Esau McCaulley
11 min read ⭑
“Sometimes we judge the outcomes of God’s leading by some material benefit, but I think that the truth is, no matter what happens to us externally, we always have the opportunity to become more like Jesus.”
The following is a transcript of a live interview. Responses have been edited and condensed for brevity and clarity.
QUESTION #1: ACQUAINT
There’s much more to food than palate and preference. How does a go-to meal at your favorite hometown restaurant reveal the true you behind the web bio?
Everyone’s favorite spot when I was in high school was a barbecue place. It was in a storefront and kind of moved around the community in Huntsville, Alabama, where I’m from. They had these really good Southern barbecue sandwiches with coleslaw that came wrapped in aluminum. It wasn’t even real packaging — just normal tinfoil. All you had to do was walk up to the site, and the food you got was delicious. We would always get it after school.
That place represented the way my neighborhood functioned. The exterior of the barbecue spot wasn’t that nice, but the food it produced was good and you had to know about it to appreciate it. In some way, that’s kind of like my neighborhood. People might look at it from the outside one way, but there was actually some stuff going on that was life giving inside. It was good barbecue, and barbecue is linked to the South, so that’s what I thought of first.
Tony Hughes; Wheaton College
QUESTION #2: REVEAL
We’ve all got quirky proclivities and out-of-the-way interests. So what are yours? What so-called “nonspiritual” activities do you love and help you find spiritual renewal?
I’m a huge sports fanatic and especially a fan of LeBron James. I think he’s the best basketball player of all time. I’m prone to give a theological take on social media and then follow it up with about 15 sports takes. One thing about me is that I enjoy watching great athletic prowess and often think about what it means to dedicate your entire life to a physical skill. In a way, I do the same thing with a mental skill — mostly writing.
People judge me for the way I approach sports fandom, especially since I change who I support every so often. But here’s the thing: I really like the Bible and I’ve read most of it — some of it multiple times — and nowhere in the Bible does it say you have to support one team your entire life. It’s not in the Scriptures!
So I switch teams from time to time because it’s boring watching your team lose all the time. I usually pick a player I really like and follow their career, and when they retire, I pick another player. For example, I like Tom Brady, but he recently retired, so I have to find a new favorite quarterback. And in that sense, I’m a true sports hypocrite.
The other quirky thing about me is that I really love fantasy and science fiction. So when I’m not reading theology and writing, I really like to sit down with a good science fiction book. Why? Mostly because it helps me imagine a different world. Sometimes the world I inhabit is kind of stressful. And it’s not that those fictional worlds aren’t stressful, but it’s often different from the bad we have here. I want a fictional account to take me out of this world’s real-life stress and imagine a different place. So I do enjoy a good bit of escapist fantasy fiction and preferably a long series where not all the characters are jerks.
QUESTION #3: CONFESS
Every superhero has a weakness. Every human, too. We’re just good at faking it. But who are we kidding? We’re broken and in this thing together. So what’s your kryptonite and how do you hide it?
When it comes to writers or public figures (or whatever it is that I am), people sometimes think that we’re impervious to pain and, therefore, it’s okay to talk about us in ways that they wouldn’t talk to someone face to face. One weakness I have is that I’m not impervious to criticism, and it hurts. I often say that people can’t stop what God is doing in their lives, but they can steal the joy from it. And I’m probably guilty of letting people who don’t really know me steal some of the joy from the things I do. In other words, I would say I’m “criticizable.” I feel things, and while that feeling sometimes helps me have empathy, it also means that I’m prone to take criticism too much to heart and allow it to discourage me.
QUESTION #4: FIRE UP
Tell us about your toil. How are you investing your professional time right now? What’s your obsession? And why should it be ours?
There are always two obsessions going on in the life of a writer — the thing people know about and the thing you’re currently working on. There’s a time lag between when you finish something and when people hear about it. For instance, a year and a half ago, I was really excited about a book I was writing about Lent. (And I remain excited now that it’s coming out!)
Growing up in a liturgical context, I practiced Lent and the prayers of Lent. The concept of the season itself really appealed to me. So I wanted to write an accessible book that helped people who were not from a liturgical context as well as people who had been a part of the liturgical world to find a renewed inspiration to pursue Lent. That’s the book that’s currently out right now, and it’s called “Lent: The Season of Repentance and Renewal.”
