Welcome back to the Theology of Business podcast with host Darren Shearer. This is the show that helps marketplace Christians to partner with God in business to help you make disciples of your company, your industry, and your community. If you want to learn more about how to do business for the glory of God and shape culture through discipling the business world, this show is for you. You can get more of the Theology of Business Institute's interviews and teachings like the one you're about to hear at theologyofbusiness.com.
SPEAKER_02Before we dive into the content for this episode, I want to give a quick shout out to our sponsor, High Bridge Books. If you're a Christian and you want to write, publish, and sell a book, you really need to contact us. In fact, you can contact me directly because this is my company. You can reach me at Darren at highbridgebooks.com. Our authors have sold many tens of thousands of life-changing books for the glory of God, and we're always looking for more Christian thought leaders to work with. You can take a look at our publishing package and some of the other services we offer at highbridgebooks.com. And you can also learn about some of our incredible authors and their books. So go to highbridgebooks.com. All right, let's jump into this amazing episode. On this episode, we're joined by my good friend and former Divinity School professor, Dr. Antipos Harris. He was actually my pulpit ministry professor at Regent University. And uh in addition to being able to glean uh such uh such excellent mentorship in his classroom, we we just became good friends, had a lot of deep philosophical theological conversations outside of the classroom and got to take some road trips together. And uh he's just one of my favorite people in the in the whole world. He's now the president and dean of Jakes Divinity School and serves on the pastoral staff at Potter's House, the Potter's House, I should say, in Dallas, Texas. And before Bishop T.D. Jakes appointed him to this role, he was the founding dean of the Urban Renewal Center in Norfolk, Virginia. I gotta say Norfolk. That's how they really say it out there. And he's the author of several books that I've had the privilege of publishing, including Unstoppable Success, Monday Morning Inspiration, and The Gifted Worshiper. And his latest book is titled, Is Christianity the White Man's Religion? How the Bible is good news for people of color. And he's uh a public theologian. I love that uh that that term, and he thinks deeply about the inequalities in our society through a biblical lens and and and with so many inequities in the world today, uh, not the least of which is income inequality. And that's what I really want to talk about uh within today. So, Dr. Antipas, thanks for joining us.
SPEAKER_01It's a delight to be here, Darren. I'm honored, thrilled for the opportunity.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and and so for the many business professionals and others who are involved in what God's doing in the marketplace, I want to dive into this issue with you of income inequality, especially as it relates to those who own and manage businesses. Uh, what has been your personal experience uh and how has your personal experience informed your approach to this issue?
SPEAKER_01Well, mostly uh my personal experience has um sort of developed out of my family history. And also that's one context. And the other context would be the work that I've done in the inner city. Now I want to be clear that I am not from the inner city, I'm from a very rural community, but a lot of my ministry, adult ministry, uh, has been within the urban context. So I'll start with my own, my family background, deeply rooted in the deep south in Georgia. Um, my grandfather fought in World War II and um from a little town called Warm Springs. You recognize it from President Roosevelt, uh, the little White House. Um, it's there in Warm Springs, Georgia, and that's where my grandfather and grandmother are from on my mom's side. And my dad is from uh Manchester, my hometown, uh, and then grew up in Columbus, Georgia. So um very rural areas in Georgia, um, very poor family, uh working poor. Uh, you know, my my grandfather, after he came out of the war, uh, of course, he had a family and built my grandmother, uh, was a working woman who had um African-American woman from Greenville, Georgia, who was a businesswoman, and business for her was um was to, you know, railroad was a big thing for African Americans in those days, working on the railroad, laying the railroad track. So as they came down the coast uh or down through uh Greenville, Georgia, she recognized that the African-American railroad workers did not have a place to live. So she uh created what she would term as a little hotel on her house. She actually built it herself, by the way, and uh and she would charge them rent as they uh would stay there at a portion of her house, and she became uh one of the entrepreneurs in the area uh who built uh her wealth. Now, some of it was not legal because she did sell moonshine as well in those days. But she was a businesswoman, she made it work, right? Uh in those days, uh it takes my great aunt to tell me, talk to talk about it. Uh, my my she was such an aggressive businesswoman that my grandfather was, well, my great-grandfather was not um uh proactive enough. So she put him out because she needed to build her business and he was too lazy for her. So we love to tell that story. Um so, but at any rate, she she would um uh you know have a hotel in her house, sell moonshine, and she was a midwife because many African Americans couldn't go to the hospitals in those days. Uh so she would deliver babies for the African American women. And so she's just an entrepreneur and she could have written a book called Multiple Streams of