Julie Lyons' "Holy Roller" -- CC interview

How did a nice white middle-class ex-Evangelical girl like you end up worshiping in a black Pentecostal church in a poor part of Dallas?

Spiritual desperation. I wanted to find a church where I could see evidence of God's power. I read about this Jesus in the Bible who healed the sick, cast out demons, and freed people from horrible spiritual conditions. And it seemed like in the churches I grew up in, the good people got gooder, but the bad people stayed bad. I didn't understand why people's lives weren't getting changed, and why folks looked the other way when there was pretty grievous sin stuff going on right in front of their faces.

Well, that's my really pious answer. I ended up at a specific black Pentecostal church--The Body of Christ Assembly, in South Dallas--because I lied to my editors at the Dallas Times Herald, where I was a cops reporter. I pitched this story about inner-city pastors praying for crack addicts, and how some of them were getting instantly freed from their addictions, and how I knew some of these preacher guys. But I didn't know anyone.

My editors were really excited about the story idea, so I had to find these preachers real quick. Just so you know, the idea wasn't a total fabrication, because I ran into a preacher who prayed for crack addicts in my previous job with The Seattle Times. But when I went looking for someone in Dallas, I got thoroughly lost. I'd only lived here a few months. I ended up on a one-block street in drugland, and the first preacher I talked to was Pastor Fredrick L. Eddington, Sr. And it turns out he prayed for crack addicts. And some of them got healed.

Basically, God saved my butt. I got my story, and it went Sunday A-1.

Now I share the same pews with the people I met so long ago. My husband and I have been members of The Body of Christ Assembly for 19 years. Our son has grown up there.

What do white Christians generally not understand about the black church? Conversely, what do black Christians not get about the way white Christians think and worship?

In the black Pentecostal church, it's not how much you know about God. It's whether you believe what you know.

You might not find too many Bible trivia contest winners in my church, but you will find people with transformed lives. They met Jesus one day, and they have never been the same. I have worshiped alongside former crack addicts, alcoholics, criminals, and prostitutes. You will also find people with less spectacular stories, people like I used to be: a bratty, self-centered girl who suffered from depression and other stuff and was a bit of a flake besides.

Speaking generally about the black church, it has always held a different status in the community. For decades it was the only place where black Americans could be treated with dignity, ascend to positions of influence, and worship Jesus in their own way. In the Midwestern town where I grew up, I didn't know anyone who aspired to be a preacher. But this is a common aspiration in black communities, for better and for worse. Some wonderful, gifted, compassionate people find their way into ministry, with or without a seminary education. But a fair number of people with stunning talent but zero character make it into the pulpit too. So, I tell white people not to be overly impressed by the incredible worship and preaching in black churches. If there isn't a godly man or woman behind it, it's all noise.

What is it that black Christians don't understand about white Christians? That they don't preach the way they often do (sedate, linear, and dressed in Hawaiian shirts) and worship the way they do (broomsticks up their backsides) because they're inherently "boring" or because they lack passionate faith. White people, especially where I grew up, tend to be reserved, and they take more of a didactic approach to Scripture. But they're just as passionate in their way.

Not long ago, I was talking with a mainline Protestant theologian who is fascinated by Pentecostalism, both professionally and as a believer. He told me he really does believe that Pentecostals are connecting with the power of God in a way that mainline Protestants and other churches have lost. Yet it was my impression that he has to be careful about the people he says that to. What have you seen in your years as a Pentecostal Christian, and where does the fear and mistrust of Pentecostals come from?

For years, Pentecostals were identified with a lack of formal education, low socio-economic status, loosey-goosey doctrine, a lot of whooping and hollering and out-of-control tongue-speaking. Now that Pentecostalism is basically sweeping the world--it is the mainstream of evangelical Christianity, by sheer numbers--Protestants as well as Catholics have been forced to re-examine the stereotype. Pentecostalism has appealed to the terribly oppressed and the poor because they can tap into a Jesus who is powerful enough to totally change their lives--and he doesn't play favorites. He can pull someone out of poverty. He can give dignity to the despised. The power of the Holy Spirit exceeds the evil forces that are accepted as a fact of life in much of the developing world, and Pentecostals believe we're engaged in a cosmic struggle between good and evil, which corresponds to the realities of people living in Africa, Central and South America, and the persecuted church.

