We need an aggressive vocation recruitment program. The church has got to develop new ways to nurture and encourage black vocations.

The mission (today) is still the same -- evangelization. The focus of our work is still what are the best ways to spread the good news in the black communities. ... What has changed is how we go about responding to that mission.

There's still so much work that needs to be done.

Many people will assume I'm drawing a wildly idealistic portrait of what the church can become. I would argue that all of the changes I'm calling for are not only realistic, they're essential. And I'd also say that in some way or other, each of them is already underway.

I grew up Protestant. My dad was a Charismatic pastor of the Families of God denomination. Often, we noticed that - during a lot of his evangelistic-type services - that some of the Amish and Old Order Mennonite couples would come and stand across the street from the church and look in the door.

God wants to save us in a people. He does not want to save us in isolation. And so today's church more than ever is accentuating the idea of being a people. The church therefore experiences conflicts, because it does not want a mass; it wants a people. A mass is a heap of persons, the drowsier the better, the more compliant the better. The church rejects communism's slander that it is the opium of the people. It has no intention of being the people's opium. Those that create drowsy masses are others. The church wants to rouse men and women to the true meaning of being a people. What is a people? A people is a community of persons where all cooperate for the common good.