#85: Lo Alaman: We Sang a Dirge

Lo Alaman is a pastor, poet, father, and husband. Throughout 2020 Lo has been experiencing the feelings of a global pandemic, and the realities of being a black man in the US. As he experienced more and more he journaled his thoughts ending in a piece of literature called: We Sang A Dirge.

Full Transcript

Tony: welcome back to the reclamation podcast, where our goal is to help you reclaim good practices for faith and life. I'm Tony. And today is episode 85 of the podcast. I get to sit down with pastor poet, father, and husband, low element. Now lo has a new book out that's different than most. You're going to read this year.

His book, we sang a dirge is really about wombs and laments about the black community and the hope of the gospel. Wow. I tell you that this is one of those conversations that you just need to listen to. And process the words that he's saying, and honestly pick up a copy of his book and begin to look at the processing, the emotional processing that he does in this writing.

Now I'm going to warn you in our conversation today. We get real honest, We get, very clear about some things he shares with me, a poem that really struck a chord and it's all about the N word and what that means and what it looks like. So, you know, if you generally listen to this podcast with your kids, you might want to just be forewarned.

There is some language that you may not be ready to explain. but then again, maybe we need to. So, thank you so much for listening. If you can please leave a rating review. We're still working our way to a hundred reviews by the end of the year. we need all of your help in order to do it. I appreciate all of you so much, anytime that you, you do leave a rating or review my team reads all of them.

Without any further ado. Here's my conversation with lo everybody. Welcome back to the podcast. I'm excited today to have author poet, speaker, and discipleship, community leader, low element low. Thank you so much for being here today. 

Lo: Tony, you have set my name, my last name better than anybody else so far.

So thank you. Thank you so much. 

Tony: Well, I will be honest. I cheated and I looked at the way, you said it on YouTube as many times as possible. 

Lo: Come on. I thought we had to go. 

Tony: So speaking of YouTube, you're, you're, you're kind of viral, famous, right? You're you're YouTube video famous because. Of a wedding, your wedding.

can you tell us what happened and where everybody should go to check it out? Even though I know it's super weird, but it's such a great video. Come 

Lo: on. It's weird. It's like the weirdest thing. so I got married to this really awesome chick named Erica. She's fantastic. been my best friend for a long time.

We met in seventh grade. She's the homie and yeah, we, she told me, that she wanted one thing for the wedding. Do you want me to write a poem and say it for her as she was walking down the aisle? My initial thought was that we were going to do like poetry and like the wedding vows. Yeah. I rap battle, of stories for the wedding bells.

She didn't, she didn't like that idea as much. I probably would not have gotten the same kind of viral anyway. So she wants the poem as she walks down the aisle. I say, yeah, I write, it said a bunch of things that I feel all the good stuff. She has an aunt who says that she can't make it. And so almost was like, would you mind if I send some random person from my church to your wedding to record this for me?

And we were like, sure, we don't care. We're gonna get married. What else do you, she sends this guy. He records it. I spit bars at my wife. She walks down the aisle. We get married. We go off to our honeymoon. Things are great. We are so unconnected with anything that happened after we love it. We are on our honeymoon and my mom is blowing my phone up.

Like she's calling nonstop and I'm like, I'm kind of preoccupied. 

Tony: Where'd you? Wait, where'd you honeymoon at? 

Lo: We were in Puerto Rico. 

Tony: Oh, come on with it. 

Lo: Yeah, man. It was so cool in December. And so it was like, we got away from like the weird Mississippi Christmas. we are Mississippi winter. It's not really a thing.

but we're in Puerto Rico and it was beautiful weather. We had fun. It was a gift. So it was, it was all cool. So we're there. My mom's blowing my phone up. I answered. I'm like, what's up? Like, what do you need? And she was like, you need to get on YouTube right now. You're going viral. And I'm like, Mommy don't know what viral is.

And I hang up the phone, I get back on there. And I think at the time we first checked it, I was like 2 million views. Wow. And a couple of thousand reposts, eventually call them that and be like 17 million across platforms and different celebrities are sharing it. And people are messaging us from like the Philippines and the UK and different parts of South Africa are like, Oh my gosh, we love your weddings level of law.

And it was weird. Like the messages that we were getting by, people were telling us stuff about their. Their marriage is falling apart or stuff about, you know, one thing, finding a spouse and it created a really interesting opportunity to have dialogue with people in, in feedback. And, that was cool.

But from that point on, there was an assumption that like, Oh, you're like YouTube famous. I quickly found out YouTube famous and going viral and not the same thing. Oh, they're vastly different things. Like there are cats that have gone viral, and it does that change. they're catnip at all. So we got no change in catnip.

It was the same old stuff, but it was, that was a cool moment. 

Tony: Do you find, Do you find now that that was, does that feel like a different lifetime 

Lo: ago? I am definitely a different writer, for sure. I'm a vastly different husband. I had no idea what I was getting into. 

Tony: Hey, speaking of husband, your family is, adorable .

Lo: I have like the winningest family ever, 

Tony: dude. I always say that I out kicked my coverage. 

Lo: That's it. 

Tony: And I, I'm just going to tell you that. Wow. I mean your family and congratulations, baby. Number two. 

Lo: I'm all in man. We're cooking. We're cooking. 

Tony: I saw you guys just recently went on a baby moon as I was Instagram.

Stalking you. how, how was the baby moon? How, how are you feeling? About baby number two. You're I mean, you're still a man to man defense, so that's good. 

Lo: I mean, but we're, we're, we're losing correct now. technically we're at, we're in, we're in zone coverage, with it being two Oh one with us and man, baby girls a lot.

And she's kind of, she's really smart. Like you kind of, it's hard for me to talk about how smart my little girl is without us coming across with like prideful the smartest little human. In the history of little humans, like she is insanely smart. And so she is charming and sweet and she knows how to pray.

Now, it's, it's, she's a, she's an amazing kid. and I, I told my wife, I'm like, I don't want to mess this up by bringing another potentially better or human into this mix. Like, we're kind of killing it right now. And, we, we were not trying to advocate, but quarantines a thing. And so. yeah, when not having another kid and we are, I can't tell you how excited we are about it.