Income. There you go, multiple streams of income. But the downside, here's where I'm going with the downside of that whole situation is that she did not have a bank account. Um, in the early 1900s, um, she could not have a bank account. So uh in the local banks that were white-owned, so she would put money under her mattress, and of course her house burned down and her money burned. And she'll just start all over again once she built her house back up. And about the second or third house that burned down, um, we believe that some of it may have been KKK related, but um, just burn the house down, build it again. She'll, and then she became the bank for the community, because now people would come to her and borrow money in the African-American community. So as you see, it was sort of had that sort of um that cultural history in my family in the rural south. And um, so when my grandfather came out of the war, um, he couldn't, of course, uh move into the white side of town. Um, he had to live in the African-American side of town, couldn't access the the uh the money that the government was giving to those who came out of war. Um, so he borrowed money from my grandmother, who was my my his wife, my grandmother's mom, so my great-grandmother is who we've been talking about. And so she gave him money to to build his little house down in Warm Springs, Georgia. Now, um granddaddy was a uh was a chef for 40 years and worked for at the little White House um um as a chef for 40 years and and raised children and some of whom went to college and others didn't. In those days, in order for African Americans to become middle class, they uh started to depending heavily on um government assets. Uh one of the reasons, and I know we're not talking politics here, but one of the reasons the majority of African Americans shifted from Republicans um before uh the New Deal to become Democrats after the New Deal was because Roosevelt went to the Rural South and saw the need for running water and electricity and sort of building up the communities where a lot of African Americans lived in those days. But even more so than that, as the government started developing after the World War II and creating opportunities for African Americans, such as, of course, military was already there, but um, they built uh uh post offices. And they when the schools were integrated, it created an opportunity for African Americans to go to college and become school teachers. So there you have it. My mom became uh went to school for education, my dad went to school for education, and he became an uh English teacher right after desegregation. So um, economic structure that built the African-American community, particularly in the rural south, but across the country, um, had to do with government jobs. Um they because uh that's how African Americans, by and large, went from working poor to become middle class. And uh so many of them went to college for education and or went to the military or became post office workers. And um and so that was the economic structure. And so that experience for me, the history of my family, shapes how I relate to this discussion about inequality and and economics, uh, on the one hand. On the other hand, as I have done a lot of work in the inner cities of America, and I see the plight of the ghettos and barrios. And many of them were because people like my grandmother, and I said my grandfather was in the war, came out as a chef. My grandmother went to work for Goodies hair care product. And um so they had these production lines in the in the inner cities, and African Americans would then either go to become middle class by um teachers or, like I just said, uh post office workers, or they would go and work for manufacturers on the product lines. And my grandfather grandmother worked for Goody Hair Care Product until she was laid off. And she was laid off because jobs started to being shipped to shipped overseas, they no longer needed the production lines, and then shortly after the techno technology came in and started to replace in the need for the remaining production workers. So you have places like, say, Ferguson and uh St. Louis or Atlanta, Georgia, where you have all these African Americans moving into the inner city for the job opportunities, the skilled job opportunities. And now they're disappearing, and the moms and dads end up flipping hamburgers in New Haven, Connecticut, flipping hamburgers. And at that point, they're dependent upon uh minimum wage most of the time to make life happen. Um, so um, so those two sort of strands inform my understanding of how we are what we are now in this economic discussion.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Wow, thank you for sharing that that uh autobiographical and historical perspective. It definitely helps us to understand where you're coming from. Uh so as you're speaking to our listeners, uh primarily Christian business professionals, managers of various various types, and and and I like to emphasize the the concept of management and managers, because we all have some responsibility uh in in in business if we've got a job, we're managing that job and the resources that that come along with it. What are some of those those primary um biblical themes that need to be informing and and some of the specific issues that we need to be thinking about and what the Bible and what God's word has to say on these matters relating to income inequality in kind of the typical uh small business, and and we'll we'll focus here for the sake of this conversation here in the United States. I know we have listeners all over the world, but uh all over the world, but right here in the US for the typical small business owners, small business manager at really any any level, um what what are some of those concepts that we need to be thinking about?
