My Personal Pilgrimage

My first conversion to Jesus Christ took place in 1949; my second conversion to the kingdom of God occurred in 1968. Both conversions were needed to make me a fully biblical Christian. See Acts 8:12; 28:23 & 31.

I began my Christian life as an evangelical conservative, almost totally unaware of the massive social evil in America. Everything was individual responsibility; everything was spiritual; America was a Christian nation. Period. The kingdom of God on earth as justice for the oppressed poor did not exist in my understanding. Though I didn't know it at the time, though I would have denied it, I was an American Pharisee. My understanding of the Bible was narrow, even after studying every book in the Bible in college and graduate school. I read my Bible with American cultural blinders on as did my teachers.

Then God intervened; my cultural scales fell off; a spiritual floodlight revealed massive social evil. This was connected with Martin Luther King's assassination in April, 1968. God used this tragic event for good, for my personal good. For the first time, I saw that America was fundamentally flawed at its core, pious proclamations about America being a Christian nation not withstanding. Now 46 years later, I am still discovering new understandings about the depth of the oppression problem and radical nature of the Sabbath Year justice solution.

Along the way, I have discovered institutional racism, ethnocentrism, oppression, White Anglo-Saxon Protestant (WASP), the American trinity and post traumatic oppression syndrome (PTOS). A multitude of persons and factors have played an important role in the continuing transformation of my life.

First of all, the Holy Spirit again and again illumined my mind and heart. Morning after morning, I woke up early, and so to speak, the Spirit put a pen in my hand and said, "Write." Again and again, the Spirit showed me new teachings from the Bible. Along the way, God brought key persons into my life such as Martin Luther King, Tom Skinner and John Perkins, authors such as Thomas Hanks, Perry Yoder and Michelle Alexander. I spent over 30 years living in two American ghettos---Jackson, Michigan from 1973 to 1993 and West Jackson, Mississippi from 1994-2010.

I retired from teaching sociology and anthropology in 1994.

My study of anthropology and sociology helped me understand the social side of humanity and Christianity. American society overemphasizes the role of the individual and minimizes the role of culture and society. Jesus was not only incarnated in a human body but also in a functioning society, the Jewish society. One of his ministries was exposing social evil/social oppression, especially among religious leaders and in the key social institution, the Temple which he called a den of robbers.

Yet with all these helps, I am embarrassed that it took me so long to see so many important things. Why did it take me 46 long years to discover that multiplied millions of fellow Americans have suffered and are still suffering from PTOS---a mental health cousin to PTSD. Millions of other Americans were demonically involved in creating and maintaining PTOS. I was one of them for too many years.

Next, a section titled: "Think, Weep, Liberate---in the Spirit."

Around 25 years ago, I attended a Christian College Coalition Conference for sociologists teaching at Christian liberal arts colleges. In conversation with Bille Davis, sociologist and social worker from Evangel College in Missouri, an Assembly of God college I learned about a new gift of the Spirit. Billie Davis said that in her Pentecostal tradition there was a strong tendency to see the work of the Holy Spirit primarily in the unusual, the unique, the supernatural as in being led by the Spirit, miracles or singing in the Spirit.

Professor Davis challenges her sociology students to understand that the Holy Spirit can also work through the mind so she exhorts them to "think in the Spirit." Simple but profound; a classic phrase that spoke to me. I now identify my gift as "thinking in the Spirit." I have sensed the Spirit of Truth illuminating my mind numerous times as I have attempted to develop a biblically based theology of society or a kingdom of God on earth theology.

At the same conference, Nicholas Wolterstorff, editor of the Christian College Coalition textbook series, spoke to us. He told of a medical doctor in Holland who trained nurses how to care for mothers who lost their babies at birth. The doctor said, "Watch the IV with one eye; with the other eye, you weep." Be a professional in taking care of her medical needs; also be a compassionate human being at the same time.

Wolterstorff applied this story to Christian sociologists. "With one eye you analyze; with the other eye, you weep." With one eye you carefully analyze society and its problems; with the other eye you weep for the oppressed of the earth.

I tied Billie Davis' and Wolterstorff's ideas together. A Christian sociologist should both "think in the Spirit" and "weep in the Spirit."

But thinking and weeping in the Spirit is not enough. The Gospel also calls us to "liberate in the Spirit." Jesus Christ stated the following about his ministry [and by implication, the church's ministry]:

The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,
because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor, . . .
to set at liberty those who are oppressed, . . .

According to the Old Testament, the oppressed are powerless people such as the poor, orphans and widows who are crushed, humiliated, animalized, enslaved or killed by the rich and powerful. One of Jesus' ministries was to liberate such people from their oppression. He was anointed by the Holy Spirit to engage in this ministry.

I now see that my ministry and the ministry of the church is to disciple persons to think in the Spirit---the Spirit of Truth; to weep in the Spirit---love and compassion; and liberate in the Spirit---release the oppressed from their systems of oppression; and then do justice in the power and wisdom of the Spirit. Liberation is not complete until justice is done.

Think, weep, liberate---and do justice in the Spirit.

To end the story of my personal pilgrimage, I would like to share excerpts from a prophecy; the following is a personal prophecy given to Lowell Noble during the morning worship of Adullam Ministries on May 17, 1998 by Pastor Leon Forte, an Afro-American pastor of an interethnic church in Athens, Ohio. This church records the prophecy as it is given and presents a copy to each individual prophesied over. Pastor Forte and I had never met prior to the morning service; through a mutual friend, Keith Wasserman, he knew I was in town presenting an 8-hour seminar to Good Works about poverty, oppression,justice and the kingdom of God. I did present a 15 minute teaching in the morning service based on Isaiah 9:7, Luke 4:18-19 and Romans 14:17:

"Favor, favor, favor, says the Lord. . . . I will open doors for you to walk in, my son. . . . Even some of these doors you may question, for you have never been this way before. . . . This is the season for you to speak. This is your hand [holding up my right hand] that I anoint to write. . . . Do now through instruction what you could not do through self-effort. . . . Many are your sons in me; nurture your sons, says the Lord."

This 1998 prophecy was confirmation of what was begun in 1968 when Martin Luther King was assassinated. My gift of sociotheological insight has continued and expanded in depth and quality since this 1998 prophecy was given. See my blog lowellnoble.blogspot.com for some of my writings.