I, all the nervousness I had on the front end, it's just faded away. I'm excited to see him, hanging out with a little dude. It's it's going to be a good time. We're we're pumped about it. 

Tony: That's awesome. And it, it, I remember, so we've got three kids. My oldest is 15. My youngest is eight and I have two boys and a princess 

Lo: come on.

Tony: Yeah, yeah, no, that's real. And one of the things, things that I was always concerned about is like, man, is it possible for me to love my second child as much as I love my first. And I think, one of the things I learned about. Love and from, I think from God's eyes in this whole process is, is how much more capacity for love.

That we have in moments like these, I'm curious, what, what has, what does Emmy taught you about God as, as being kind of a younger parent 

Lo: man? So my assumption about God, I preach a lot. So I use this analogy often. the way I typically think of the gospel, when we all typically think of the gospel, I think in Western Christianity is, you know, God forgives, he loves us and he's waiting.

with open arms for us to come home to him. I never realized how much you pursue as a parent. like parenting is a lot less of just letting her come to me. but it's, it's like a picture of, you know, Luke 15, the father running to go and meet this and he's that just waiting? there's a pursuit.

And so, I love that she learns. It makes me want to teach her things. You know, I love, I love it. She's snugly. It makes me want to be all up in her business. You know what I mean? I care significantly more about, the pursuit and chasing her down and letting her know how awesome she is and, and finding new ways to be creative with her and like letting her discover things, watching her, discover something and get something is like, it's like magic for me.

And so, yeah, man, I, I didn't realize that, Oh, snap. That's what God does. Like there's not this one moment where like the cross happened and praise Jesus for the cross, but the constant day to day pursues of the Holy spirit. I think I took for granted how often, you know, the father is making opportunities and little windows into his heart and connecting with people that show his love and his image.

And yeah, I mean, he he's, he's much more in the pursuit game then I first appreciated. 

Tony: Yeah. I always get, a little weirded out when I think about like how much I love. My kids. And then the thought of sacrificing one of my kids.  it's all in the fields, man. It that's, that really gets me in. man just makes me appreciate God so much more.

Lo: Come on. 

Tony: Speaking of feelings. you've got a brand new resource out. We sang a dirge and it's, it's, it's really just an outpouring of your heart. So I think the most logical place to start with this dialogue is, if you would define dirge for us, because I don't think that that's a word that we use very often.

And if so, you know, I, what I really want to hear is. You define it from the artist's perspective. 

Lo: Yeah, for sure. so here's, here's the fun part about that is I think that Jesus is significantly more of an artist than we give him credit. For the idea of, we sang a dirt is literally a quote from him, Matthew 11, or he says, you know, the kingdom is like these children.

Who are singing a happy song, and nobody dances. and it's like these, these kids sing them the same, the same place they're singing these sad songs. And he said they sing a dirge and the dirt is just a funeral song. it's a, it's, it's a song of morning and Lamar, it's a grieving song. And the expectation is, and the picture that Christ paint with his words, right.

He's like, This master storyteller, this master, craft craft with his words, he paints this picture of kids who are expecting you to react to the joy in their heart, and that you don't eat their kids who are grieving. Like they've lost somebody dear to them. And they would expect that people would grieve with them.

And yet. There's nothing but apathy in the eyes of those who are around this children. And so that picture that he paints is of a generation of people who have been so engulfed in apathy that the cries and the joys of children go unnoticed. And so for me, that, that picture, of Jesus described my generation.

It just felt so real and applicable to our generation that we have, several communities, not just the black community, but. I'll use my own experience. The black community has been, crying out for a long time. has been lamenting for a long time. And the expectation would be that because God cares about his people, because we're all made in God's image and that we have a mandate to love him with all of our heart, mind, and strength, and to love our neighbor as ourselves, that there are not just your problems, but there are problems, right.

the expectation should be that we mourn and we grieve with those who are mourning and grieving, and yet there tends to be a lot more apathy within our generation. So, just whipping off of Jesus's analogy. I wish I could say I came up with this. but I thought that was a beautiful picture of our generation.

And then what the expectation is within Christ, the, the label or the title we saying a dirge is borrowing from Christ illustration, and just starting just how applicable it is. I think that the cries and the grief of the black community. have been with the expectation for the father to hear them.

And I think he has. but I think it's also a cry for the church to hear. the, as we respond in love and, and, and in, empathy, we respond with the hope of the gospel that says that God is near and dear to the harvest. People invites us to cast our cares and because he cares for us. and that when we respond with apathy, it looks much more like, what the world expects of us versus when we respond with, with empathy and with, compassion, it looks a lot more like Jesus, 

Tony: That's beautiful.

And, and so one of the questions I have around the Matthew 11 verses, like I've read, you know, a lot of scripture and it's never led me to writing a book of poems. Right. You know what I mean? And so I think that there are a lot of us who read scripture often, and then don't get to the next place, which is this, this outpouring of your heart.

I'm curious, what does it, what, what is it like. For you personally to hear from God. And how did you know that you needed to do 

Lo: this? Yeah, so I'll say I'll start with where I started with poetry. I, as most children who were, not behaving, I watched eight mile when it first came out. Oh, sure. 

Tony: Yeah, no. I still watch it every time it's on television.

Lo: Come on, man. I felt like, I feel like you have some be rabbit vibes about you. Oh, 

Tony: my wife would get so mad if you encourage that because I'm ridiculous. 

Lo: I can see, I can feel it. I can feel a kindred spirits. so I used to want to be a rapper way back in the day. I would go to school and I do rap battles with kids and it was so weird, but it was a thing.

and so, yeah, I, I've always like associated with hip hop and with writing and with, you know, music. And, when I started following Jesus, I felt like those things were at odds with each other because a lot of the narrative and the energy behind hip hop music just did not really fall in line with what I understood to be true about, about Christ.