SPEAKER_01You know, I think that we that the discussion about scripture need to have more to do with how do the how does Christianity, biblical Christianity, um encourage or even require us to attend to our neighbor, right? Um because before we can talk about the business, we have to talk about the social landscape, the historical social landscape that has gotten us to where we are and what is our responsibility to get people on an equal playing field, right? Um, because part of the challenge, and I tried to paint that in my sort of autobiography, my family history, is my great-grandmother was entrepreneurial, but she had all types of challenges that inhibited her ability to invest that in a way that we can benefit from it two and three generations later, right? So it wasn't a matter of did she have the skills, was she entrepreneurial, was she a hard worker? But the social landscape didn't allow for her to do what a lot of her white counterparts were doing, that three, four generations later, same work ethic, their grandchildren, great-grandchildren are benefiting. So what I would suggest is that we think about sort of how do we help people now? We can't just talk about the past, but how do we, as Booker T. Washington put it, drop the bucket where we are? How do we start here? And I think part of it is that Christian business people can think about economic empowerment, right? Because what we have now is opportunity that doesn't meet the need, right? Uh we don't have the same problems she had, but it feels like we do, because the opportunity is way over there, and the people with the needs and the skills are way over here. I can give you an example. I have a young man who has a master's degree, African-American young man. Uh, he had a past, uh, a criminal past, which drove him to become an entrepreneur. But when he became an entrepreneur, um, he had only a little bit, right? He had nothing really, but uh he looked out and saw his lawnmower and said, you know, I'll start a lawn company. And um, and then he he built the lawn company from just a lawnmower to uh power washing, just whatever he could do. And then, but he he he hit his capacity, right? Because now he's competing with large lawn companies and law, he even became a contractor, but he's competing with with these guys who have a long history and built big companies, contractors. So he can't compete for the contracts that the city offers to pull his company to the capacity where it needs to be. So he's stuck, right? He's stuck on small. Um, so I think that Christian business people, once they understand that there are people of color uh who have great work ethic, uh, who are very skilled and have the ability to run a large company, but don't have an equal playing field because now they're competing with the big guys. So, how can we care for our neighbor, see where somebody else is in need, give them a hand up, not a handout, but a hand up. Uh, maybe that's you know, create a small contract with a subcontract within their contract to help them grow their company and that sort of thing. I think that could be helpful.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. So let's say that I'm uh I'm kind of a mid-level manager in uh in a small business, and I'm listening to this on my lunch break. I'm about to head back to head back into work. What do I need to be thinking about? And then as well for the owner of that company that's probably very actively involved in the in the day-to-day operation, is and I'm talking about the typical small business, not the kind of absentee owner type of uh type of a business, but the the where the owner is really actively involved pouring out their their sweat equity into the into the company. What can they do? And I and and and I understand like voting is part of it, and kind of the the the political getting involved in the political process to affect change and things like that. But what because it seems to me that the business owners have uh a massive responsibility as it relates to addressing this issue of income inequality. Uh what what is your your what are the biblical concepts and uh what is your your guidance to to those of us who are owning companies?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think that um as pertaining to those who who who own companies, uh I think one is to there's a skill need, right? So owning companies is not humanitarian work, right? Where you're just uh offering opportunity for people because you have a good heart. But there has to be the skill piece and the work ethic. Uh, I think work ethic has to sometimes, the the person has to bring skin to the table, right? Skin to the game, um, the worker. Um but in terms of uh skill development, I think that empowering uh folks who have the right attitude and the right work ethic uh with education and creating opportunities for them to get the training that they need to move up in the company rather than to see, I mean, there's always the temptation, this is a good worker, I need them there, and I need them to stay there. They have great work ethic, they have great character, you know, and then you just sort of, in a way, use them to build a company. And I think that has been this sort of pattern for many years, the tradition for many years, especially as it pertains to really good people and um some of African-American, but not all African-Americans. So I think that one of our Christian duty is to identify talent, identify raw talent, but identify attitude and work ethic and see how we can help that person succeed in the vision or the dreams that they have. Uh, that could be really helpful.