Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice!
—Philippians 4:4
Everyone at PTL was eager to promote CeCe from the beginning. They loved showing off her talent.
“You’ll not be disappointed,” Tammy said to the live and television audiences.
What she didn’t have to point out was the fact that CeCe was African American. I suppose they wanted to share with their audience that they were becoming diverse and that the audience could look forward to more of this on the horizon.
Even though Tammy was trying to show that PTL was diverse, singling out CeCe was a little jarring. It felt as though the Bakkers were just getting used to the idea of having black people on their show. Tammy had every good intention, and genuinely loved people, and most certainly loved CeCe. But when you come from a place where race isn’t pointed out to a place where the color of your skin makes you feel as though you come from another planet, it takes some getting used to.
After making sure everyone knew CeCe was African American, Tammy segued into the hymn “Blessed Assurance.” Some of the lyrics of that song read: “This is my story, this is my song / Praising my Savior, all the day long.” Well, that was only true of one of us. I was bagging groceries and stocking shelves all the day long. CeCe was the one singing praises all day long.
Howard caught up with me early on and asked how things were going. I was struggling.
“Did I make this trip and agree to help CeCe and live here, all so I could work at the grocery store?” I lamented.
Howard tried to lay Mom and Dad’s advice on me. But I already knew it.
“Yes, I know God has a plan for my life. But when am I going to see that plan unfold? And is it going to unfold here? Have I made a mistake?”
It was good to have Howard around, someone who knew us and a safe person I could open up to about my struggles.
Questions, questions, questions plagued me.
But Howard encouraged me and informed me of an opportunity in the choir. He led the choir, so he knew that this could potentially be a stepping-stone to something more. But when you’re eighteen years old, you don’t always see that far ahead. Most of the time teens are too busy fretting about today to find the joy on the horizon of tomorrow. And that was true of me. I didn’t know what seemed worse: the grocery store or the choir. But I reminded myself of the opportunity. Maybe this was part of God’s plan for my life.
Not being hired for what I thought I was born to do wasn’t easy. Rejection is normal in life, but I’ve come to understand the best part of life is surviving rejection and letting it become the fuel that takes you straight to your destiny.
It wasn’t long after my lament to Howard about my situation as a bag boy that he invited me to practice with the choir along with the PTL Singers on a Sunday morning at the Barn, which was a beautiful facility that was sometimes used for special evening performances. And these performances were televised. On this particular Sunday morning, CeCe was going to lead a verse of the old Fanny Crosby hymn “Blessed Assurance.” Howard had planned for me to step out on CeCe’s verse near the end and riff on it. Now, if you don’t know this hymn, you really should find an old hymnal and read the words. They’re lovely. The second half of the second verse reads:
Angels, descending, bring from above
Echoes of mercy, whispers of love.
When that moment came in the song, I gave “whispers of love” all the love I had inside me. It was one of those moments that freezes in your mind, and you revisit it often—especially when your life and career get you down, you remember those moments when you stood shining before God, feeling His joy, feeling His gift work in your bones, feeling the satisfaction that comes from exercising that gift, and then you feel all right again. That’s the kind of moment I’m talking about. It was a moment that changed my life and my understanding of how our timing is really sometimes not the right timing at all.
As God would have it, Jim walked from the set and over to the choir. Then he asked, “Who did that? Who sang those whispers of love?” I sheepishly admitted to the riff, thinking I’d crossed the line. There I was, wasting my only chance to use my gift, even though it was with the choir—something I wasn’t thrilled about—and I botched it. Now I was in hot water for trying to add a little soul to the song.
But I was wrong. Jim was not angry. He loved it. He thought it was full of the Holy Spirit. He said he wanted more of whatever I was doing on the song. And then he turned to me and told me that I was now one of the PTL Singers.
I didn’t know how to respond.
CeCe ran over to me and hugged me.
I stammered over my words, trying to thank Mr. Bakker. All I could do was thank him over and over again.