More recently, I finished a memoir called “How Far to the Promised Land: One Black Family’s Story of Hope and Survival in the American South.” That work builds on the story of the community that shaped me. In that sense, it’s kind of a prequel to “Reading While Black: African American Biblical Interpretation as an Exercise in Hope.” If “Reading While Black” is the spiritual fruit of what I learned growing up in the South, “How Far to the Promised Land” reveals how I got there and the family that shaped me. I’m excited to say I just completed it and turned in the final approval of the final edits a couple of weeks ago. It will be published in September 2023 and is available for preorder now.
QUESTION #5: BOOST
Cashiers, CEOs, contractors or customer service reps, we all need grace flowing into us and back out into the world. How does the Holy Spirit invigorate your work? And how do you know it’s God when it happens?
I always hope it’s God when it happens. Paul says, “I am not aware of anything against me, but this does not make me innocent” (1 Corinthians 4:4a, CJB) And there’s a prayer in Psalm 19:12 that, to paraphrase, says, “Lord, cleanse me from my hidden faults or sins that I don’t know about.” For us writers, I think there’s always a danger that at the bottom of our hearts, there’s an attempt to glorify ourselves and show off our rhetorical skills.
On one level, I know it’s God by the discernment of the community that receives the work. I write as faithfully as I can and then send the message out into the world and hope Christians take what is good and have grace upon what is bad. I don’t know if there’s a guarantee that it’s always of the Spirit. I try to think along with the church and the great tradition of whatever I write, but I’m a human being, and I know sometimes I fall short.
That said, most of my creative stuff just comes to me. I try to be very present in the world around me and ask myself, What is God doing around me and how can I communicate that in an interesting way? What does the church need at this moment and how I can communicate that in a way that inspires people?
Sometimes, though, you can’t see your mistakes until someone points them out to you. Someone may send me an email to point out an error, and I’ll say, “Correct, I was inadequate there.” But on the other, more positive side, people will also say, “Oh, I used something that you wrote in a sermon” or “Something you wrote or said in an interview helped me cope through a spiritually difficult time.”
So I don’t judge my work by how many sales it has. Instead, I try to take encouragement anytime someone says to me, “Your book or something you wrote helped make me a better Christian or a better person.” That’s how I judge whether or not God is at work through me — if it helps others pursue Christ more faithfully.
QUESTION #6: inspire
Scripture and tradition beckon us into the rich and varied actions that open our hearts to the presence of God. So spill it, which spiritual practice is workin’ best for you right now?
I am, by nature, a disorganized person, so I need someone to put the spiritual practices in order for me. Whenever I just open up the Bible or try to read the Bible on my own, I do a really bad job with it. But “The Book of Common Prayer,” especially “Morning Prayer,” and its readings, prayers and creeds remain my constant anchor as a spiritual practice. I return to it whenever I feel like I’m at sea.
I wake up in the morning, come downstairs and make coffee, and then I go into my office and open up my prayer book. It has set prayers that you repeat every day and don’t change. What do change, though, are the readings. Then I read a psalm, an Old Testament passage, and a New Testament passage every morning and reserve time at the end to pray and listen to God. During that time, I try to talk to God, but I also try to leave space for God to speak to me. That time of prayer at the beginning with structured readings and set prayers allows me to still my heart and listen to God.
I try to make sure there’s consistency in what I sense God is telling me to do. I try not to go on one moment of prayer because that could be my own deception. Instead, I tend to return to something over and over again and ask, “God, are you sure this is you?” And then I’ll say to other people I trust and who are key parts of my life, “Hey, I feel like God is leading me in this direction. Do you sense the same thing?” I try to discern these repeated prayers and bring that into a conversation with other people who know me and care about me and ask them if they feel like this is good, right and from the Lord. Then I try to listen to what they share. It doesn’t do you much good to have wise counsel and not listen to it.
God’s leading doesn’t guarantee success. Sometimes you face suffering. I don’t think there’s a guaranteed outcome on fidelity to God. For example, there have been things I turned down or that I said yes to that ended up not being extremely successful. Sometimes we judge the outcomes of God’s leading by some material benefit, but I think that the truth is, no matter what happens to us externally, we always have the opportunity to become more like Jesus. And I would hope that I would obey what God tells me in prayer (and maybe another faithful Christian, too) even if it doesn’t always lead to more public acclaim or success.