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. How about the issue of minimum wage? What is the the correct Christian response to this issue?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I think the correct Christian response, now there's always the question of resources. Do we have the resources to increase um pay? That that's always a given. You can't give people what you don't have. But in general, when we speak of the law, I really think that we should increase it. And um partly because people oftentimes who work the hardest are the people at the bottom. And, you know, we can talk about people working, but to be honest with you, you and I know people at the top in capitalism just don't work as hard as people at the bottom. That's how it works. You gotta be a worker, be at the bottom. You got to have a lot of people doing a lot of great work for people at the top to be as successful as they are. Now, I'm not saying they do nothing. That is not what I'm saying. But even in my own life, um, you know, I've done labor work and it's a lot of work. The work that I do now is a lot of work, but it's a different type of work. So sometimes we measure work based on um uh mechanisms that I think are unfair. And people that are at the bottom cannot live a decent life. I think about here in Dallas. People who work in Dallas and make Dallas functional and clean and whatever good we see in Dallas typically don't live in Dallas because they can't afford it. So they're doing all this hard work to make this environment such a great place to live in for people to come in who make more money than them to enjoy. And they have to go outside of the city to be a part of a community that is not as equal as the community that they have worked so hard to build. And that's an example of what I mean by um uh the inequity as pertains to minimum wage. People should be allowed to live in the city that they work hard to build.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and and it and it makes me think of this this, it seems like there's uh sense that uh white-collar work is more valuable than blue collar work as an example, or that quote unquote creative work is more that you know, there's this um what people have termed the creative class. You know, people that when they go to work, they don't necessarily know exactly what their work is going to be that day. They're gonna go and create something. You know, like you're gonna write code or they're gonna do something. And and so it's it it's based on the pay scales, it would seem that uh white-collar work or creative work is more valuable than other types of work. What what is your what is your take on that?
SPEAKER_01Well, I think there's an unfairness there. Uh I think the skills are different for different people. Now, I do think that visionary work helps create the world, and it's the people who have who dream of big ideas. It's you know, the Bill Gates or the Mark Zuckerberg who can imagine something that doesn't exist that create create a space that no one else could have ever imagined. And we all enjoyed as a result of what they saw in their head. Uh so there is a high value to that. Uh, but I think there's an equity in the dreaming and the vision and the people who are working to make it all happen. Um I think that there is so much money here in the United States at the very top, the one to five percent, um, that there is just a disparity as to how many poverty-stricken people who are working their fingers to the bones, and you got one or two percent that makes billions and billions of dollars. That it's just unfair. It's not saying that what they do is not valuable at the top, but it is saying there's a there's disparity there, and I think there's a violation of um the Christian principle uh of loving our neighbor and um doing unto others as we have them to do unto you, um, or the whole principle of Christ to to care and to support the others as equal human beings. Um there's just a problem there. Um and so I think now there are there are folks who are lazy, but there are also rich people who are lazy because many of them inherit money from their great-grandparents or great-great-grandparents, and they're they're just living in the dough, right? Um, but I can't do that, though my grandmother was an entrepreneur, and if she had the great opportunity that others had in the early 1900s, we may be able to do the same thing too. So sometimes we look at people in their situation and we pass judgment based on our point of reference. When I think that as Christians, we're called to listen to the voice of the others and understand where they're coming from and understand that where we are now is a byproduct of a history that has been dismal and with a lot of inequity and a lot of injustice. Um, we can talk race, we can talk gender, um, we can talk, you know, um, even within races, sometimes it's where you are, where you came from, who you know, what part of the country you you were raised in. Um, and I think Christianity requires us to take a look at all those variables and reconsider what is the Christian way of sharing love.
