Transcription
Jesus went a bit further to pray by himself. The disciples were sleeping. Here, all of a sudden, there is someone who is telling us this is what he said, but no one was there. This is the words of Jesus in red in your Bibles. But who was there to be recording this prayer? Because the Bible says he was by himself, so we must actually believe that he prayed by himself. But John was inspired to be given what Jesus was praying by himself. That's why the letters are in red. Same with Matthew, same with Luke, and same with John.
So you, you collect all these questions. And by the way, I went to a very beautiful school in Russian University. Send us professors down to Solusi campus. I think the preparation was quite fast, so we would not, we were not gagged in terms of thinking. Even some other guys the other day, they were busy laughing about this whole concept of 28 fundamental beliefs. I wasn't part of the JATA committee, the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventist Theology, which formulated the 28 fundamental beliefs. Then they were 27, but I was there. Yeah, so it's not like I'm coming around wet behind my ears trying to take chances.
But then you have all these questions that keep on piling up and in class. And for the sake of progress, we are told, "Don't worry, young man, some of these things you will find them." Because you are moving into the journey, then of course, that's a beautiful answer. It pushes your attention away from the focus area. You have all these other things to be worrying about: homiletics, hermeneutics, how to preach nicely, how to position, how to write your notes, how to do exegesis, and I, you know, all these things. And you get excited into the into the mechanics of pastoral homily.
Welcome to Wake Up Black, Educate and Enlighten. Chapter 19, chapter 18, chapter 20, 21, and 22 of the book of Isaiah talk about the slavery of the black people being shipped to land Zafar, and there are women being stripped, and men walking with bare buttocks. Is there? Then you read all of it, including that from chapter 20. By the time you're finishing chapter 20, 21 of Isaiah, then there is good news. "Fire for the redeemed of the Lord shall return. They shall come back. I'll take your way to Farland, but I'll bring you back to this land again," and etc. There's no other nation that was moved in ships and boats into the Caribbean, into Britain. And then the same Bible actually goes on to say, "But I'll bring you back to your land." Beautiful prophecies. But because of the Eurocentric Christianity that does not see a black man in the text, these prophecies are never spoken about. We are told that Jesus is coming again. How can Jesus come back again before repatriation and reparation, if these promises will not be fulfilled? Then the Bible is a lie.
So, is, is The Gospel According to Maponga touching on those issues? That actually, what I've just shared with you right now is chapter, chapter three, chapter four. Yes, who are the chosen nation? Christianity and Islam, by nature, they are bullies of African culture. It is expressed in their intolerance of other people who believe differently from who they are. So here's a simple example. If a Muslim walks into this village, the first object is to build a mosque and make everyone in that village a Muslim. It changes your timetable of waking up. You wake up at five. Changes your fashion, how you what. Changes the way you bury your loved ones. Now you must do everything according to Islamic law. The same thing is true with Christianity. Christianity walks into a space. Facing they want to do is a Zulu, is a Xhosa. You take off your shirt and put on your beautiful beads, Hebrew beads, by the way, which are Jewish. Put on your Hebrew gear, which is traditional, and you walk up to church. Christianity will look at you. Now, there's a bit of tolerance, but the first glance is unacceptable because the God that Christianity has does not have tolerance for culture. Does not, rather, I would rather take off that thing. I put only a shirt. You put a tie on. You put a jacket. Polish some sweet. Since now you look nice because apparently you must become European first before you can become Christian in order for God to accept you. You cannot accept you in your authenticity. He needs first to take you through the culture of the dominant culture, which is the colonial culture, before you can actually become an acceptable Christian.
An intelligent conversation needs to take place where we say, "Is everything that we are doing in the Christian church Christian? Or some of the things, norms, and rituals that we are performing are actually European culture? But now they've been couched and packaged as Christianity." The way we sing, for example. The way we dress, for example. The way we eat, for example. The way we celebrate our things, our holidays, our festivals, our passovers, and etc. Are these things, Easters? Are these things, Christmases? Yes, I've tried a lot of feathers. There's some changes. The issue over the Easter weekend. I mean, it's a simple question. No, I understand. How many days are between Friday and Sunday? If I can ask you, how many days? I've had that question from a person I used to stay with in Durban in 1999. I, I couldn't answer him. But what he asked, the same mathematically, "Don't be religious." I get that. I get it. But I don't understand why people like when the religion walks up to you, when the religion walks up to you, blinds you. It must not, it must numb your brain from common sense so that a simple question like, "How many days are between Friday and Sunday?" you begin to, to want to chew your, your thing. It's like almost all the knowledge you went to school for disappears through the window.