CeCe and I never dreamed we would sing duets together. It was early on in our time with Jim and Tammy Bakker that the opportunity presented itself. Even though the whole Charlotte experience initially made my heart bounce back and forth between feeling rejected and embracing the hope of possibility, I tried to keep my faith. When circumstances shifted, it was faith that gave me the strength to walk into the possibilities—new, scary, very white. God thrust me into it. I seized it.
Our first appearance on the show was a duet, and it was a doozy.
We were standing side by side, all tense and fidgety, getting ready to sing together on live television for the first time. The producer shouted for people to take their places and for the lights to come up.
“It’s happening. It’s really happening!” I wanted to pinch myself, but I was so focused on the moment.
Then, from the back of the set, Tammy walked in and stood right next to me. I was not ready for that. I stood as straight as an arrow. Nervous. Trying to keep it together. She could sense my nervousness, I think. She said, “Everything’s going to be just fine. God will be our confidence.”
And then Jim entered. “Good morning,” he said to everyone right as the countdown started.
“Ten, nine, eight…”
Jim kept talking, reassuring us that God was going to use us and that we’d be a blessing to the masses.
“Seven, six, five…”
The producer continued the countdown and Tammy, who was standing between me and the piano, placed her finger on the piano. Then the lid of the piano slammed down on her hand.
“Shit!” Tammy said it so loud, I couldn’t believe it. CeCe and I were like deer in headlights, full of disbelief, looking straight ahead. But the countdown continued. This was live television, in mere seconds.
But in that split second, my whole world shifted like an earthquake had moved it off its mark.
The producer ended the countdown, and the lights came up. And without missing a beat, Tammy greeted the viewing audience, “Praise the Lord!”
“Shit!” and “Praise the Lord!” within the span of a few seconds. What had just happened? Were my ears playing tricks on me?
The show went on, and CeCe and I and the rest of the singers sang the opening song. Afterward, I wondered if anyone other than CeCe and I had heard Tammy curse. I wondered what we’d gotten ourselves into. I even questioned whether we had made the right choice in joining the singers. You’d think my first thought would have been about how we sounded and if people seemed to like it. I immediately asked CeCe, “Do you think anybody else heard Tammy curse on air?” CeCe didn’t think so and also shared my surprise and questioned what we’d gotten ourselves into.
“Shit!” and “Praise the Lord!” in the same sentence from a Christian woman?
Was I living in a nightmare? But this wasn’t a dream at all! This was my new reality. We were a long way from home and the church and Christianity I thought I knew. My world was upside down. Everything about our PTL experience was different. These people spoke differently, and they drank different drinks that were not of the Lord! But I’ll get into the drinking later.
The swearing-Tammy incident was an event for me. It rocked my world. But it pushed me into discovering some of these truths on my own. I saw that there was more grace in some of these gray areas than I once believed. Church life and grace life grow and morph with you. When you’re a kid and church is your everything, you accept it and love it and continue on with your life.
But when you embark upon adulthood, you begin to see things from the new vantage point of age and experience. Sure, I loved church when I was younger. I still love church. It’s a central part to the rhythm of my life. But at the same time, as much as I loved the experience of church when I was younger, the rules that accompanied church felt heavy at times.
CeCe couldn’t wear makeup as a teenager. That was worldly. And young men did not wear beards. We dressed our best, because Jesus cared what we looked like when we sang our songs to Him. And music? Gospel music was it. Secular music? No way. That was worldly music. You risked going to hell if you listened to secular music. That was the Devil’s tool for evil.
My dad didn’t allow us to say certain things; certainly we were not allowed to use profanity. We even couldn’t say things like, “Shut up”; yes, that was pushing it. Living in the world, you’re going to hear everything. But that was the world, Dad said. We didn’t speak like the world. But when we moved to Charlotte, I realized that these brothers and sisters used curse words. Were they going to hell? Were they really even Christians at all?