And then the more I got to know him, I found out that Jesus spoke with a lot of parables. yeah. I mean, and it's what we call punchlines, in rap music, he does that, a lot of metaphor, a lot of alliteration, a lot of sonification like he, he he's he's. He's really brilliant with how he structures his stories.

beautiful storyteller. I kept learning more about the gospel is about scripture and diving headfirst into the book. And, found out that over a third of the Bible is made up of poetry. and not just like the song, but the whole book of limitations. And, the, there, there are whole moments in my job where Joe was like lashing out to his friends and they essentially have a rap battle with poetry, but they're going back and forth with each other.

Right. So it's all in the book that. Whereas I thought scripture was this rule book. Scripture is actually a bunch of story. Meaning God wants to take me somewhere. It's a bunch of poetry and art, which means he's not trying to engage my, my ration now, but engage my imagination in my emotions. and then the epistles and the letters that he gives, it's all coming in the context of relationship.

People actually knowing each other it's instruction, but it's instruction that's relation those kids covenantal. And so my whole understanding about. the gospel has been changed as I've experienced Jesus and experience God's heart. I don't think it's just me. I think it's just how he, how he works and how he's wired.

His word, is there's much more humanity to be found in the text. and there's much more of an invitation to, to be creative and to be artistic in that. And so, as I've matured in my faith has been following Jesus. riding has just been kind of a thing that's been helpful for me. I write, I try to write a poem every day, as a journal.

It's just a good practice that I kind of, I do a decent enough job of, 

Tony: question on that. Cause I love to dive into daily disciplines. Take me, take me. I'm going to pin that. I want to come back to the rest of it. But when you, when you open up scripture in the morning, is it like. I read a bunch of scripture and write up a poem.

Is that, I mean, walk me through the process. 

Lo: I can get it for you. I have a journal around here and what I do is I have a note in each like day, and it asks four questions. It says, what's your fruit, what's your thorn. What's your fine. What's your bud. and this is extended agrarian metaphor for.

What's your Vaughn, how are you connected to Jesus? what's your blood? What happened in this week? I got to be excited that you're looking forward to, what's your thorn. What hurts you? and what's your fruit? What what's, what's been blessing you? what's God been doing and every single day, I try to take note of how my soul is actually doing the whole Westland question.

Like, how is it with your soul? and just take note of that. And so, as I practiced my journaling, it's just writing out. What's really in my heart. And then from there, I'll open the word and just read. And if I wouldn't go as far as the it's like Lectio Divina, but it's just sitting in the scripture, and having my heart being exposed and invitation for God to expose his heart.

And then typically, I'll write a poem. That poem doesn't always, I wish I could say it always connects with either of the two first experiences. sometimes it's just random stuff. sometime it's actually taken what I've been feeling throughout the day and make it that a poetic thing other times, continuations of a poem.

So if I'm writing a poem, that's extended over like a week and a half or some have gone over a month. Then not a full month, but if I'm writing a whole poem, I'll work on a poem that day, just to keep sharp with that practice and being intentional about doing my life, and my story and the narrative of Christ.

so yeah, I mean, I wish I could say it's much more like a consistent, but it's simple.  journaling my day, read scripture, write a poem. 

Tony: That feels pretty consistent. That's that's beautiful. That's beautiful. Thank you for sharing that. 

Lo: Yeah. Oh man. So with that, like about the whole book thing, I was, I was, as everybody, I was in front of my phone for a lot of the quarantine and I couldn't get away from a lot of the videos and a lot of the conversations that were surfacing.

just with the, like the racial tension and the unrest within our culture. and having a lot of thoughts that I have a lot of feelings that weren't quite manifested and thoughts just yet. So I actually, I wasn't journaling at first. I, I put my general down during the move things got busy and I picked my journal back up and I knew I felt more of an, I could actually express what I was, I just know.

So it took a while to even like, be able to name it. But I started writing down what it is I'm carrying. What is this storm that I'm feeling? What is this anxiousness I'm feeling? why, why, why am I celebrating what I'm celebrating? And it, it, the, the passage of scripts that I had read was Matthew 11.

and Christ says like, you know, we, we sang this desert, almost read past it. but I, I felt like, man, this is not just the generation of his day. This feels like our generation. And at the time I was getting a lot of phone calls from a lot of white folks. Who were asking me about this particular issue, and were apologizing to me as if it were just my problem.

You know what I mean? Like, it wasn't that they were grieving too. It was like, you're a black person. So obviously you are grieving this thing. Which I felt really weird about, as if like this wasn't all of our issue. so yeah, I feel like that, that, that passage jumped out, but also felt like, because I was already in the practice of journaling, PR around that I just spent the next month and a half writing a whole bunch of poems that were really cathartic for me and just helpful to just get on paper.

And then I share one of those poems and a friend reached out and was like, Hey. You wouldn't happen to have any more of those. And I was like, I've been writing for two months about this. I could actually do. and it became a whole thing, like a project that we worked on and now it's about to be a book, which 

Tony: is incredible.

And, and you kind of have four different sections of the book, right? You've got leaning in lamenting with listening to longing for, and I'm curious, I'm curious when you were putting those poems together, is that naturally how it came out or was it more like a, I'm just going to vomit everything that I'm feeling out and then I'm going to rearrange them in kind of a, I mean, how, how did you come to these four spaces?

Lo: So I think so, because the book wasn't in mind at first, some of it was just vomit out, you know, I was, I was literally just, like some of, some of the things you'll read in the book are. just raw my expression in my feelings about it on a specific day. now obviously, because I kind to be a better technical writer in that it goes through a process of like making an actual 

Tony: extra course.

Right. Yeah, it's a, it's a process. 

Lo: So, but like, but the, the, the whole idea of the four movements didn't come until later after I had the vomit of words and emotion and feeling and yuck, there, I noticed that there was a lot more hope in it than I expected there to be. you know, I think that's a biblical image kind of invites us to is not just like lament is not whining.

lament is I have a hope and an expectation for God's promise to be true. And when I look around, I don't see that being the case. And I assume, that guy hasn't gone anywhere. So somewhere me or our culture has gone astray. And so the mint is grieving the fact that we are distant, grieving the fact that our world does not look like what God wants it to look like and have an expectation that he's the person I should give that to.

