L E C R A E Takes Us Through An Honest Journey | Now With Natalie | FULL EPISODE

the views information or opinions expressed during the filming of this show are solely those of the individuals involved and do not necessarily represent those of hillsong channel or hillsong church [Music] why do we see ourselves the way we do culture often dictates that our worth path and identity are determined by our race our gender the things we've done and the things that have been done to us projections of the lives of others and the state of our world saturate our news feeds making it difficult to distinguish the real from the highlight reel i'm natalie manuel lee and in this series i'll be digging beneath the surface to uncover what it really means to be bold transparent and confront our shame and this season i'll be speaking with people at the top of their industry from the realms of music radio politics television and philosophy to find out how they navigate shame and translate their hardships into opportunities to refine themselves instead of define themselves so how do we rise above challenges to truly operate in our purpose and identity life offers us few certainties and pain is one of them but if there's one thing that we're all longing for deep down i think restoration would be it i'm seeking to gain further insight into the concept of restoration and how one can eventually arrive there from places of shame and pain when life bombards us with its many waves of hardships how does one bounce back from devastating wrongs or criticisms to find forgiveness and hold true to our sense of self if neither our hard times or our own shortcomings define us then where does the basis of our value come from and how can personal restoration lead to broader restoration in our culture and our communities in this episode i spent time with hip-hop artist lecrae this two-time grammy award winner is a gifted lyricist and a force for social change and he is someone whose journey have always respected from afar we traveled to his home base of atlanta and took some time out in his studio to discuss how his own path to restoration has informed his music and his drive to see communities changed i believe you're right here yeah wow are you ready for this this is awesome [Applause] [Music] take me back to your childhood for me being noticed or accomplishing things gave me a sense of purpose because i didn't know any other way to overcome the traumas that i experienced there's major traumas that people can experience from violence to car accidents to abuse i checked most of the trauma boxes so uh so just winning being successful uh doing well at school being popular all those things were kind of the armor that i was putting on myself but the problem with layering all that armor is that when it comes to like a spiritual battle it doesn't do you any good and um and that's what happened i just essentially got broken down family issues you know relationship issues and i was just at the rock bottom and um and when it got to that place um gratefully god just sent people you know young christians who were because i couldn't imagine myself being a christian right like where am i supposed to fit in there you know i'm supposed to wear a suit and stop listening to rap like how does this work but they were just trying to love me and show me love and spend time and they invited me to a conference where i saw other christians like me and uh came to faith how have you not allowed that trauma from your childhood to creep back into your identity today wow um it's an everyday struggle i don't believe in like balance right like balance is the idea that one day everything's gonna just sit perfectly i believe in tension it's always gonna be a wrestle people don't just drift into discipline you know i'm just like oh man i just woke up and i was just so disciplined and yeah unaffected it takes work how did you get to that place it's like a disease if you can't admit you have the disease how can you get help so i had to first admit i had a disease you know acknowledge uh the the traumas that i'd experienced and the mistakes that i made and realize they don't define me and then i can move forward and so once i can acknowledge them then i can start seeking help and and being okay with it and it becomes a part of your everyday experience now and i have some great people in my life that taught me leaders leading vulnerability if you want to be a leader you're going to have to be vulnerable um leaders lead in vulnerability that's that's a bar hey put it on the next album [Music] put on the next hour yeah as an artist how do you see yourself i see myself as a voice or soundtrack to what's going on in the world you know reflect what could be and what should be what box would you check rap christian non-christian other oh to answer that question i got to kind of i got to get a take a little deep dive hot water is good for like healing cooking cold water is good for refreshment but lukewarm parasites land there diseases so you got to spit that out because it's no good for you and so for me i feel like as long as i'm hot or cold i'm good um so whether i am known as christian artist or artist who is a christian it doesn't matter because both of those are hot and cold they're beneficial right so for me i don't feel the need to check the boxes as much as i feel the need to be a reflection of authenticity and in my faith [Music] i'm noticing that the conviction to be authentic is often forging the fire of difficult times rising through the ranks of music industry success could easily tempt one to suppress the demons of the past and lose themselves in the lures of the present so what motivates someone like lecrae to push authenticity to the point of breaking the glamorized perception of a hip-hop artist and bring his hardest and most complicated experiences to light in your book an album unashamed you talked about some hardships yeah can you unpack that i talked about everything in that book i left no stone uncovered actually and i did that for a reason i felt like if i tell you about my abortion if i tell you about my sexual abuse if i tell you about my physical abuse and i'm still here and i'm still standing and i still have joy then maybe my scars will bring you healing did you feel shameful with the abortion yeah it took a while you know i'm i'm i'm dating this young lady and um you know she gets pregnant and in my mind i'm thinking okay this is gonna ruin my life you know i i don't i don't have time for