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good morning to you. this is "mosaic". welcome. it is always a privilege to host "mosaic" on behalf of my cohost , elizabeth. there is a passage of scripture in the 131st psalms that says , how wonderful and beautiful it is for the brothers to dwell in unity and harmony, some translations say. and the contemporary translations say brothers and sisters. but for our purpose of our theme today, we will stay with brothers. brothers to brothers . i have had the privilege of going to this group brothers to brothers a few times now and i will come back and go back. when i asked them, that i would like them to have a representative from "mosaic" to be on the program, they almost unanimously recommend reginald lyles. welcome. >> a pleasure to be here. >> thank you for taking the time to be here. this morning.

i always like my audience to know who you are . some of your background and history. share a little bit about your experiences have been. >> i am race in oakland, north oakland. although i lived in other places in the city of oakland. i am a member of allen temple baptist church. been there for 40 years. i was the chairman of the deacon lord one time. i am still a deacon. i am a servant. a believer. i teach class 9, sunday school class. adult class. 35 or 40 people attend every sunday. we tried to make the word become alive in our lives and our context , as our understanding. i also teach old testament. i am old testament

one and two, with the leadership institute that was founded by dr. smith, sr. i am a seminarian graduate. graduate of san francisco state. high school at oakland tech. i am married to dolores gibson lyles . the flower of berkeley. >> she will be looking at this. >> yes. >> we live in marin county. i was in law enforcement for 30 years . started in the berkeley police department for 20 years and came over to novato as a captain and then deputy chief. i still live in novato . >> i told you earlier i did not know you have that police background in law enforcement. i was at a gym one day and they said that their church

with allen temple do a lot of work and reginald lyles has been the liaison. and they said, he is a police officer and i did not know that. yes, he has had a lot of experience with law-enforcement . and a great reputation for that. >> i always believed in matthew 5, blessed are the peacemakers . for they should be called children of god . i always wanted to be a peacemaker as opposed to a peacekeeper. anybody can keep the peace, if you have enough power and weapons and authority. but it makes a, a peacemaker have to listen and understand all factions and try to navigate and create a peaceful solution. >> that is a great way to look at it. >> where everybody is affirmed and left toll. >> i like the concept and understanding. we know there has been a lot of tension in our communities, the american community with police. i'm sure

you have had to walk that line at times . >> i have been one of their fears critics . i love cops but i have to be honest, in the last 20-25 years, they have walked away from their ethical positioning. on all of them. >> no. >> not all of them. there is a percentage that have walked away from the ethical understanding of who and what they are in our society and community. thereby we have mario woods and eric gardner , philando castile. >> you are speaking from experience. not outside from the inside and that makes a difference. >> they are not happy, some are not happy. but the truth is, the light. you have to get

back to ethics. >> the truth sets us free. >> mario woods, 5'6î, 114 , 120 pounds. homeless with a penknife and nine officers stop him . they all shoot him . terrible. >> we will come back to brothers to brothers but i'm glad we had this introduction of what you do and who you are. thank you for being with us. join us in our next segment. with reginald lyles. brothers to brothers and some of the work he is doing.

welcome back to mosaic. i am ron swisher. we have been speaking to reginald lyles and you heard some of his great background and experience and one of the reasons i invited him was to talk about brothers to brothers. tell us about brothers to brothers . >> brothers to brothers has been going on for about 20 plus years. it emanated or started from a gentleman named her often. he was trying to bring african-american men together and focusing on bible study and navigating life. and so it started with two or three friends that he knew that attended church with

him . and it has grown to now. we have a session every tuesday night and maybe 65 or 70 men come and they are an eclectic group. we have adventurous, baptists, a large group of catholic, we have muslims that attend and we have some people who are agnostic , et cetera. >> even a methodist now. >> even a methodist. and we have folk who have been very accomplished in their careers. we fed presidents of colleges. former mayors. and city council persons. lawyers,

businessmen, developers. >> one of the things i found interesting, my first time they said they wanted two things not to be mentioned. your title and your denomination. is that right? >> correct . >> you don't get in the way. >> you have to be that the door. they tried to go on first name basis . the respect everyone. we have to listen . that is what were working hard on. forcing ourselves and sometimes it has to be forced to really hear what your brother is saying and we use the platform of studying the scriptures. we read the bible from genesis to revelation's. and start over again and go genesis to revelation. >> how many times have you been through the bible? >> i would say 10 plus years, at least four times. sometimes we get three or four versus and then people