And so that, wasn't just a thing that I read and I look at limitation, which limitation is actually like. It's beautiful. Four-part moving of, of, of, of poetry and the ends of a, a lasting poem. That's like, it's a little different than the first four, but it's. It's it cross the poem. That's like going through like the Hebrew alphabet, explaining their grief, explaining their limit in a powerful way.

And so, but, but it's also in the midst of its anguish. It also linked into that hope and that expectation and that line, how long Lord that's repeated all throughout the old Testament, you see it as not just a, a whining frustrated thing, but it's an expectation. Like God, you're gonna do something. So how long, like we believe in you for this.

And so I'm vomiting, all this stuff out. I have a lot more hope in it than I expected and hope for like longing for it. This was the natural first thing, like in this, in this anguish, I don't just want to frustrate it. I want to clearly point people to say our goal and what we're longing for is for Christ to be head, and for his kingdom to come.

from there that anger, I felt within myself with people not willing to admit with acting as if it was our problem, as opposed to all of our problem, limiting, which just seemed to be the natural next step. and then listening to like having a conversation with each other was like another thing I felt like I wanted to tell my story and not let pain be the one that narrated it.

and so encouraging folks to listen to the fullness of like a black spectrum, There's some poems in there that are just worshiped poems and snippets of what I think black worship looks like. 

Tony: I like, I like the praise break. 

Lo: Yeah. and other poems are like, they're just more silly. and th they're, they're, they're a lot more lighthearted, but it's, it's all a part of the story.

So I think the assumption that the black experience has nothing, but grief is much more the narrative of the enemy than it is the narrative of Christ. My story is more than just grief. I'm real. And so that's not a natural next step. And so, and then to kick it all off, because I like alliteration, I wanted to start it off with like leaning in.

So the, the, the sections came later, and I think they were naturally kind of already there, some of them. but it, it took some just intentionality to kind of like, 

Tony: I look at it as liturgy. 

Lo: Hmm, 

Tony: you know, like there's an intentional liturgy to it. And I, and maybe that was, you know, and, and oftentimes, like we don't always start with, you know, the sermon or the, the word, or, you know, the, you know, but we put it all together in a liturgy that makes, that takes us on an emotional journey.

And I feel like you did a great job with that. One of the, one of the questions that I have is, is that all of this feels like one giant act of worship. I mean, so I, I'm curious, I've always believed that grieving is an act of worship and lamenting is an act of worship. I'm kind of curious to see how, how that's developed in you and was that always there in your Christian walk?

Or was there somebody who, like, who said, hello, I'm going to pull you aside and I'm going to teach you what it means to grieve with God, or how does that work in your life? 

Lo: Nah, I can't say any one person pulled me aside, and hammered that home, I will say. So this is a long story you probably do not care about.

but in college I majored in mortuary science and embalming. I was going to be a funeral serious. Awesome. 

Tony: You would knock them dead. 

Lo: Yeah, I'll stop 

Tony: dad jokes, but 

Lo: you got three of them. You're entitled to a dad joke. 

Tony: Well, I'll slide them in there. 

Lo: And so for me, like, Grief was a natural thing. my mom in a funeral home, growing up, I was raised by just my mom.

And so, she worked several jobs, growing up and she worked in a funeral home. I wasn't weirded out by dead bodies and really kind of crass, I guess, but they didn't make a bad living. And so I was like, all right, I can do that. and while I was in school, you learned about, you know, the five stages of grief and how people process things.

And I couldn't, I thought I was following Jesus. I started following Jesus on my team. And I couldn't disassociate with all this language around grief and Matthew chapter five, verse four, where he's like, you know, come to me with all your morning. Like blessed are those who mourn, right? Not just, it's a, it's a, a good practice.

It's a blessing to mourn because the result of mourning for him as the comfort. And so the idea of grief being a process. I don't think the church reads that like Matthew five, four as if this is a journey to come and bring your morning to bring your grief and your pain. But I think it is. And I think the idea that that journey ends with comfort is it is observable.

At least when people are, have, have lost life, and lost loved ones. And so, yeah, I'm, I'm following Jesus and I am learning a bunch about death and grieving and processing that. And there began to be this, this realization within my own heart, that man, the places I felt like I've grown the most have been placed where I've been honest.

In real, not that blaze Robin good or have it all figured out, you know what I mean? I think I'm more impressive when I have it figured out, to other people, but even that may be a false narrative. I think what, what God is much more of an invitation to be fully who I am, that fully known and fully loved concept.

And so, yeah, man, I think it's, it's, it's been a journey to kind of wrestle with my own grief, her own trauma. but I think in those places, that places I've, I've learned to trust God the most. 

Tony: So one of the things that I have, really learned in this season of COVID and it, I was in the army for a number of years reserves and, I was deployed.

And, one of the things that has felt very familiar to me in the season of COVID is that prolonged stress turns the cracks in our lives into canyons. Right. It really just blows it, it blows it up and, yeah. And you can step over a crack for a really long time, but you could die in a Canyon. You can lose hope in a Canyon, but God's redemptive.

Grace is that you can explore canes in ways that you can never explore cracks 

Lo: for more. Now, come on. 

it sounds you have a poem coming somewhere in there. 

Tony: maybe, I would settle for a book, but you know, we'll see what God's going to do with it. And so he hears, I bring all that to kind of, it feels to me like, This racial tension in America is a crack that has now blown up into a Canyon.

And I pray, I pray that the Canyon never goes back to being a crack cause I don't want to ever step over it again. And it felt like during the midst of COVID, as, as a, as a culture, we were doing a really great job of exploring the Canyon. 

Lo: Mm, 

Tony: right. Like we were, we were all exploring it together. Right. And, and that was really good.

And then all of a sudden, an election cycle comes and now it's like, we've just, we went to another Canyon. And so I guess one of the questions I have for us and not just you, but for us, how do we keep this Canyon in a place where we're not willing to get out of it yet? And we can continue to explore all the.