this it's about me and my future my life and i don't have time for this so what you're going to do is you're going to get an abortion and i just kind of coarsed her into doing this you know that at this time of my life and so she did it it was traumatic for her and um and i just moved on i think if i would have stopped to process what was happening it would have wrecked me so i couldn't stop to process it i just had to scathe over it and keep moving as if nothing happened and i never knew why i kept a picture of her you know i always kept a picture of her but i just couldn't process why i kept it and it was years later and i was about to get married and my fiance my wife now she said um i don't know if it's healthy for you to have these pictures of these past women and um and i was like all right cool let me get rid of these pictures and so get rid of them probably a good idea you're about to marry you can burn all of them actually okay yeah this might be a good idea and i i was like i can't get rid of this picture and it was because i hadn't dealt with what i'd done and um and i broke and i started crying and i was explaining to her what was going on and that was the first time i felt any emotion and remorse and shame is that why it took you so long to confess what happened what do you think was growing in that secrecy yeah the only tools i had was to acknowledge that i'm a failure and if i acknowledge that then i have to live in light of that and so i don't want to do that and then you're talking to a person who comes from this broken family where his father you know was was not involved at all you know there was addiction and he was homeless and so to me i'm saying oh i'm i'm on that trajectory and now i'm like my dad and i couldn't live with that so it took me a long time to acknowledge that access all your favorite preaching worship and shows on demand this is incredible hillsong channel now subscribe today what tools do you feel like you should have had to overcome it quicker i didn't have those kind of um emotional tools to to navigate this with shame was just you blew it and it's over for you that's it that's the end of the story and that's the only your life is over you're done your failure that's it there's no redemption there's no restoration there's no that's it and i think that's the lie that shane wants to tell us there's no hope shame steals hope exactly yeah so i spent um you know a large portion of my life here in atlanta you know because i've lived in the not so nice parts of atlanta and i've lived in the nice parts of atlanta and so um so i know it from that vantage point and uh i feel like a lot of times music is the voice of the city and so if i'm going to be creating music i want to be connected to the city in an authentic way so it's important for me to be in the communities it's important for me to just be around the folks and uh know what they're battling what they're wrestling with so that the music can uh can express that so just open your eyes what i've learned on this journey so far and in my own life is that hardship is rarely a single season we often climb one mountain only to encounter another that we didn't see looming on the other side over the last few years of turmoil in american culture many voices have risen up in the public discourse including the craze having watched the cray lending his voice to heated issues relating to race and the dignity of human life i wondered what impact the season had on him personally you have a new book and a new album restoration yeah it was birthed out of a tough season that you went through yeah and now a better season tell me about that tough season um toughest season of my life toughest season of my life um i obvious obviously i've experienced a lot of trauma uh but this is the worst i felt really betrayed by the church you know i started speaking out against social injustices and uh when i started speaking out against these injustices i just assumed the church would be like hey man brother everyone's made in god's image and we should care about these people and instead it was stop being divisive just get back to the gospel and i was like [Music] is this someone in church is this a leader is this a friend this is leaders this is fans this is just by and large and they're saying you're being divisive by speaking up about humanity exactly or they'll say like you know just preach the gospel and it'll all be fine and i'm like no the cross is shaped up and down and left and right up and down is our relationship with god yes we want everybody to have a relationship with god but left and right is we got to have a relationship with each other we gotta that changes the way we interact with each other and we're not treating each other well right now and so that's a human issue and i was addressing it and you know was muted and i and when leaders um take sides people that you looked up to people are just coming at you mind you i was probably looking way too much of social media which is an evil evil place when it wants to be it's the best thing that's ever happened to us but the worst thing that's ever happened to us so that just sent me down a very dark path and i started to just not trust uh christians you know and when and and then i started to blame god for his people and then and then i started to just be mad at god and not want to deal with god and i was like maybe you're not even real how does one cope when it feels like the very foundations of who you are and what you believe are pulled out from under you our perception and experience of the divine can often be undermined by the feelings we see in the flawed human individuals and institutions that represent higher powers wrestling with our core beliefs can be a healthy process but where does letting go of those beliefs lead us once i stopped really saying i acknowledge god is good and he's true um then you can you can justify anything during that time period was severe depression crippling anxiety what was your conversation with god like it was a lot of like where are you at you know where are you at well if you're here why i don't see this where's this why is this this way we'll fix that and uh i learned that god is not afraid of us being honest about our pain or our anger he's not afraid of that he's like bring it come on bring it at least you're talking to me it's when you stop talking to me that it becomes a problem because now you don't even believe i'm i'm here and i can hear you what was the turning point