Today’s topic and subject matter is a tough one. I’m talking with my friend David Gate. David is a writer and poet. He has a new book releasing in 2025 called A Rebellion of Care. But David also has a long history as a worship leader, songwriter, and artist.

David wrote an article recently in response to the new Ryan Coogler move Sinners, starring Michael B Jordan. The title of that article was “How White Charismatic Worship Stole from the Black Church: The Vampires who steal stories and songs and culture.” I know. It’s a bold, often cutting article. And while I don’t agree with everything he says, I believe he gets to the heart of a tension that many feel.

As with most of American culture throughout history, we have not given due credit to the black church. To black music. Black innovation. We have borrowed (or as David would say – stolen) from black culture and profited wildly off of its innovation and yet have not cared about black liberation in the white charismatic church. Which is the heart of what this conversation is about.

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Today’s conversation is with Dr. Lester Ruth, a research professor of Christian Worship at Duke Divinity School. If you go back in the archives you’ll see I interviewed Lester and Swee Hong Lim around the time they released their book A History of Contemporary Praise & Worship. Lester is a worship historian. The subject of this interview is about Christian Nationalism and Worship, a new course that Lester has been teaching.

I wanted to interview Lester about this because I believe it has so much relevance to our current political climate, the church, and our worship practices. Now…I know anything political tends to bring out some tensions. And this may cause some frustration for you. But the goal here is not to be partisan or take sides. We’re merely looking at the history of Christian nationalism today and even around the world. We talk about the three strands of Christian nationalism in the US today. We talk about the intersection of worship and christian nationalism and how that influences the kinds of songs we sing. We also talk about how we can have healthier dialogue together, no matter our political differences. We even end the podcast with some Civil War history and Lester’s reading habits/suggestions.

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Today’s conversation is with Andrew Osenga. Andrew is an artist, songwriter, producer, musician, and author. He used to do A&R with Integrity Music. Used to have a band called The Normals. Was a part of Caedmon’s Call. Has a host of solo records and albums. He’s a very thoughtful voice in this space of worship and spiritual formation. He leads a project called Anchor Hymns. This was a deep, far ranging conversation.

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