I have seen a fair amount of what we call "fakin' and shakin'" in Pentecostal circles--as well as emotionalism, and an emphasis on spectacular spiritual "gifts" at the expense of godly character and sound doctrine. The things for which we're criticized are more prevalent than I'd like to admit. But I'll take a powerful, life-changing Jesus any day over the tepid, sad savior I was introduced to as a child in the Reformed and mainline churches my family attended.

You write openly about your lonely childhood, and your struggle with same-sex attraction. Where did your attraction to women come from? How did you conquer it? What challenges to the church does the greater acceptance of homosexuality pose -- and how should the church respond?

I don't know where my attraction to women came from. I remember it as early as 7, when I knew nothing about sex, much less homosexuality. It wasn't a "choice" for me.

I do know this: I had a deep wound of rejection, as do many other people who experience same-sex attraction. This wound can come from sexual abuse, being abandoned by a parent, being ridiculed, or feeling like you were totally different from everyone around you. In my case, I had a terrible, crippling fear of not being loved. It shaped my life in profound ways. For whatever reason, I craved affection from a woman.

When you reach adolescence, those cravings become eroticized. That's when you do have a choice, if you're a follower of Jesus Christ. When the hormones start raging, you can go with the out-of-control sexual thoughts, or do the same thing heterosexual Christian kids are taught to do--channel that sexual energy in another direction until you get married, and "take captive" those thoughts and fantasies with God's help.

I had enough of a desire to please God that I fought those same-sex erotic thoughts. I didn't act on them. I was actually more attracted to men in terms of the sex act itself. But that deep desire for affection from a woman remained, and if I'd given it free rein, I'm sure it would have led to a sexual relationship at some point.

I got free of same-sex attraction through prayer. A Christian counselor who believed in the power of the Holy Spirit prayed that a "curse of sexual perversion" be broken off of my family. It felt like the power of same-sex attraction was sapped in that instant. It has taken me much longer, however, to deal with the wound of rejection. God has brought me to a place of wholeness through being loved without reservation by my husband, Larry, and through intimate friendships with two spiritually mature Christian women.

I think the acceptance of homosexuality poses an extraordinary challenge to the church. There is a dividing line today between those sectors of Christianity that accept the Word of God as the final authority for all matters of life and doctrine, and those that don't. And there is a dividing line between those churches that believe Jesus Christ has the power to transform a person's life--including their sexuality--and those that don't. I don't think you can have a more fundamental challenge to the church than questioning who Jesus is and what you deem Truth.

We need to reclaim Jesus' transforming power. If you can't offer that power to someone who wants to be free from same-sex attraction--and, by the way, this power is always rooted in love--you'd best keep your mouth shut.

In "Holy Roller," and in your work for the Dallas Observer, you were absolutely scathing about sexual abuse in the black church, and how the exalted role of pastors within black American Christianity served to cover up criminal and immoral sexual behavior. What did you see, and what kind of reaction did you get once you started writing about it?

Well, let me say this. If readers of "Holy Roller" think I'm hard on the black church concerning sexual immorality among leaders, just know that I pulled my punches. The problem is far worse. There is this misapplication of a Bible verse in the black Pentecostal churches--"touch not mine anointed"--that says you shouldn't criticize or expose a man or woman of God who's fallen into serious sin; you should just go in your private "prayer closet" and beg God to deal with them. This belief has allowed a whole lot of abuse to go more or less unchecked.

I wrote a bunch of stories for the Observer about Sherman Allen, a black Pentecostal pastor in Fort Worth who used to be affiliated with the Church of God in Christ, my former denomination. Allen allegedly was involved in all kinds of immorality, perversion, and occultism. It did sting me when COGIC people called me things like "Judas" and a "demon." The Apostle Paul said we're supposed to expose the deeds of darkness, and I did that through old-fashioned investigative reporting. It was astonishing to me--and still is--that many church people showed more concern for Allen and his calling as a preacher than for the many, many women and men he victimized.

One of the best lines in the book is your quoting Diane Eddington, your pastor's wife, confronting sexual sin among women in the congregation directly: "Ain't no penis in the world worth going to hell for!" You see that over and over again in your congregation: this strong sense that the life of faith is a struggle, and that we have to be accountable to each other. You write that the concept of "holiness" is not taken seriously, or as seriously as it ought to be, by Christians outside of Pentecostalism. Talk about that, and your sense of how the broader church in America confronts sin in the lives of its members.