where you knew you know what like you said earlier i came to the end of myself you know i'm i'm on a on a binge i'm just you know staying out late drinking having fun just like trying to cover my traumas in my mask my pain and um and then i wake up and i'm like yeah this is just this is not it and i'm unable to sleep now so my anxiety's got me to where i can't sleep i'm losing my appetite and um and so i said all right fine fine let me go read my bible i open up the bible and i'm in the gospels and i see jesus talking to peter and he says you know peter's said well i'm done i've already turned my back on jesus denied him three times and and i'm done and uh you know jesus is coming to peter after everything's said and done and he's been crucified and uh and jesus says go feed my sheep and i read go feed my sheep i just broke i couldn't i couldn't control it i just cried uncontrollably and i just knew what does that mean go feed my sheep i made you for more just being out here satisfying your selfish desires or just living life you know mundane living i created you for a purpose and i need you to take care of my people whether that is speaking life to them making music for them i need you to feed my sheep there's a world out here that's hurting and lost and dying and struggling i need you to get well so you can give them what i've given you yeah and it broke me it seems that most of us need to reach the end of ourselves in order to get close enough to the answers that we've been reaching out for all along and often it's when we look beyond ourselves to the bigger picture that we find the anchoring perspective that sets us back on the road to purpose but once we make our choice at that fork in the road there is still a journey ahead of us i'm interested in the pragmatic steps towards healing how do you move on when you've been knocked back by the shame that's been cast upon you how do you move forward from the church hurt i had to realize that the same grace that i want god to give me i got to give my brothers and sisters um because i'm not perfect and i i'm judgmental and i criticize and um and so i want people to give me grace when i make those kind of mistakes so i gotta i gotta give it and that's really hard especially when you've been done wrong and you just like oh my gosh but you know i you it's hard to fight with somebody who's out doing you in love so if if i'm loving them and just loving them it's like they don't really have a any legs to stand on when they're like ah i don't agree with what he said but i can't knock the character and the love of god in this guy you got to be patient with people you know and um and i i needed to be patient with them and uh and now i am i'm far more patient with people because god was patient with me and you still have your same stance as you did then for sure i still have my same stance and sometimes you have to give society a time to catch up you know what i mean like sometimes they you you'll be on the right side of history but it just takes time for society to catch up i mean you know it's like civil rights era in america was like those who stood up for that um you know they were on the right side of history and they were gracious to people who saw things the wrong way and uh and you know time and god has manifested it to where things change and so i believe things will continue to change did you forgive them absolutely i did i'm either going to hold on to what they did to me and it's going to make me bitter or i'm going to forgive them and it's going to make me better don't get me wrong forgiveness is not the same as acceptance it's not as if i accept wrongdoing if someone has you know abused me i don't accept that it's not like well hey it just happens but it's all good i forgive you it's that's not okay and and that's not acceptable i forgive you i love you but that's not acceptable and i can't let you continue to abuse me i can't let you beat me but you know you're not condemned um i'm not looking at you as lesser than for your actions don't take advantage of me but i forgive you absolutely yeah and that's my vantage point [Music] why is the album called restoration uh because i want people to experience what i've experienced i've been restored and restoration is something that people don't believe in they just they don't believe that the worst case scenario um can be restored they just don't they get to a place of such hopelessness that they're like there's no way god can do anything with this i was a drug addict i can restore that i was a prostitute i'll restore you but i you i killed somebody there's restoration what does it feel like to be restored though how can someone pinpoint that they're being restored i think it's when you no longer define yourself by your failure no longer define yourself by what happened to you or what you did but you define yourself by how god sees you get exclusive access to behind the scenes footage episodes from season one and check out other bonus content only on hillsong channel now what's up baby [Music] oh man what's up dog what's up oh he got me where are we now yeah right now we're in english ave um which is a community in atlanta uh previously known as the bluff so there's a lot of folklore about the bluff being like the heroin capital of the south and uh but this is a school in the middle of english shaft called peace preparatory academy started by my good friend ben wills what's this area like uh it's changing it's changing yeah i mean i would describe it as like everything you think about uh in a flourishing neighborhood the opposite so that's a good way there's no grocery store here there's no banks there's no uh really commercial properties place for people to work housing is extremely limited so 60 of the homes are vacant or abandoned and then it's also known as the largest open-air heroin market in the southern united states and so on a daily basis heroin opioid cocaine traffic through here as well as people so human trafficking is a major issue in our community as well and so a lot of the things that are needed for a thriving community we're not here and we really sensed god's call to participate with him in redeeming and restoring what once was so from the mid-50s through the 80s it was a thriving community a thriving african-american community people describe dr king and abernathy walking these streets or even preaching or teaching in this building and then you know crack cocaine and that epidemic as well as heroin and some other things have