The different caves in this Canyon? 

Lo: Yeah. Well, I would say shameless plug by a book. aside from that, I think that there is, I think there has to be a place where we don't separate, Answers for grief assumption that we're wrestling with a thing you can agree with thing even. Yeah. If you have the right answer, you know, like in the process of getting help.

So my wife has had cancer, ovarian cancer and praise God, you know, healing is coming that and we're, we're ready to have a kid we're super excited about it. but that was a thing, right. And while doing chemo or while getting treatment while getting better, while we're moving towards health. There was still a grief in the middle of that process.

You know, the hard I think we assumed is, you know, as long as we're taking steps forward, there's no reason to grieve anymore. I think the moment we started to think the answers are going to eradicate grief. We expect answers and solutions and progress to do a thing that progress can't do. I think that having a gala where we are on the first place, a lot of my white brothers and sisters were saying, well, have we not made progress?

Why are we still grieving some of these things as if progress is going to get to take away the need for grief? I think it's through grieving and through lamenting that we keep progress going, that we keep moving forward, progress in and of itself. Isn't the solution. And even within these conversations, the end goal is not.

You know, some racial utopia, the end goal is that we follow Jesus and that there's a new, there's a new heaven, new earth. 

Tony: Amen. 

Lo: That's the end goal. As long as we're having discipling conversations, I can always love my neighbor better. I can always appreciate the image of God more in a person's life. That never stopped.

I don't think you graduate from loving your neighbor. That's something that we continually have to be sanctified towards. so yeah, I think you're right. I think, but it can't be that we jump into a new cane discovering those things as if the old King it is still worth exploring because we have a lot more work to do.

Tony: So you're getting ready to have baby number two. 

Lo: Yeah, man, 

Tony: it sounds like, you know, it's going to be young man. Well, dude, w what are your thoughts for both of your kids? but specifically for your son, as it pertains to this topic? H how, how do, how do we teach the next generation about what we're going through right now?

Lo: And so that's what we are as a family, just kind of wrestling and praying about. and I wish I could say we had it all mapped out. I think we're still in the process of discovering even within our own selves. what trauma has looked like had an old preacher friend who had it kind of really, really, really powerful way of explaining how he thinks about ministry.

And he was like, you know, he likes to administer through his scars. ours are stories of healing there, evidence that you've kind of come through something. And he was like, you know, scar can tell a really good story ministering through your wounds, a different things. Cause if it's still a wound that hasn't had any healing yet, you're probably going to do more harm to yourself than good.

And your perspective is probably still going to be a little damage to other people. And so I think myself, there are some scars along racial tension that I am so excited about leading my family through. I personally am recognized, but I still have some wounds. and I don't want to minister through those.

And so, when I was gosh, 14, First, the only time I've ever been handcuffed before, it was in the cafeteria, the ninth grade, this guy named officer Brent, puts me in handcuffs because I don't tell, take, a pizza. we'll play with Pete half-eaten pizza. two arbitrators is supposed to go what mine.

I don't see why I should take it. I said no. and there's a weird interaction between like police and black people. That I think exists in a lot of places in Mississippi, in particular, it was a was interesting, interesting, interesting experience. And, I remember within myself like this, this anger misses, this is before following Jesus.

I don't have any kind of, for what the flesh is or a carnal nature. I just know I'm angry. and he like puts up a can of mace in my face and he's like, I'm gonna like spray you don't sit down. And this indignation is anger rises up in me and I'm raising a conduct without a dad. I'm raised in a context where it's like, authority is already kind of a rub for me.

and so that, that's a place where I can, I can recognize that, say all things STEM from this, but had I had a father in my life, I think there would have been a way in which I can hear authority from a, a loving tone, as opposed to authority being this absent, power that's being used over me. What I want to do for my kids is that's a scar.

I have so much healing from that. Want to be a present voice for my kids to say, Hey, authority is a thing that God gives, to be respected. it can be abused. but, but there are ways in which you can control yourself as a black boy in America. I don't think you have the Liberty to always lash out the way that you want to.

but that experience would have been very different for me. Praise God. It wasn't. but I, I want to be able to teach my kids how to respond in a healthy, not fear-based, but respect based way. so I feel that, I'm still for those conversations. I'm I don't know about the place where I'm currently still fighting some wounds.

I do life in a, in an all white context, as far as my church goes. and I love our church is awesome. yeah, we're cool. But I am still wildly frustrated with the segregation within the house of God. and that's a place that I don't, I'm not always nice about, the idea that we have white churches and black churches, and we intentionally want them to be that way.

That's that, that, that rubs me the wrong way. So, yeah, man, that's what I gonna pray about and to figure out, to wrestle with, I, I think it does start with, with those conversations within family, before it becomes a politicized thing, it has to be, how are we encouraging families to do life together?

Like Paul's language in first Corinthians four 15. He was like, I don't, I don't want a thousand teachers. I want fathers fathers more. We need a bunch of teachers. And so I just want to be a teacher. I want to be a present voice, that is hopefully reflecting God's heart. 

Tony: A great resource. If you haven't checked it out yet, a guy by the name of David Swanson wrote a book called recycling, the white church.

I had him on the podcast because our church is predominantly white and we really struggle with, W with just representing the full fullness of the kingdom of God, especially in our, in our congregation, because it's just, the community itself is 98% white. And we were having this conversation and he said, something that has stuck with me forever.

And maybe it's useful for you in this context, as, just as, at least as you're thinking and praying, he said, segregation was intentional. And, desegregation will have to be, more aggressively, intentional than segregation was. And so I I'm, I'm praying with you cause it that the. The distinction in the local church on Sunday morning, just leaves the local church as the bride of Christ.

So incomplete that it just, it really, it weighs heavy. It weighs heavy, I think, on any, any pastors put any thought into it? It should weigh heavy, I think. 