My theology isn't terribly sophisticated. When the Word of God says "be holy as I am holy," and that "no man will see God" without holiness, that sends a chill up my spine. I was pretty much taught growing up that you have this magic moment of salvation, and from that point on, you're OK with Jesus. You can go on doing the same sinful stuff, and your salvation is secure. I don't believe that anymore.

When a person turns to God and repents of their sin, there should be a visible change in their lives. John the Baptist taught that; Jesus taught that; the apostles and writers of Scripture taught that. When the Spirit of Jesus lives inside you, you are continually drawn toward holiness. It is a struggle at times, because our natural minds and bodies enjoy a lot of things having to do with sin. It is only through a life of discipline--of prayer, meditation on the Word of God, worship, and making yourself accountable and transparent to godly leaders and friends--that the Spirit assumes a greater place of influence in your life than what we call the flesh.

Pentecostals emphasize the work of the Holy Spirit, so they're well-acquainted with the Spirit's role in shining a light on the areas of sin in our lives and prodding us toward greater devotion and holiness. The great thing is that the Holy Spirit gives us a power boost to overcome particular sins. God doesn't just leave us high and dry with an impossible demand that we be holy; he gives us the power to live that way. If we want it bad enough.

I was once told by a Catholic priest, a former missionary to Africa, that if you don't believe in the existence of the demonic, Africa will cure you of your naivete. The parts of "Holy Roller" about the mission trip your church took to Africa were riveting to me. Why is spiritual warfare so much more out in the open in Africa? And with African Christianity growing so fast, what does the Western world have to learn from Africa's Christians?

Many if not most Africans have been immersed in the reality of demonic forces from the day they were born. In Botswana, where we ministered, children are often dedicated to demonic entities. Many people consult practitioners of witchcraft to obtain some semblance of control in their lives--over money, marriage, illness, and so on. So people overtly engage and grapple with these forces, effectively inviting them into their lives. That doesn't happen quite as often in the Western world.

These demonic forces destroy people's lives. They are very real. They are always attached to some kind of sin or misfortune. They must be expelled in order for a believer in Jesus Christ to experience what we Pentecostals call a "victorious" life--a life free from domination by sin and darkness.

I have met African Christians who think Americans are clueless about the spiritual realm, and about the battle that's going on there. They believe that our approach to faith is foolishly rational, and that this is one of the reasons why so little supernatural power is evident in our churches. Certain sin conditions--uncontrollable sexual compulsions, for example--must be dealt with on the demonic level. There is a spiritual force behind them, to the point where the individual feels powerless to change. Africans have much to teach us about the reality of the spiritual world.

If you look at Jesus' ministry, he cast out quite a few demons, and this was among "churched" people--the Jews of his day. We tend to forget that.

Finally, your Bible Girl column on the Dallas Observer's website was extraordinarily candid and brave about faith and your personal struggles. You took an incredible amount of abuse from readers, too, who couldn't seem to deal with the fact that the editor of the city's alternative weekly was a practicing Pentecostal Christian. You left the Observer, though. What's happened to you since then? What lessons do you have to offer to Christians in mainstream journalism? Are you going to write Bible Girl again?

I stepped down as editor of the Dallas Observer in order to have time to write the book without cheating my family. Since then, I have also been free to spend more time in ministry. I go door to door in the streets of South Dallas with an evangelism team. We're out there to win souls for Jesus, plain and simple. We pray with people, invite them to church, and deal with material needs as we identify them. I also teach and preach. I have been to Botswana and South Africa three times in the last 10 months as part of my church's ministry team, and I'm hoping to go back there this summer. I couldn't have done that if I were still editor.

Christians in mainstream journalism need to learn their craft and live their faith openly. That's all I have to say about that for now, and that's a lot.

I'd like to revive Bible Girl, and in fact I'm looking for a proper venue to host it. Bible Girl still has a lot to say. And like my pastor said the other day, the hatas just make me greata.

(Write to Julie Lyons at therealbiblegirl@gmail.com) Buy "Holy Roller" at your local bookstore, or via this link to Amazon.com.