SPEAKER_02Yes. Yeah, and an author named uh Jeff Van Duzer came on the show uh several several episodes back. And one of the things that he said is that sometimes we mistake um the the invisible hand of market forces, to to to use Adam Smith's term, for uh the almighty hand of God. So if if the market is saying that this job is worth X, then uh and and this type of work is worth so much more that this is, you know, you're gonna make a lot more money doing this, um, that that we can make a theological case in our head that well, it's probably the same way with God too. God looks at this type of work as being worth much low, much less than this type of work. And and that's why we have to really be critical about our business theology, lest we start to always equate what's happening in the market with what God's perfect will and what God's perspective is on these issues.
SPEAKER_01I agree. Um, that's theological syncretism in its worst way, right? It's where we judge the hand of God based on the market. It's because the country was built on greed and pride. Uh the Africans that were brought here to develop their the colonies uh were working harder than anybody. They were the machine that built the new world until we didn't need them to be the machine anymore because it could be, we can get by cheaper doing it other ways. So this notion that somehow the market determines what's right, what's wrong, is theological syncretism in the worst way. And I think that's where Christianity has to rethink how we're discerning what is right and what is wrong, what is prosperity and what's not, because money cannot be a long prosperity. And we know that looking at it from different ways, but in particular, as we see so many people who have a lot of money and they're not happy, they need the gospel too. But this mechan this barometer of God, um, God's success based on money, it needs to be debunked. Um, and we need to re really rethink uh our Christian values around money.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. Um John Perkins, you know, the great civil rights activist, he he, and I'm gonna butcher the quote, but he said something along the lines of uh what every person needs is is Jesus and a good job. Um because that, and it goes back to what you were saying earlier about the opportunity for skills training for that business manager to be able to help somebody rise up in in that company. And maybe not that they're necessarily going to stay at that company for the rest of their career, but that we're fulfilling our calling to make disciples. I mean, that's what the the great commission is not to go into all the world make a profit, is to go make disciples. And so I think what you were saying about when I asked you what is the responsibility that we as Christian business managers have, and you went right to uh skills training. I think another way of saying that is make disciples. Because when you make disciples, uh people can they can provide for their families. Like they they will they will figure out a way. You'll you'll be able to guide them and to equip them uh with the uh the tools that they need to to kind of come come to the next level. Well, as we wrap it up here, uh Dr. Antiposis, what would be your your pirating advice for these Christian business managers listening?