How you grow up shapes your worldview. And when you step out of the world you know into a new place, with new people, your eyes open. Sometimes that’s good, sometimes bad, but always a revelation. When CeCe and I stepped off the bus with Mom, stepping foot in Charlotte for the first time, our eyes were opened. In many ways it was our first steps into liberation.
Slowly, CeCe and I were liberated from all those silly rules that kept blinders on us. PTL was makeup land. The world of cosmetics. CeCe became a cosmetic girl. No more using Vaseline as lip gloss. Now it was real makeup—the kind in the commercials! Worldly! Oh, Lord!
On one occasion, our entire group of singers went out to eat at Bennigan’s after doing a show. We sat in the tavern section. I looked around and thought, “Oh, Lord, what am I getting myself into?” CeCe and I didn’t drink alcohol. That was Devil water. We all took our seats, and the man next to me began taking drink orders. When he came to me, I told the group, “Hey, y’all, I’m a Christian. I’ll have a Diet Coke.” Everyone laughed.
I could not believe my eyes. Real Christians sat on each side of me, drinking alcoholic beverages. I was drinking Diet Coke, but I still feared going to hell for sitting in that sinful place with these people who called themselves Christians and drank ALCOHOL!
I still don’t drink alcohol. I prefer an icy ginger ale. But I don’t judge Christians with integrity sitting around, having a great time, and enjoying a beer or glass of wine. Some will say I have matured as a Christian, and others will say I am a backslider.
The Lord has brought me a long way, and my eyes were opened with regard to how to get along with saints who were raised differently and also love the Lord. In that moment when Tammy screamed, “Shit!” growth happened. It was confusing, but it was also the beginning of a liberation. I realized that God’s family doesn’t look or act like any one kind of person. You can be a white Southern lady or man in a Bennigan’s enjoying a beer or glass of wine and still be part of God’s family. You can be a black man in the South, sipping some ginger ale and still be part of God’s family. I learned that God’s family was much bigger than Detroit. All these years later I can say emphatically that God’s family is bigger than any one person’s experience or context. God only cares that you love Him and that you love others.
I enjoyed watching my mom and dad step into the same liberation over the years. Once my mother was at home singing while she dusted the furniture. My brother Ronald walked through the room but stopped when he heard what Momma was singing.
“Momma, is that Whitney Houston you’re singing?”
“Oh, is it?” she replied, playing dumb.
“Yeah, Momma. You’re singing ‘Where Do Broken Hearts Go’ by Whitney Houston.” She kept on humming.
So there you have it. Even my own mother can enjoy Whitney’s music. And who couldn’t, right?
Music was something else that expanded when we arrived in Charlotte. Being part of The PTL Club, CeCe and I met many singers, including Sandi Patty and Amy Grant, both early pioneers in the Contemporary Christian Music (CCM) scene. Amy Grant went on to be one of the first highly successful CCM singers to cross over into the general (or “secular”) market.
For young singers with high hopes and dreams for our own careers, meeting real-life singers was so impactful. It showed me that the church—the family of God—didn’t look only like Detroit. It looked like Charlotte, and New York, and Nashville. Everyone I met loved Jesus, but they were so different from me and CeCe. I was young, but not too young to realize that this experience was going to be a stepping-stone that would change my life, and my understanding of people, forever.
* * *
Our performance of the song couldn’t have gone better. The reaction of the crowd was overwhelming. In spite of all the pressure, we stayed true to who we were.
After the show ended and the lights came down, Jim and Tammy ran to us and hugged us over and over, telling us how wonderful we’d done. Jim kept saying how he knew we’d do well. He was like a mini-prophet. He told us God was going to do great things with us. But all I could think about was Tammy’s language and how relieved I was to have that number over and done with.
It was a confusing time for me, as a growing young man and as a singer. I wanted to excel, to take advantage of the opportunity, but I was conflicted because Christians in the South were so different than in Detroit. But the longer we performed with the folks on PTL, the more comfortable it all became. Although I didn’t start cursing, I did begin to flourish where God planted me.