{"id":13531,"date":"2018-09-04T12:44:21","date_gmt":"2018-09-04T16:44:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/?p=13531"},"modified":"2018-09-04T12:44:21","modified_gmt":"2018-09-04T16:44:21","slug":"lecrae-reveals-nearly-stepped-away-christianity-even-considered-suicide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2018\/09\/lecrae-reveals-nearly-stepped-away-christianity-even-considered-suicide.html","title":{"rendered":"Lecrae Reveals Why He Nearly Stepped Away from Christianity and Even Considered Suicide"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"The<\/a>
The Come Up Show | Flickr.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

When most people go to church, they do not expect to find a Grammy Award winning artist speaking to them about faith, but that is exactly what happened at Pastor Rich Wilkerson Jr.\u2019s megachurch, VOUS Church, in Miami, Florida. The topic was \u201cJoy Through Sacrifice,\u201d and the guest speaker was Christian rapper Lecrae.<\/p>\n

The artist began his talk with a prayer and the Bible verse Hebrew 12:2, \u201cFixing out eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and perfecter of faith. For the joy set before Him, He endured the cross, scorning its shame and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.\u201d Lecrae also made sure his audience had a full disclaimer when he took the stage. \u201cA lot of you know me as an artist. I have no idea why they let me preach,\u201d he joked, \u201cbut we\u2019re going to figure this out.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lecrae shared several personal stories from his past, including how he was molested at the age of seven. He detailed how he went astray as a young man before finding faith in Jesus and setting out to have a successful career in both Christian and mainstream music. He became increasingly interested in social justice and racial issues as he grew older, but as he became more vocal, he realized that not all of his fans would agree with his opinions.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was about to learn a very powerful lesson,\u201d Lecrae said. \u201cIf you live for people\u2019s acceptance, you will die from their rejection.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lecrae certainly faced his share of rejection. In addition to losing social media followers and fans, he and his family received death threats. Lecrae said he felt so abused and rejected that he developed depression, nearly abandoned his faith entirely and contemplated suicide.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was in a really dark place, my faith was messed up,\u201d he said. \u201cAt the end of the day, I had to realize that these are frail, fallen people, not God Himself [who are] doing all this crazy stuff.\u201d The rapper allowed his pain to lead him back to God and His plan. \u201cI had to embrace that trauma and let it mold me into someone new,\u201d he said. \u201cThe shift is being willing to die to whatever we were before the pain to birth the person that we [are] becoming. That shift is when we\u2019re too attached to who we\u2019ve been that we\u2019re held back [from becoming] who God wants us to be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lecrae ended his sermon to the millennial-dominated church with a warning against becoming dependent on the fickle approval of social media. \u201cWe\u2019re in the social media world hoping for likes,\u201d he said. \u201cIf you woke up this morning and you loved yourself and God loved you, any additional like is a bonus. Like\u2019s don\u2019t change the world, relentlessness does.\u201d<\/p>\n

One can only hope that the congregation of VOUS Church takes that message to heart.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When most people go to church, they do not expect to find a Grammy Award winning artist speaking to them about faith, but that is exactly what happened at Pastor Rich Wilkerson Jr.\u2019s megachurch, VOUS Church, in Miami, Florida. The topic was \u201cJoy Through Sacrifice,\u201d and the guest speaker was Christian rapper Lecrae. The artist…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":616,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3383,11,8,4],"tags":[3767,3766,3768,3681,602],"class_list":["post-13531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christian-celebrity","category-christian-music","category-music","category-pop-culture","tag-christian-artist","tag-christian-musician","tag-depression","tag-rapper","tag-suicide"],"yoast_head":"\nLecrae Reveals Why He Nearly Stepped Away from Christianity and Even Considered Suicide<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Christian rapper Lecrae spoke out about his struggles with faith and depression as a guest speaker at VOUS megachurch in Florida.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" 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