministry, the fivefold ministry are perfect offices that are filled with imperfect people. They're filled with imperfect people, that's just the fact of it.

Speaker 1: 8:17

And if you're going to be a leader, like you said, commitment the thing that would come to my mind that matches along with commitment is accountability. Sometimes you find negligence when it comes to accountability with leaders. One of the things that I try to teach my leaders is everything rises and falls with the leader. We can make all of these excuses, all we want to, but it rises and falls with the leader.

Speaker 2: 8:43

Go ahead I need you.

Speaker 1: 8:44

That caused me to step in. Go ahead.

Speaker 2: 8:48

But yeah, I believe that that commitment is so vital, you know, and you know when people join a ministry, you know we have new members class and doing that class, you know I come in on one of the sessions and I asked them what church they came from, number one, and then, like you do at an interview, reason for leaving.

Speaker 2: 9:14

You know, because if you tell me where I was at my last church for four months, the church before that for three weeks, then the one before that for four months, then now you're not ready to tell me that you're not stable, you're not committed, you see. So now I see your track record, you have an instability problem, and so now my job as a pastor is to teach you commitment, to teach you continuity and stability. You know, because when people walk into our churches, a lot of them will have strength and then they will have weaknesses, and so my job as the apostle is to find out your weakest area and try to build that up and maybe at the end of the day, you become a better leader. Yes, sir.

Speaker 1: 10:03

I like that. Let me ask you a question. Yes, what are some of the key areas that you find that Satan is fighting? Ministries and leaders.

Speaker 2: 10:16

Well, let's talk about the ministry first. It is one of the areas I believe he had his target. It's the music ministry. Okay, all right, all right, the music ministry from musicians, the choir, the praise team, the dancers. Bishop, I love what you're drinking. I drink it every day. It's some good stuff. Yes, sir, I came away. I came away from Stoners. I drink it every day. It's some good stuff. Yes, sir, I came away.

Speaker 1: 10:45

I came away from Stoner's. I love it.

Speaker 2: 11:08

I love that. Okay, and so the music ministry is one of the areas where he targets the most, and the reason why I, the reason why John the Baptist got beheaded, was because he was an atmospheric shifter. John the Baptist came to prepare the way for Jesus. Ok, the praise team, the music ministry, you all are preparing the way for the word of God.

Speaker 2: 11:34

That's one of the reasons why John the Baptist was beheaded, because he was that atmospheric shifter. I remember Jehoshaphat. He was outnumbered and God told Jehoshaphat get those who can praise and put them on the front line. So, those who can praise those who are in the music ministry, they are on the front line, okay. So those who can pray, those who are in the music ministry, they are on the front line and the devil do not like the fact that they are shifting the atmosphere and so, for that very reason, they are under attack. That's why I like David.

Speaker 2: 12:11

David was not only a worshiper, not only could he play, but David knew how to fight. He knew how to fight. And so when I have people coming in and they want to be a part of the praise team, the dance team, et cetera, I'm not only concerned about their gifting Okay, can you sing, can you stay on key but I'm also concerned to know do you know how to fight? Because when you join this auxiliary, when you join this ministry, this frontline ministry, it's warfare, okay. And so the issue that we have now in church we have a lot of people who sing I'm on a battlefield for the Lord but they can't fight. We have worship leaders that don't want to fight. We have dancers that don't want to fight, you see, because this here is an area where the enemy is launching his attack.

Speaker 2: 13:11

I've had people nice people that would join the music ministry and when the attack comes, they want to leave, because you're looking at the glory but you don't see the story. You don't see what goes on in rehearsals, you don't see what goes on during the week, and there's a great level of attack when those who submit to their worship ministry and so with that, that's why you see a lot of people that are dealing with a high turnover Because they are gifted, people that can sing but they can't fight. You see, go ahead.

Speaker 1: 13:52

You see, one of the things that happens is that the enemy uses a spirit of offense. That's what he uses to shift people out of position. You know, when you look in the scripture, the Bible talks about John the Baptist. And keep in mind John the Baptist. When Jesus comes on the scene, he's the one to let us know. He said behold the Lamb of God takes away the sins of the world. He said know. He said behold the Lamb of God to take away sins of the world. He said this is him. He is the Lamb of God. We find out that he is the Messiah. We find it out from John the Baptist. When John gets locked up in prison and Jesus doesn't come see about him, the first thing John said is he the one or should we look for another? Watch this. Is he the one or should we look for another? Watch this. He's ready to take back his testimony because he got offended? Jesus' response is blessed is he? That is not offended with me.