led to the deterioration we see today this school is a picture of restoration within this community it literally is kind of like a heartbeat here in this community for restoration so we're seeing entire families transformed entire systems transform entire mindsets transformed because of what's happening here with the school i'm always inspired when i see community and cultural restoration flow out of journeys of personal healing but what exactly is the link between the two what personal principles and learnings fuel one to look beyond themselves and reach out and love what are the underlying beliefs that make this kind of discipline and selfless love possible i think the lesson i learned is god is not transactional you don't say all right if i do this you'll do this he's relational he's like i'm going to walk with you through that i'm not just going to make it go away i'm going to walk with you through it all what would you tell someone that's dealing with shame right now and it's still defining them today if you woke up today that's all the evidence you need to know god's not done with you so don't be done with yourself because he woke you up this morning so that means that's a new opportunity to be a new version of yourself you know it's going to be a lifelong struggle but you don't have to it's like being in the gym it's never going to be like woo that was so easy but it it does become routine and you do start to get stronger and you do start to see the results if you're leaning on god more if you're trusting on in him more you can fight that pull of guilt or shame or trauma or whatever it is that's that's pulling at you but but i think you have to constantly wrestle attention but what if you never get to that point it's hard i didn't say it was easy that's hard it is because a lot of our identity in my opinion for me when i struggled a couple years ago was my identity was in everything i did it's tough that's good i agree i think it and for me i would just say man i was on rodeo drive and uh i had an event i needed a shirt quick it's like yeah go up to this floor i started looking on the racks i'm like this is back in the day and so and i'm new to this so i look at the shirt and i'm like excuse me you know there's a sticker on this and i think the sticker's wrong the price is wrong and they were like oh you're right it's just plain t-shirt right right it's not 300 it's 600 that's an old sale time out time out explain to me what kind of cotton this what is what's happening why is this t-shirt this much and this is the first time this was explained to me you know she said it's the time and craftsmanship that went into making this shirt and it's the name of the designer and that's what drives the price up and it hit me that's us my designer took time to craft me in the uniquely and then he stamps me with his name i'm made in the image of god that's where my worth comes from it doesn't have anything to do with what i did that t-shirt didn't do anything but sit on the rack but the work that went into it the name on it gives it its value and that's what i want people to understand is it's not what you did or didn't do it's it's how you were created wonderfully and fearfully and who created you that's what i want people to experience when i listen to my music when i make music it's not like a sermon i don't like right sermons i just talk from a real place you know and so when people listen to it hopefully they're hearing like real stories and feeling like oh that's my story i appreciate him saying this so that's that's restoration for me [Music] a lot of my music isn't what it is if i don't have real life experiences to to to pull from so i can't just say oh we should help and i'm not helping i can't just say look at this community and i haven't seen the community and so uh this is this is the tangible reality that makes the music what it is the type of communication we're trying to instill into these kids is that they're they're legacy builders that they can continue a legacy of restoration in this community and and continue seeing transformation happen i believe a lot of it is going to start with these kids you know they're going to their mindset has got to change for the community to change [Music] [Music] [Music] um [Music] [Music] in the next episode i visit the home of model and influencer jordan woods we unpack her journey through body shaming and internet bullying as well as making and owning up to mistakes the concepts of public shaming and cancel culture unpacked as we delve deep into her redemption story [Applause] if you've been affected by the subject matter in this episode please contact a qualified healthcare professional in your area or go to hillsongchannel.com help shame will tell you you are what you've done i've discovered on this journey that shame has robbed a lot of people knowing who they really are during that time did you engage in the backlash i just resorted to creating so many distractions in my life that i didn't deal with what was happening we're in these verbally abusive relationships with our smartphones you got to ask yourself why right it was always somebody saying to me i was praying you died this morning it was kind of like a frat party the fans the girls in front of thousands of people but i was a shell inside one way to marginalize black people was to convince them that what they're saying isn't true that we've had it just the same can we have these conversations and it is unifying i think it is uncovering the darkness of what this country has been to so many why do you think that people don't want to confront their past everybody wants to feel good i will take this to make me feel good it's killing us when i was just at rock bottom so rock bottom that i was suicidal i had to just acknowledge some of the things that i've done some of the things that i thought were the hardest things to ever go through those were the things that solidified in me try me and try god there is so much hope and encouragement given when you're transparent with your story people they don't want to see the perfect story you've got to refuse to allow yourself to be defined by your mistakes you can't do anything to change the past but you can change your perspective of the past the beauty is is we're discovering how to dismantle shame robbing us of our full potential you

Channel: Hillsong Channel

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Id: Lsi9Pt70Mig

Length: 31min 44sec (1904 seconds)

Published: Sat Sep 19 2020