Bumpin' Jesus in the trunk

When I first heard of Christian rap I was an atheist, and I LOVED rap music. I listened out of curiosity, and it SUCKED! It was poorly recorded, very little talent to be found and, in my opinion then, had a ridiculous message.

Well in the past 8 years I am not the only person to be touched by Jesus. The Christian rap industry has exploded and man some of it is GOOD!! I have no doubt that if the same beats had secular words some of these songs would be on the top ten in our country. But instead these artists are hardly recognized at all.

Some churches, radio stations, and people in general are against Christian rap. They believe it's blasphemy. I can't see it. The words in these songs are often more powerful than ANYTHING I hear on Sunday morning, and my preacher often takes a dagger to the heart of congregation.

Often Christian rappers have lived a VERY difficult life. They are not out of touch with the things that are happening, especially to the youth. I wasn't crazy about Christian rap when I was first saved, and even when I first began working with youth, but things have definitely changed.

I knew that the kids (the youth at my church) enjoyed rap music, I knew that Christian rap was a good alternative to the CRAP they have pumped through their heads on the radio and TV, but I didn't think it would make much of a difference. I thought it was just entertainment. I was all for it because at least they weren't listening to garbage, but as far as a real worship service, I never would have looked to a rapper.

We had a lock-in a few weeks ago, and Brian and I asked a fairly local rapper that we knew to perform at it. The kids were "pumped" as they say (I think they still say that?). They handed out fliers at school, they invited ALL of their friends, who brought their friends and their friends. They were talking about it non-stop for about a month. Our little youth group of 15 kids on a good day, had a turn out of 44 teenagers!!

Before Jai (the rapper) performed we had a speaker. He had an awesome message on purity (our theme was Purity: From the Inside Out....we even turned all all of our clothes inside out) and afterwards he laid a cross down and all of the kids huddles around it and prayed. It was beautiful.

Well then Jai came out. I was very interested in seeing how it turned out because I remembered my pre-Jesus view on Christian rap and I knew that most of the kids there were not saved. He did an hour and a half long set and those kids LOVED it!! They were jumping around and going crazy! It was perfect, exactly what I had been praying for! And then something I didn't see coming happened....

Jai had brought a singer with him, and at the end he brought him back out. He started singing as Jai talked, slowly the group started huddling together. I saw that they all had their arms around each other, every one of them. Then they all started kneeling. 44 teenagers were on their knees praying. The music touched them! They were crying, some were praying out loud, and what was really amazing (if you know teenagers and their attention spans you will know why this was amazing) they stayed there, for about 15 minutes. When it was over they all stood, crying hugging each other. People who had not known each other 1 hour ago were now hugging each other and crying together. Several of them asked to talk to the chaperone's privately and since then several of them have either come back to church, or at least talked about it (which is a start).

The atmosphere was very different after that, for the rest of the night. God truly came down. He used that music to make an impact on some of their lives, one girl rededicated her life to Jesus right there that night. Christian rap changed her life, and who knows how many lives will be touched through her.

I never knew and I still do not understand how Christian rap can make such an impact on our youth, but I am not asking questions. It is obvious to me that Jesus is using rap music as a tool to reach His children and I am all for supporting that. :)