QUESTION #7: FOCUS
Our email subscribers get free ebooks featuring our favorite resources — lots of things that have truly impacted our faith lives. But you know about some really great stuff, too. What are three resources that have impacted you?
From the time I was a kid and throughout high school, I was not a big reader of theological matters. Growing up, the strongest influence on me was my mother, who prayed for us and taught us to love Scripture, as well as the local church we went to, its Sunday school teachers, and the pastor who preached there. This taught me that the best thing you can do for your spiritual life and that of the people around you is to get involved in a local church that believes the Scriptures, preaches the Scriptures and helps people live them out.
I was raised by a single mother, but despite the difficulties that came with raising children alone, she pointed me to the source of my hope. There’s a saying in the Catholic tradition that saints aren’t an exegesis of the Bible, but rather the lives of saints are an interpretation of what it means to follow Jesus.
Reading about the lives of the saints can teach you how to be a Christian. So I learned how to be a Christian by looking at my mother, my pastor, the Sunday school teachers and the church deacons who would come speak to me, support me at my sporting events and encourage me.
Later on, the works of C.S. Lewis, the writings of Frederick Douglass, and other thinkers I came across later in life were a way for me to intellectually make sense of this love of God that was built in me when I was a kid. And that’s because there’s life within the local church. People can read all the books they want, but they won’t find a living, breathing thing that makes what they learn sustainable apart from the local church.
We all have things we cling to to survive (or thrive) in tough times. Name one resource you’ve found indispensable in this current season — and tell us what it’s done for you.
There’s a podcast video series called the Jude 3 Project. It’s run by a woman named Lisa Fields, who does a great job of answering questions about the faith that arise within the black community. So I always recommend that people look them up.
Another great organization is called the AND Campaign, which argues that what the church in our culture needs is a gospel-centered worldview committed to compassion and justice, especially as relates to the public witness of the church.
And lastly, I would have you listen to the sermons at Progressive Baptist Church in the South Side of Chicago and the pastor is Dr. Charlie Dates.
You should also subscribe to either the YouTube channel or the podcast. They advise me every week, and I would recommend that to anybody.
QUESTION #8: dream
God is continually stirring new things in each of us. So give us the scoop! What’s beginning to stir in you but not yet fully awakened? What can we expect from you in the future?
I have another book project I’m considering, but the publisher says I can’t tell anybody about it yet. But what I can tell you is that something is stirring that you may hear about in due course.
Overall, though, as I mentioned earlier, the most recent thing I’m looking forward to is the book I just finished.
Also, there’s another book set to come out in 2024 that I can’t wait for people to see. It’s called “God’s Colorful Kingdom Storybook Bible: The Story of God’s Big, Diverse Family.” It’s a children’s Bible I wrote that brings together 15 stories of the Old and New Testaments in language that’s accessible to young people.
So those are the projects that I’ve already completed. And the one that’s stirring? All I can tell you is that it’s coming!
How do you judge your own work? How do you know it’s good enough or that it accomplished what it was supposed to?
We appreciate Esau’s answer to these questions. Instead of relying on book sales or other people’s praise, he looks at the impact his work makes on people’s lives and how it helps them know Jesus better. It reminds us of what Paul wrote in Galatians 1:10 (NIV):
“Am I now trying to win the approval of men, or of God? Or am I trying to please men? If I were still trying to please men, I would not be a servant of Christ.”
The next time you and I are tempted to judge our work based on the world’s external measurements or others’ approval, let’s remember our true calling — simply being a servant of Christ.
Esau McCaulley, Ph.D., is an associate professor of New Testament at Wheaton College and theologian in residence at Progressive Baptist Church, a historically black congregation in Chicago. He’s the author of Sharing in the Son’s Inheritance, Reading While Black: African American Biblical Interpretation as an Exercise in Hope (which has won numerous awards, including Christianity Today’s Book of the Year) and a children’s book titled Josey Johnson’s Hair and the Holy Spirit. His writings appear in publications like The New York Times, The Atlantic, The Washington Post and Christianity Today. He and his wife, Mandy, have four wonderful children.