SPEAKER_01What I would suggest is that um Christian business people really understand that uh only in America is money power. And that we have to understand that in order to help others uh with a hand up, we have to be willing to uh engage them in such a way that can empower them from an economic perspective. Because, you know, when we talk about the race discussion, for example, sometimes I think we go in circles in this country because we assume race and racism has to do with, you know, whether a white person likes a black person or whether a white person is a friend with a black person. Well, really, I try to get people to think deeper than that. Racism in this country is more ideological and social and economic, that people of goodwill can perpetuate the problem and they don't have a heart to perpetuate the problem. Um, you know, so then we spend a lot of time searching our minds and hearts. Do I love people of color? Do I love white people? That's not the issue. The issue is that in order for people to move from the social location that's down under to a social location that is of equal playing field, there has to be intentionality about the way we think and the way we uh understand the way the country has had its foot on the back of people of color. That's not whether I like you, you like me. That's not the discussion. This is a social fabric that has to be re-woven. And the only way we can do it is that we have to work together and business people, because this is such an economic problem, right? Um, we need Christian business people to really understand this issue and be a part of the solution to help overcome that sort of underbellied reality that has really sustained itself so many years. Because there are people who work hard and can't make it because they don't make the money, because they were un, they don't have the education. You know, often said in us earlier that African Americans became middle class by and large because of governmental mechanisms like teaching schools and you know, teaching school or post office workers or military. So much so that when I grew up, my parents told me, you know, you're going to school for music, you really need to take some education courses because I know you want to be a producer, but you need something to fall back on. Well, that safety neck was because the government has set it, set it up such a way that it's hard not to get a job to be a teacher when you might not be able to step into this sort of white man's world and succeed as a businessman, right? Because they were speaking from their point of reference. Um, there are mechanisms in society to keep you from succeeding as an entrepreneur. So that's that fear sets in. I need a safety net that the government provides. And that has all kinds of ramifications. They have ramifications as it pertains to health insurance, because now my health insurance has to be my mindset, is that it's dependent upon a job, uh a teaching job or something. Um, and we were not taught or exposed to opportunities outside of that job for life insurance and health insurance and investments and things like that. So we had teachers work for years and say they get fired or something, or they retire, and now they don't have health insurance because all this time they have depended on the job and have not invested in any sort of um investments outside of that job. Uh so there's a mindset. You follow what I'm saying? There's a mindset. Didn't mean that they didn't work hard. It meant that there was a knowledge gap on what they should have been doing all along, a smart and wise investment uh into the future or their children's future of 529 and other ways that they can. So these at this educational um mechanisms outside of say working hard is sometimes the the the the the problem that happens in our community. Um and I see it all the time. This is not just one or two cases, it's all the time.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And we can so dangerously use scripture to kind of reinforce some of these um these really wicked views on uh really just a very corrupt theology of business, like even the way we interpret things like the the parable of the talents, and just kind of just distilling that down to well, if you're not making a bunch of money, then you must you must be that wicked, lazy slave that buried his his uh his talent. Um, or you know, looking at scriptures like the poor will always be among you, for example, uh you know, often just grossly taken out of context. And and so, you know, you're you're always just gonna have poor people. So just um, hey, that's they make their they make their decisions, and it's probably because they're um you know the market forces are working against them because they're not doing what they're what they're supposed to be doing. And and and so it's just so so critical to look at things from from God's perspective. And uh what is what does God have to say about our neighbor and and how in a in a as it relates to income inequality, and as much as it depends on us as uh Christian business managers, and and that's uh that's pretty much all of us. I mean, that's the main character in virtually all of Jesus' parables was a business, some sort of a resource manager. Uh what is God what is God calling us to do?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, you know, I heard a preacher preach uh in that passage that you just referenced um about um you will always have the poor with you. And he was preaching that the job of Christians is not to eradicate poverty or to address the problem of um poverty, uh, or to address it, but not try to eradicate it. Because if we tried to, it would be a vision against what Jesus was talking about. And I think that I mean, a person with means, it's easy for them to say that, right? But a person in poverty don't read that passage that way. The person in poverty reads it the opposite, saying, hey, pay attention to us because we're here and there is a need among us. And while there may be always someone in need, it is the call of the church to always try to address and to deliver people from the evil of poverty, because poverty is evil. And uh one way to look at that is to say our job is never done. Not that we shouldn't um work towards uh achieving the goal of eradicating all poverty, we should work toward that goal with everything within us because poverty, a person in poverty knows how painful poverty is.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And and and for those of us listening to this podcast, I mean, the Great Commission is not going to all the world and eradicate poverty necessarily, it's to go make disciples. Because when we make disciples, we're we're fulfilling at least as much as it depends on us to help somebody else move ahead. That's what discipleship is, right? It's like Paul said, imitate me as I imitate Christ. And and just helping somebody, whatever God has given, given to me, you know, I'm gonna make that make that available to you because you're my neighbor, right? I mean, isn't isn't that the way we ought to approach it?