But maybe Christianity pushes Russia, I mean, sorry, faith more than reason. So if you're accepted by faith, maybe you don't have to reason. But faith is not stupid. Faith is, is, is knowledge in manifest. Faith, you need to know what you believe in. Okay? You cannot believe in nothing. No. Therefore, faith is a servant of knowledge. Okay? The world perishes not for the lack of faith. The world perishes for lack of knowledge. Therefore, knowledge is superior to faith. Though churches want to establish people who believe, but the Bible says, "Worship God with understanding. Come now, let us reason together." It doesn't say, "Come, let us have faith together." In our infancy, we accepted everything. In our old age, we question everything.
So here you are as a young man with lots of questions, theological questions, biblical questions, authority of the Bible, the writing of the Bible, the collection of the books, the difference between the Bible and scripture, and all these things. Miracles that are happening in the Bible. Jesus went a bit further to pray by himself. The disciples were sleeping. Here, all of a sudden, there is someone who is telling us this is what he said, but no one was there. He said, "This is the words of Jesus in red in your Bibles." But who was there to be recording this prayer? Because the Bible says he was by himself, so we must actually believe that he prayed by himself. But John was inspired to be given what Jesus was praying by himself. That's why the letters are in red. Same with Matthew, same with Luke, and same with John.
So you, you collect all these questions. And by the way, I went to a very beautiful school in Russian University. Send us professors down to Solusi campus who were thorough. And and I think the preparation was quite fast, so we would not, we were not gagged in terms of thinking. Even some other guys the other day, they were busy laughing about this whole concept of 28 fundamental beliefs. I was in the part of the JATA committee, the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventist Theology, which formulated the 28 fundamental beliefs. 2017, then they were 27, but I was there. Yes, so it's not like I'm coming around with wet behind my ears trying to take chances.
But then you have all these questions that keep on piling up and in class. And for the sake of progress, we are told, "Don't worry, young man, some of these things you'll find them." Because you are moving into the journey, then of course, that's a beautiful answer. Because it pushes your attention away from the focus area. You have all these other things to be worrying about: homiletics, hermeneutics, how to preach nicely, how to position, how to write your notes, how to do exegesis, and I, and all these things. And you get excited into the into the mechanics of pastoral homily. And boom, you graduate and you start working. And then the young people start walking up to you, asking some of them even asking you the very same questions that you must be, that you should be having answers to, which were not answered when you are there. And now in old age, when I begin to ask those questions, people take the same mud and throw it on my face and say, "You're going to tell us that after 33 years, you're still asking these questions? Now it's your turn to be giving us these answers." And I say to them, "It's not about finding answers. It's about us engaging meaningfully on a conversation where for the longest of time, we have not been prepared or interested in having those conversations, uncomfortable as they are."
Sola Scriptura, but you know, Sola Scriptura, you're only doing 66 books. The Ethiopian Bible is 18. And the question, which Bible here is my motivation for Africa? Africa went to the shop and bought a packet of apples. Half the first one, the Republic was rotten. Throw it away. Pick up another one again. Half second bite. Two, the worms are still there. Pull speed on the ground. The intelligent friends standing in the room then looks at this one who is thrown away two apples. It's the same food. Don't do that. Switch off the lights. Let's eat the apples. Now, that woman is intelligent because you don't, the only problem we have here is the abundance of light that what is showing us the worms. So if we can switch off the light, we can eat there the apples, and even the worms become part of the protein. Now, how do we as Africans think that by switching off the light of knowledge and information, continuing eating of this rotten eggs in my own thing, guys? We may also just switch on the light while we're eating. When we notice what is rotten, I think that's what we don't want. We don't want to switch on the lights.
But would that be your message? That's my message for Africa. Keep the lights on while you are eating. What you don't understand. And knowledge, knowledge is expensive. Yes, but if you think knowledge is expensive, try ignorance. You may find that it is equally more expensive. The African people, the duties on us in this age of information, ignorance is a choice. I thank you.
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