Lo: Yeah, absolutely. Do you, 

Tony: you know, one of the things that. In, in this resource that you're, or this piece of art that really you're putting out into the world is that there are no real, there's no answers in it, right?

There's no, like there's not, there's no five steps, you know, to creating, racial reconciliation. There's nothing like that. so, so a year from now, What are we celebrating about this piece of art 

Lo: man? And so I, I was, I used to do student ministry, and I had, I would do this exercise where I had my kids kind of rewrite a Psalm Psalm 23.

And I was like, all right, none of you guys are shepherds. None of y'all have sheep. I want you guys to rewrite this, this poem. in a way that makes sense for your own context. And so if it did that, it was a fun practice. Some kids, the, the Lord is my construction worker and below is my dentist. You know, it was, it was fun.

It was fun. But as they, as they do this practice, they're like, okay, where, where is, you know, the, the message, like where is the practical, this is what I do now. If that's how you read the Psalms, you're kind of missing the point. 

Tony: the, the 

Lo: Psalms aren't necessarily giving you this five step plan for how you worship God, in fact, much more.

What it is is either a snapshot into somebody worshiping God or a snapshot into somebody lamenting, But it's them expressing their hearts toward the father, and even a call for all of Israel to do that, or for God to heal Israel, whatever. And so for me, I think, I don't know if I have an expectation that.

this will work his way into like a book of Psalm or anything like that. my expectation, my hope would be that we have it's very worship, fully written. and so my hope is that it would at least mess with your assumptions about worship and where you worship. there's a line in one of the songs and one of the poems that says, no one grieves.

the, the, the loss of my songs and no, Ingres the loss of my people, except me and heaven and ideas, like in our spaces of worship. If I find myself in just all black spaces, if it feels right, you know, I don't think all white folks think that way. I think they kind of just think it is how it is. or, and, and, and so my hope is that there becomes this kind of grief of.

Those lost in worship. I think that the hope I have is that if you read this book, my hope is that if you read this book, you will wrestle with the poem. I think we were in the information age where we read things really fast, try to memorize it, underlined things, and try to regurgitate that information later on.

my hope is that you wrestle and that you sit with it for a while, and then it forces you to do that same restaurant with somebody else. I think that it's really easy to kind of lean into the echo chamber and just agree with your own opinions and have your own assumptions. the beauty about poetry is that it can be interpreted a million different ways.

And so my hope is that it will force you across the table from somebody else that may interprets the book totally different than you. but leans towards, this hope. This lament is grief and Ms. Longing, that thing is what community should look like that worship for what what's coming and that frustration with what is like the, the now I'm in not yet of the kingdom.

Right. so I think, yeah, if that happens, if people are reading this thing and it's great and dialogue, and it's keeping the conversation going, it's keeping us discovering what's in the cavern. I think it's a win. I 

Tony: love that. I'm going to put you on the spot if that's okay. Would you mind reciting one of your favorite poems or laments from the book?

Lo: Ooh, I'm totally down with that. So it'll be a good one when we probably wouldn't be too, too long, but I got it.

So typically I have these folders memorized. Yeah. but life is crazy right now. And so I don't 

Tony: it's nobody knows the difference. Anyway, we're not using the video. 

Lo: That's so good. I feel like I should do this all the time. Just like just cheat with it. Let's see. Let's see. Is there a particular one you think would be more helpful to read for your, 

Tony: I just whatever, whatever comes to your heart.

Lo: I'm always, like I wrote the book, I was talking to a friend and I was like, I was like, letting him hear some of the poems and everything. And he was like, where do you see yourself actually doing that poem with the N word in it? And I was like, I don't know. I really hope I'm in a white church, read a poem that says the anywhere.

I'm not gonna read that one, but 

Tony: I listen, if you want to go for it, go for it. 

Lo: I kind of do, but I kind of know, 

Tony: well, Hey, listen, it's the nudge of the Holy spirit. Cause I want you to do it too. Done 

Lo: Daphne. Ah, where are you at? All right, so his poem, should I go into the title and everything? 

Tony: Yeah, please.

Lo: All right. So this poem is called inwards. We weren't allowed to say. for context, if you're wondering in the book, the actual inward is like semi blanked out, so you don't have to like read it. I feel like that's like the most sensitive way to put it in to put in a book. 

Tony: Sure. 

Lo: all right. So N words weren't allowed to say also note that the, the context for this home, this is just an actual story, like as an actual person.

and I'll talk more about it later, but visible. One, my boy Javan says lo that nigga Jesus is turning my life around and I am an undone laughter. A gutter joy unhindered by diaphragm or decorum. My heart can't help, but to call beautiful what my Western eyes, religion only knows how to perceive as blasphemy of which is closer to the nature of Christ.

I am not sure if it's just what happens. When the spirit touches a center's tongue confession falls from the lips quicker than political correctness can catch prey. We hear it more often pray that nigga Jesus save all my niggas, both the ones that can, and absolutely cannot say, nigga, the latter will tell the former that words like that don't belong in the father's house.

Call their vernacular contraband and miss the miracle at caries. Expect the tongue to be baptized before the body. Condemn the language of square pegs to fit their round hole. Comfort too. I mean, I get it. I guess white folks got to take extra precaution when saying Nicker and snigger boy, I using them words for anyway, I get the unfairness of it.

How come we get to regurgitate our favorite rap lyrics with impunity while white fans have to echo the genre with more skips than the scratched up CD. I understand the sensitivity history hit a pretty hard fork in the road. Words like that. Remind us of an ugly past fill with wrong turns and burn bridges, but still perhaps the labeled ain't been as liberated as the laborers would like us to believe among the murderers and deserves.

Perhaps Christ has room with a table for potty mouths as well, and is even worthy of whatever broken praise they might bring to him on their tainted tongues, three inwards. We weren't allowed to say no, never not again. Nice day officer, our native tongue, not forgotten, but stripped from our mouth is like a move mouth screw and words we're made to feel numb, nervous, nasty, negative about ourselves.

