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As I listened to that song, I thought a couple of things. One, if we're going to present the Creator as a loving father image, we need to consider the fact that many of the young men and young women that we're writing to don't have positive images of earthly fathers. I certainly don't.

But when I think about my mother, who sacrificed and moved us from Chicago to Madison so she could go to school to better her life, to set an example for her children, and how both of us went to college because of her example, I realized scripture shows the motherly side of God as well. And maybe, like Tupac, we blame him for all the things that have gone wrong and he's the one that's always been in our corner.

If you want to reach young men, particularly men of color, and you want to get straight to their hearts, talk to them about their mothers. Then flip that on its head and say, "in Isaiah God refers to himself as a nursing mother with breasts rather than a proud pacing father handing out cigars." It turns it on its head to give them a different image.

What about the lyrics "I hear Brenda's got a baby, Brenda's barely got a brain. The girl can hardly spell her name." What's that one connect to?

As a pastor I deal with so many people, men and women, who have been victims of sexual abuse. In evangelicalism we are so good at talking about pro-life issues, celibacy issues, and we need to teach those things and talk about those things. But who talks about the sexual abuse and sexual assault that many times is the impetus to sexual promiscuity?

I preached a sermon once about how Jesus loves people and his ability to put his arms around people who have been sexually assaulted and sexually abused. A woman came up to me with tears in her eyes after church and said, "I want to join this church. I was a victim of date rape my freshman year of college." In all my years I have never ever heard anyone take a sermon and talk about God's love for the sexually assaulted.

But rappers are doing it. In that song that's what Tupac is talking about. He starts out by telling about Brenda having a baby and you think, Okay good, he's going to bash the young, the young hoes in the community. But he's not. He bashes society. And basically what he says is we're no better than the scum that raped Brenda because we were so busy we didn't even notice her belly getting bigger. So it was a challenge to society, what's going on that you're allowing this to happen to children?

Copyright © 2004 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

Jesus & the Hip Hop Prophets is available from Christianbook.com and other book retailers.

Gee and co-author John Teter have more information on their web site, Jesus & the Hip Hop Prophets.

More information, including interviews, reviews, and an excerpt, is available from the publisher.

Dick Staub's interview with Os Guinness presents the view that the only thing culturally relevant is the gospel.

Recent Dick Staub Interviews include:

Craig Detweiler Finds Faith in Film | The co-author of A Matrix of Meanings talks about spirituality on screen. (Feb. 03, 2004)

Walter Wangerin Finds God Everywhere | The author of The Book of God discusses his newest novel—an ancient story with modern relevance. (Jan. 27, 2004)

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February (Web-only) 2004, Vol. 48