I'm in no rush to get there, but I often wonder what heaven is like. Creation is groaning. The world is not the way God intended it to be. So heaven weighs heavy on my heart.
My idea of heaven is colored by heavy bass lines and thumping drum beats. When I imagine heaven, I see baggy pants and Jordans, suits and church hats, sweatpants and chinos. I smell gardens and slums, flowers and cinnamon. I see basketball courts, asphalt and forests. I imagine the ground shaking as people from all nations dance to an eternal beat. In my divine imagination, heaven is a hip hop block party.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of hip-hop's birth. From the rubble of gentrification and political abandonment in New York's South Bronx, overlooked black and brown kids took turntables and records to create new words, beats, movements and art. They built community and kinship, created meaning and culture, and fostered a sense of self-worth in a world that hated them. “We were using our time to make things that made us feel good and that united us,” Cold Crush Brothers member Easy A.D. told oral historian Jonathan Abrams. “Imagine walking out of your house every day and finding abandoned cars burning and buildings empty and going to elementary school.”
Drawing on a rich heritage of African oral culture and black prophetic tradition, hip hop offered hope to those on the margins while also criticizing society. Hip hop culture delivered messages of joy, social awareness, cultural consciousness, resistance, activism, and community involvement. My college years were filled with memories of D.Nice warning us that participating in street violence would lead to self-destruction, and Queen Latifah calling for respect for black women in “UNITY.” The prophetic message, set over a dope beat, depicted an apocalyptic block party where everyone thrives. Hip hop created a space in the slums of the South Bronx to imagine a paradise on earth.
In his 1993 single, hip-hop artist Tupac Shakur asked, “Is there a slum in heaven?” To most people, heaven is the opposite of a slum, which is often viewed as a place of poverty and violence, with little consideration given to the oppressive policies that forced people into these overlooked spaces.
But hip hop made space for beauty in these ghettos. Young people used what was available to them and co-created a culture that gave people of all skin colors a place to live with dignity on their own terms. Imagine that: life and beauty unexpectedly found in a space reserved for death.
Jesus knew slums well – his hometown of Nazareth was a poor and forgotten town that was often mocked for its reputation (see John 1:46) – and I don’t think it’s a coincidence that Jesus used his own victory over death to invite us to a new way of life, to meet us where we are and empower us to see beauty in the midst of anticipating death.
Yet despite Jesus' example, churches often prefer the safety and order of clean buildings to unknown spaces in need. While many churches do the necessary work of meeting people's immediate needs, such as feeding and clothing, few challenge the systems that allow slums to continue to exist in the world in the first place. And even fewer take the time to recognize the beauty that is already present in these spaces. God is already in these spaces. Churches must recognize that sometimes our role is to meet God in these spaces.
In contrast, hip hop culture has empowered young black and brown people and provided a space for creative and subversive expressions of joy while participating in resistance and advocacy. For many, hip hop is more than just music; it is a movement that supports justice movements and knowledge building. Organizations like the Hip Hop Caucus, the Hip Hop Advocacy Center, and even my work with SojoAction use hip hop thinking to fight for social change.
I think the church must return to its origins: meeting people where they are, speaking life into places of death and destruction. And let us remember that the church has adapted to the realities of new situations before. I think of the quiet retreats of antebellum America, where enslaved people interpreted the Bible for themselves, trusting in a God to free them. These were places of safety and joy in the face of physical bondage and emotional devastation, and they became the forerunners of the black church. I think of early Methodist churches growing across North America, inviting all to come, spreading a simple proclamation of the gospel that reached literate and illiterate, rich and poor.
In other words, churches need to take a cue from hip hop and rediscover the power of remixing, transforming what has been deemed old and worthless into spaces of beauty, hope, and prosperity.
Of course, hip-hop, like the church, is not perfect. Both have been criticized (rightly!) for violence, misogyny, and corruption. But what we see in hip-hop (and not so much in the church) is a willingness to innovate while still respecting the old. Hip-hop is celebrating its 50th anniversary, but there is still room for both older hip-hop fans and Gen Z to get involved. We see this innovation when new artists put a twist on existing songs, adding new beats, new lyrics, and even guest artists. Remixes take something new and make something new and fresh.
Yet in the church, older generations struggle to prepare younger leaders. And when the young are ready, the older generation often fails again, refusing to give way. Meanwhile, young people must embrace our history as they begin to lead. Churches would do well to consider how different generations can coexist in leadership, mixing the old and the new to create beautiful new spaces where there is room for both joy and resistance.
In this kind of church, when someone like Tupac picks up the microphone and asks if there are slums in heaven, everyone answers, “Yes.”