Speaker 1: 14:44

Jesus said the only reason you're shifting is because you got offended. I found out something that many times what the enemy will do he'll bring in a spirit of offense, cause people to get offended. And the reason I'm talking about that so much because I like what you just said you can't work in this ministry unless you know how to fight. David was a worshiper, but he was a fighter, and they go hand in hand. Well, he says in John 4 and 24, the father seek of such. I'm looking for worshipers, but the worshipers must understand they got to fight.

Speaker 2: 15:19

They got to fight. You look at Nehemiah building a wall, the men, they had a hammer in one hand and they had a sword in another hand.

Speaker 2: 15:28

They're working and fighting at the same time and fighting at the same time. And so I believe in this season we need leaders, we need people in the music ministry that know how to serve but yet fight at the same time. You know I can't preach it enough. You know dogs doesn't bark at the parked cars. A dog only chase behind something that's moving. When you are on the move for the Lord, you have to expect adversities and things to happen.

Speaker 1: 16:04

Another area of ministry that you've got to have tough skin if you will the usher's ministry. You can't usher in the house and you're not prepared to fight because you're talking about an offense. An offense will definitely come in there and I like what you're saying because there's certain ministries. Before you welcome people in, you need to let them know that this ministry comes with the challenge. Do you think that you can handle the challenge?

Speaker 2: 16:30

thank you, remember when go ahead, no, go ahead.

Speaker 1: 16:37

No, no, go ahead, go ahead, I'm listening.

Speaker 2: 16:39

Okay, I remember when, when Mary, I mean when Martha got mad at Mary and she told Jesus do you not care that my sister left me to serve alone? Well, when you read the text, the Bible says that Martha invited Jesus. Ok, Mary didn't invite Jesus to the house, Martha invited Jesus. So in that text, Martha is under attack because she was the one that ushered in the glory of God. She was the one that invited Jesus in. Okay, and going back to the ushers, they are under attack because when you first walk in, you see the ushers.

Speaker 2: 17:22

Okay, they are inviting people in. You know, they are too on that front line. Yes, sir, the greeters, the doorkeepers, the ushers, yes, you know, and that ministry itself is coming with a text. You know, and you have to stay prayed up and learn how to suffer and serve at the same time. That's why the Bible said Jesus was obedient, even to the point of death. He was obedient, you know, and there's a dying process that we go through in those positions. There's a dying process that we go through in those positions.

Speaker 1: 17:55

But whenever there's a dying process, there's a death, there's a burial and a resurrection. I found out something Whenever God's getting ready to move us into a new space, there's a cycle of death, burial and resurrection. The Bible says in John 12 and 24, except the seed fall into the ground and die and die that seed must die so that it can bring forth more fruit.

Speaker 1: 18:19

And I'm going to tell you, I preached a message one time and the message was it seems like God is trying to kill me, and I told the people he is. He's trying to kill areas in you and that's the only way you're going to be used and be effective, the only way you're going to be used and be effective, the only way you're going to be used and be effective for the kingdom of God. Apostle, I want to say this, the apostle Paul. He gives us a picture of us as an athlete. He says run this race with endurance. Then he also gives us a picture of us as a fighter, that we would fight the good of faith, fight the good fight of faith. We've got to understand if we're really going to gain momentum in the kingdom. We've got to know how to run, but we also have to know how to fight. Yes, sir.

Speaker 2: 19:02

Right, right, come on. Yes, and there's a time for both of them. There's a time to run, go ahead.

Speaker 1: 19:09

When I heard you start off, when I asked you, I said who is Apostle Mac? Who is it? I like the way you started off. I always like to hear a man start off there. You begin to tell me about your family. I'm going to tell you, sometimes we have a lot of zeal and zealous people in ministry and they become so zealous that they forget about their family. I love where you start off. You let me know. Let me tell you about my wife. Now let me tell you about my church. Let me tell you about my wife, not telling me about your degrees. Let me tell you about my wife.

Speaker 1: 19:44

Let me tell you about my children, because the truth of the matter is, ministry is wonderful, but when it's all said and done, god holds you responsible for your family. Your family is your first ministry. I want you to talk to me a little bit. I like the way you started out. Talk to me a little bit about the importance of family and ministry.

Speaker 2: 20:05

Well, you know, family, I would say, is so important. You show me a healthy family and I show you a healthy church. As a matter of fact, before there was a church, there was a family. Before Satan attacked the church, he attacked family first. Yes, and so I believe family is so important and so I believe family is so important. Many times in the body of Christ, people will win in the church but then lose at home. Yes, because we spend so much time at church, so much time doing church stuff, that we don't do family stuff, doing church stuff, that we don't do family stuff. And I believe one of the reasons why a lot of our PKs, a lot of our children, don't like church, because there was no balance to the point where you didn't show up to the football game. You didn't show up to the basketball game.