Nooses around necks, hung on trees. Watch loved ones. Go up then down then back up again, like they were capitalizing with letter as if the black body was a proper now, but in words that we could not own. Our names, our needs, the narrative of what this country has done to us. Neighborhoods of violence. Here I speak of both Tulsa in 1921 and fuller park tonight, in words that we lost our nerves, our newborns, our nieces, our nephews are niggas.

Our niggas are Nicholas is four. I make a poor handyman. My wife fills my toolbox with a list of numbers to contact professionals. Plumbers, electricians and other people who actually know what they're doing. I think she's a hater, but I know she's not wrong. Still. Even I've stripped enough screws to recognize where the church is heading vacant pews and hollowed seats.

Repentance is a turning motion. But we demand it in advance with grinding force. Christ has a grace from our friends that my church doesn't always know how to give and this commitment to only presenting and accepting what is neat in Polish is face value ugly, but the underlining issue of calling black speech sinful was a hidden hideous.

See all busted face. Like you got hit in the face with a sack of nickels looking boy five. I imagine Christ is the Brown boy. He was slander by names and accusations only. He could repurpose. Hail the King of the Jews. They taught isn't this the carpenter's son. They mock he eats with sinners and tax collectors.

They scoff and he claps back by preparing us a seat at the table. He built in his kingdom. So seed in loose and rigid soil tells the harvest. He has a home for it, regardless of the type of dirt, it was buried in that nigga. Jesus has cold Javan says. His statement, rich and eschatological theology, a toddler, faith taking its first steps towards walking in God's call for his life.

He is learning to believe the promise of God is for him. And I dare not call back anything but beautiful. We don't call this grace. My nigga. Now there's a word we can all use white, black, or any shaded Saint in between when love meets us. Right where we are call it grace, as it is, it's always been. 

Tony: Lord hear our 

Lo: prayer.

Amen. 

Tony: Oh, it's so good. there's a temptation for me to want to explain that, but I'm not, I'm not going to ask you to talk about it at all and I'm just going to let it sit 

Lo: well. So I think we looked, we let it sit, but I also would love, I would love to hear your thoughts on it. I can put you back on this spot.

Tony: I mean, what, what I heard were, what I heard were voices of, of men figuring out what to do with the culture. That's not accepted by mainline Christianity, and yet they want nothing more than to be accepted by Christ. And what's the connection between the two. Okay. And how does it fit together? Cleanly.

And it doesn't fit together cleanly and like so many things in life. There's a natural tension in all of it. And yet at the end, what we see is a grace. That's kind of surrounds both the young toddler and the faith and the, the man who is looking to for wisdom and that grace surrounds them. And just saying, there is no clean answers.

There's no clean path. There's lots of pain. There's lots of anguish. And yet Christ still shows up. It shows up for me, he shows up for you and he shows up for everything in between. And even when the church doesn't show up, Christ shows up, 

Lo: come on, man. You shall be like, write the foreword to my book or something.

Tony: I mean, I mean, honestly, that's, that's what I was. I mean, that's what I, I felt like I could see, I could see the conversation develop in. In the poem, as, as one person is asking another person who's developed wrestling with his own theology, that's supposed to be further along than the person he's mentoring.

And yet there aren't clear answers because people keep dying. Right. And like, there's just a lot of that pain and anguish. And yet you're trying to feed hope to someone who may never have had hope before. I, I, I love that line that. That the toddler first step in eschatology and like, it was just like, ah, like it's good.

It's so good, 

Lo: man. Come on, dude. I think that, I think that the, so I was playing basketball a couple of days ago. last week my cousin came down and we went to go play. Mommy's courts and COVID so weird, right? Like you have to like distance yourself and you see people playing on the other side of the court and you're finding your side of the court and walk up and they went to hoop and I'm like, I don't know if we're supposed to like, touch the same ball or whatever, but.

But I also haven't seen people in a long time, so we played basketball. 

Tony: Right? Of course she did 

Lo: Lysol down later. so we're playing basketball with these guys and, they're both Hispanic from Miami. one had lived here a little longer than the other one, and this is like fresh off the election. And you could tell they wanted to, they wanted to bring it up.

but they didn't know how, And so we're just, we're just playing ball. And somehow it comes up that they're from Miami. And, one of the guys that was there, was, you know, talking to his grandparents about, you know, the election and everything like that. And we started this conversation and I, I bring up, I almost intentionally try to bring up the fact that I work at a church.

after I start hanging out with people. And so, because their assumption is like, Oh, I can bring all of these conversations to you and we have all this stuff. And then the moment I say, I worked for a church. They're like, wait, am I allowed to still talk about this stuff with you? Cause I I'm, I'm, I'm much more candid until I know you work for a church.

and, and that feeling of the church, not being a safe place for folks to be who they fully are, it says a lot more about the church than it is the culture. You know what I mean? Like if we've gotten to a place where we expect folks, one of my favorite lines in that poem is we expect the tongue to be baptized before the body.

Like we expect the language to be already perfect and already manicured and already fit within our rationale before we even explained to them. Jesus, you know what I mean? I think we have some things backwards that I'm, I'm hoping, I'm hoping if nothing else, W w we began, we began to long for the last more than we long for correctness.

You know what I mean? 

Tony: Yeah, yeah. no, that's, I agree. A hundred percent. And I think that one of the things that we forget about all the time is that the church exists for those that aren't here. Right. And so like, w when we think about, when we think about, I, and I, and I'm not saying that we have to give into culture, right?

Like I'm not saying that, that in any circumstance that we have to give into culture, but, but honestly the best ministry that we should do should be in culture. Right. And it should be there. Right. That's where we're loving and accepting. And that's where we're all the things. And, and, you know, we.

Talked about it before recording disciple-making as my like passion. Right. And we would say that you have to walk alongside some one where they're at in their journey of faith and be rooted in scripture and it must be multiplied. And so then that means that you don't get to choose where you want them to be when you pick them up along the side of the 

Lo: Hmm.

Someone, no, 

Tony: sorry. I know. Well, I mean, I, you could get me going on this topic forever, but I love, I love your heart for that, man. And I love this piece of writing and, you, you've got an incredible spirit. That's a gift to the kingdom. So, so thank you for that too. 

