Sublime

filled with the kind of determined cheer that masked a deeper despair.

He conducts an ongoing interrogation about what it all means. What’s black culture? What’s hip-hop? What are the responsibilities of a society and the people in it? And his inquiry isn’t bloodlessly academic, either; there’s something very consequential about his approach.

In situations like this, it is controlled chaos. I wish I had the code to unlock Michael’s mind. But no such code exists. All I can bring to the conversation are my heart and my trust that God wants me in the midst of this chaos. The imprisoned are the poorest of the poor. If the heart of God is to be found anywhere, it is to be found in the hole.

If there is a fundamental challenge within these stories, it is simply to change our lurking suspicion that some lives matter less than other lives. William Blake wrote, “We are put on earth for a little space that we might learn to bear the beams of love.” Turns out this is what we all have in common, gang member and nongang member alike: we’re ju