Speaker 2: 21:09

You know you didn't show up, you know for my events because you were quote unquote at church all the time. But I believe, like Jesus told his disciples, come your part and rest a while.

Speaker 2: 21:20

But, men go to and fro and never have time to eat, and so I believe in a balance. It must be a balance. You know my family. They follow me all the time. Guess what? They follow me because I follow them, yes, sir. And so when we're doing the church stuff, they're following dad, but then there were times when I follow my daughter.

Speaker 1: 21:46

I follow my son.

Speaker 2: 21:47

I'm supporting them. Jesus said this one thing when he was galvanizing the 12 disciples. He said follow me and I'll make you fishermen's of men. But when you read it, when you read it slow, he said follow me and I'll make you. In other words, it's not about you making me, it's also about me making you.

Speaker 1: 22:13

Okay.

Speaker 2: 22:14

What am I doing for you when I look at my family doing for me, but in return, what am I making you? What am I doing for you? And there's a sacrifice that must take place in the body of Christ. So that we can spend time with family, not just doing what we want to do. Yes, spend time doing what they want to do, and I think that in itself creates a healthy atmosphere, not just in church, but while you're at home as well.

Speaker 1: 22:48

I like that. I like that. I like that. You know, when I heard what you said, how we can run after church and we're successful in church, but we're not successful at home. If I'm successful in church and I'm not successful at home, I'm a failure in church and I'm not successful at home, I'm a failure.

Speaker 1: 23:13

I'm a failure, right. I am a failure If I'm doing extravagant things in the church, but my children are watching me and they're watching my life and watching my relationship with them, not just my relationship with God, but watching my relationship with them. And if that's not intact, I am a failure. See them. And if that's not intact, I am a failure. See, you know, the priority is God first, family second, ministry third, and sometimes we think that God and family are synonymous. They're not.

Speaker 2: 23:45

They're not. No, no, no, no.

Speaker 1: 23:47

God first. Matthew 6, 33. Seek ye first that Greek word is proton, first time rank and order Seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness. But ministry and God are not the same thing. We must make sure that our family because our family is our first ministry I like, I like that. I love what you said. You can be successful in the sanctuary and a failure in your home.

Speaker 2: 24:13

You're right. And so in my room I have plenty of hats, ok. Ok, I have hats that people have given me for anniversaries, birthdays etc. And I have some that I bought, but, to know me, I probably only wear one of them, okay, okay, and I say that to say this as a pastor, as a man of God, and I'm quite sure you could relate to this we wear many hats, okay, my mother and father is still living. So when I was born, when I was born, the first hat I had was a son. I'm a son, I wear that hat. So when I got married, I had a husband hat, okay. Then, when I had children, I had the father hat, all right. So when I started pastoring, I had the pastoral hat.

Speaker 2: 25:14

So I'm having five hats, but I think the failure is going back to the natural is only wearing one. So you're having the pastor hat on all day at home and you never put the son hat on. You never put the father hat on and you never put the husband hat on. Never put the father hat on and you never put the husband hat on. And that imbalance takes place in the failure, in the inability of wearing more than just one hat, and so there are times in my life where I take the apostle hat off.

Speaker 2: 25:45

I put the husband hat on, and now I'm a husband. Take the husband husband hat off and then put the son hat on taking care of my parents, taking that hat off, putting the father hat on taking care of my children, and so that balance take place, knowing how to change those hats, absolutely.

Speaker 1: 26:06

Now I had that one hat on all day see when you get your wife don't want to be calling you, having to call you apostle and calling you bishop. Now I don't want my wife to call me bishop because when my wife called me bishop, the only time she called me bishop is when she mad with me. Whenever she say bishop, I know she upset about something, so I don't want her calling me bishop at the house. So we have to understand that. I like that example that you gave. We've got to know that we use multiple hats. Your children they don't need a bishop at that time, they need their daddy. Your grandchildren they need their granddaddy.

Speaker 1: 26:42

That's what they need in their life, and we've got to know how to separate the two and then watch this. When we do that effectively along what we do in ministry, that's when we can stand before him and say now, I can hear you say well done. I can hear you say well done. All right, Boss, I think you're left out for a moment. Glory to God. We're going to take a moment and let him come back. Thank you.