SPEAKER_01Amen. Uh yeah, absolutely. Uh, and but you know, I think it the it's one thing if we were living in a society where everything starts at the same place, right? Um, Sandra D. Proctor, we read his book, Certain Sound of the Trumpet, in the class that you have with me. He preached a sermon and he talked about um beneath the scratch line. That was the name of the sermon. And he says that, you know, some people are born above the scratch line, and some people are born beneath the scratch line. And depending on our families and our family history, would determine whether we're born above the scratch line or beneath the scratch line. Not everybody is born in the same place. And he said that the people that are born above the scratch line have a responsibility to the people who were born beneath the scratch line. And he used his own life as an example. He's an African-American preacher, or was um uh African-American preacher in the mid-1900s. And he says that um, you know, his mom and dad um were went to church, went to Sunday school. So he was, you know, great people in the city of Naufall, Virginia, respectable people in the community. So he was born with his grandmother, uh, taking him to church and and um, you know, make sure he went to school and make sure he even went to college. But he had some boys around the way whose dad never did go to Sunday school, was an alcoholic, um, and so he was born into a situation beneath the scratch line. So you cannot look at a person who's born beneath the scratch line and a person who's born above the scratch line and just say, you know, well, they have the same opportunity. Well, they may have the same opportunity, but they don't have the same resources to access the pop the opportunity. So part of love of the neighbor is to take the advantage that I have and try to reach out to my neighbor to help them be at a place where they can also live above the scratch line. So when they have children, their children are not born now beneath the scratch line. So that's the love of the neighbor. That's what Christianity is about. That's, you know, so I, you know, in that case, um Sammy Dr. Sammy D. Proctor was talking about two African-American people in the middle 1900s. He wouldn't even, he was even discussing, you know, I'm African-American by virtue of being African-American, I'm beneath a certain scratch line. And there's a white person. He said, let's take this out of the black and white discussion. Let's talk about it as a just a merely human discussion. We all have different advantages in life. And it's just a general Christian principle for us to attend to the need of the neighbor, not as a handout, right? Don't just give me money, but teach me how to fish so I can, you know, don't just teach, give me a fish unless I'm in a crisis and and need a relief. But teach me how to fish so that I can also um live into the fullness of my humanity and provide for my family uh for the long haul. So I think that we're not just uh I think that the old model of Christian charity has to, we have to rethink that. Because the old model of Christian charity is to take something to people and give it to them and feel good about ourselves about doing it. But that can empower poverty, right? Right. How do we not just give people a handout but give them a hand up so that they can stand on their own two feet?
SPEAKER_02And and and this is a broader issue that we talk about uh really it pretty much across all the episodes on this show. And it and it's this this discipleship is what is really the missing piece because we can we can complicate things so much when ultimately it just comes down to uh spending time with people and helping them to become more like Christ. It's imitate me as I imitate Christ. That's what Paul said. And um, and that that happens uh economically, it happens in you know what I the way I see you, uh, you know, loving your wife, loving your spouse, uh, parenting your kids, like just how you do your job, all of those, those different things are context for discipleship. Um so I I just love talking to you, brother. Um what would be what do you where do you want to direct people to learn more about you and what you're working on?
SPEAKER_01Oh, thank you. Um, my social media on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, follow me at D-R A-N-T-I-P-A-S. That's at D-R A-N-T-I-P-S, that's at Dr. Antipos. Uh, or my website, which is Antiposharis.com. Uh, and for Jake's Divinity School is at Jake's Divinity or jakesdivinity.org.
SPEAKER_02Beautiful. All right. Well, we'll have those in the in the show notes. Uh, Dr. Antipos, Dr. A. Uh sure appreciate you. May God continue to bless uh everything you're doing in the in the Jakes Divinity School, bless your family, and uh sure appreciate you sharing with us today.
SPEAKER_01Thank you so much. It's such a delight. Thanks for having me on the show.
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