Lo: Thank you. I was telling somebody the other day, like, I was on another podcast because that's what you do when you read a book, this, this white lady named Heidi, and she was like, thank you so much for this.

And thank you for writing this book and everything. I was like, you don't know how good it is to have. This conversation with a white person

I've been carrying it for awhile. One of the lines in the poem is, I was talking about how, the rally was seasoned with as much pepper as it was salt this time. Like there's a lot, there's a lot more folks part of the conversation that's going around and I'm so happy to see it. Like, and as, as long as these conversations are rooted in discipleship, I am so for them.

Like, if we're talking about how, you know, we love our neighbors and how we, respect and appreciate the image of God. Like that's a discipleship conversation. so about it, just conversations about like race and ethnicity, I think they're worth having, they don't get me out of the bed in the morning though, you know, like.

Ultimately, this has to be at least for us as we follow Jesus, this has to be, how am I following Jesus? As it pertains to this new invention of rates, like racism thing in scripture, ethnicity is not a thing in scripture. And it's this new concept that we have to figure out, okay, this thing doesn't take away from the witness of Christ.

How do I witness bear the witness of Christ in the midst of this new thing? And so, yeah, man, I'm, I'm, I'm thankful that it's not just a couple of conversations about, you know, How would these white folk, the electric slide and, any weird ethnic conversations like that, like, I'm, I'm much more focused on and more excited about having these conversations within folks who follow Jesus.

Like yeah. Thank you. 

Tony: so I know my, my listeners are gonna want to get more of you. Where's the best place on the interwebs to, to connect with you and work. And they pick up a copy of the book and, what's all that look like 

Lo: pretty simple, dude. my name is Lois L O it's kind of easy. you can find me on anything at low the poet, on Instagram, Facebook, I, I'm going to get cool enough for a Twitter one day.

And so. Maybe 

Tony: it's not worth it. 

Lo: I hear that's what we have to go and bring home because that's not where it's at. It's a, 

Tony: I always say that Twitter is like a giant cocktail party. 

and yeah, and, and, and most of the people there feel drunk to me.

Lo: Don't find, I mean, I'm on it. 

Tony: I'd be full disclosure. Right. I'm on it. But like, sometimes it's just like, why am I on it? So I don't know. But anyway, so, okay. Last question. Oh, we're going to pick up a copy of the book. 

Lo: Yeah. So, all those waves up on my stuff. There's a link to it. It's like the first thing you'll see.

But also if you just Google, we sang a dirge book. You'll find it on the Amazons. You'll find it on the Google. it's all over the place. As far as like we sing a dirge. A book, Google that, and you should see my face. Probably not my face. You probably see the 

Tony: book cover. 

Lo: Yeah. 

Tony: Yeah. last question. I always love to ask people.

It's an advice question, right? And I want you to give yourself a piece of advice, but I like to take you back to a very specific. Moment. Okay. Okay. So, you're getting ready to walk down the aisle before your viral wedding, right? and there's this young man who's getting ready to start this new life with his best friend in the world.

The woman of his dreams, who's about to embark on a journey that's full of poems and songs where, oftentimes you're going to be asked to speak, to, to things that may feel way bigger than you are. If you're going to go back and, and talk to that young, younger version of lo what's the one piece of advice you would give them.

Lo: See, I, that always trips me up. The one piece of advice. That's that's that's not fair. Can I give him three? 

Tony: Sure. 

Lo: All right. first thing I would tell him is that this is about to be a final moment. So ditch the yellow microphone, get a regular looking microphone. 

Tony: that's just a good practical advice.

Lo: Second thing I'd tell them is this is about to go viral. So maybe capitalize on this, start a YouTube page. get people like maybe monetize the video. I don't know. I don't know. 

Tony: I don't know. Maybe it would have been, that would have been nice 

Lo: though. It would have been 

Tony: 20 million views ago. 

Lo: Could've been really helpful on some Jesus stuff.

The, I would say, really appreciate this community. That you're a part of. So at the time that we got married, we were a part of a church and, Oxford, Mississippi. And it was the only place I've ever been. That was like this, our, our definition of discipleship was not the typical church model. It wasn't all the young folks go here, singles go here, old folks here.

they heavily believed in intergenerational ministry. And we've benefited so much from our first two years of marriage, just being around folks who had been married before, who already had kids, some folks were, we were, we were 23 and four, and there were college kids in our group. There were teenagers in our group.

There was a year old couple in our group, a 55 year old widow in our group. Like, like the makeup was just so. Blended. And I have, I think I took that for granted. I assume this is what it was like and every church, and wanting to create that within our community. Now, most of the folks in my church, like the idea of.

You know, we're empty nesters. We only want to be Indianapolis and esters or, you know, we're in college. We only want to be with folks who were in college or like we like homogeny a lot. and I, I long for a season of life that looked like that one. And so I would just tell my younger self. enjoy this, learn this, multiply this, as fast as you can.

Cause that's, I think that's where life happens. when, when, when in the middle of, you know, different walks of life, not even just racially, like generationally, like different walks of life. it looks more like the kingdom and so, yeah. 

Tony: Hello. I really do appreciate all your generosity today. You were awesome.

Lo: Reverend Bishop, pastor Tony. I appreciate you as, 

Tony: Oh, they'll go through an awards like round like that, and nobody wants any part of that. 

Lo: Don't 

you just love Lowe's spirit and the way that he connects, I just, I deeply appreciate processing feelings. In poetry. And I think that he is one of those guys that, we're going to want to watch for a really long time, because he has a voice that I need to hear.

And you probably need to hear too. So, thank you so much for being on the podcast. Thank you all for listening. Do me a favor, go and follow on the socials, check them out, pick up his new book. We sang a dirge wherever you buy books and, and support the ministry that he's doing as always. The biggest compliment that you can give us is to share this podcast with a friend, leave a rating or review wherever you listen.

I appreciate it so much. And look forward to connecting with you guys real soon.