raise their hand and have a question or they want to expound on the passage. and from that exchange , we believe what needs to come out and needs to be heard, is heard. >> i heard you mention earlier that you teach the he be the scriptures, old testament. >> yes . >> why that? some people would say why not the new testaments, the gospels, being the primary choice? the old testament some people say it is difficult and challenging. >> it is , in some places. but it is important that we understand we who follow jesus christ need to understand that jesus christ was a christian. he did not read paul and he did not read matthew or mark or luke . he was trying to reflect on the profits and the law and he was trying to say , i think,

this is how you have been taught. i want to reveal to you another way of looking at this, in the context of where you are and where you are living now. this is not to be a word from god that is exclusionary. but inclusive. i think when we understand that , and the attributes of christ, then i believe we can understand better how we should live. what was jesus talking about when he was quoting isaiah? what was this elijah moment when he was running away from the profits . what was that about? do we have the same situations here? i don't think you could really understand new testament scriptures unless you understand what they were

fighting off of . how they are evolving off of that. they are echoing off of what they know, what they have been taught and launching out into a new way of applying it to their lives. >> paul would say, without the roots you don't get the fruits. you need that history and heritage. >> you sound like a rapper. >> every now and again. >> without the roots you don't get the fruits. we should not call it the old testament . we should understand it as such and we should understand who those people were. they were african asiatic people. we should embrace that and understand that. and apply that evolution , how the scriptures evolved through time to the day and how we are evolving. i don't believe god has stopped revealing godself

to god's creation. >> one of the teams of the united church of christ is god is still speaking. i like that. >> i like that. >> i noticed in the two times i have come that each individual is able to speak. and you say listening is some of the skills we develop. i did not see anyone saying, you are wrong to say that. >> we don't allow that. we don't allow that and we also don't allow arguments. we can have an exchange, you can have a person saying i believe it is this and this is how i heard it and another person will say, i heard this . but we don't have that direct back and forth argument or debate . >> why is that? too much conflict? >> people's feelings get hurt and we are not there to hurt or trample on anyone's feelings. we are there to open their mind. we believe in the renewing of the mind. i have

heard often times folks would say, i have never heard it like that before. that is fine. as you well know, learning can be a struggle. and it takes courage, doesn't it ? you have to launch out on things you don't know and see if it is being raised. we pray for the presence of the holy spirit. we believe that the holy spirit is an entity and agent that is here with us . we are guided by it. >> you also pray for others. we want to come back to another segment . it is so inspiring. but we need to take a break. we will come right back . please join us again with reginald lyles, brothers to brothers.

as reginald mentioned earlier, there are brothers from all backgrounds that come. one of the persons who come is an author and he happens to have the author's book. i think it would be good to lift him up and tell us who he is. >> yes . his name is ronald cole. he is reverend ronald cole. his book is, paying attention. the inspirational journey. ronald cole is a dear friend and i think we met one another when we were in fourth grade, third or fourth grade. he is a phenomenal minister of god. and servant of god. and we both serve under jaclyn thompson. the senior pastor at allen temple baptist church. this is a great book. a great read for men to see how god is

using an individual. this gentleman is a very uncommon man but he writes for the common man. >> okay. okay. why brothers? why men? why the emphasis? >> well, that is one of the struggling issues of our growth, i have heard folks say , we need a time where we can be alone and to talk and et cetera. i hope that we can evolve into having men and women . but at this point, that is where it is . we have our treats and we have a retreat every year. we have brought in dr. jaclyn thompson who presented in front of us and reverend dr. -- reverend dr. pope , has also presented and

dr. thompson did a session for us together >> i'll see it as sexist by any means. i see it as men need certain things to address and women have certain groups. that's the way i see it . >> you are probably right about that but, i think we need to of the time when we come together. we will see what happens. we will follow the holy spirit and see what happens. i could take it either way. >> as i mentioned earlier, in the introduction, the contemporary translations says brothers and sisters in harmony and unity. >> yes . >> that is the ultimate. >> if the bible was written by women it would probably be a lot different. a lot of versus would not be there. the man is submitting an all that language -- >> women would be silent. that was around us.

>> i was in seminary and heard a story about howard thurman, he was reading the scripture to his grandmother. no formal education. it came to the point where it said women should be silent in church. she said, don't read that part. also the part about -- >> servants be obedient to masters. and she said she does not want to hear that. >> which is away about controlling people. i think the gospel is liberating. i believe in the liberation theology and that is the context from which i calm. and that is what i tried to promulgate. >> another interesting discussion when i went the last time, we talked about the text

in the context of people's lives. some people wanted to talk about the context of people's lives and we had a long discussion about that before we got into the bible study. some people say we are here for the text. what are your thoughts on that? >> it has to be a combination. i don't think that literalists studying the text without context, without making some application, the text will not serve us. the bible is not merely a history less than. -- lesson. when we look at it like that, that allows us to not think that we have to act out the bible is osseous to act. -- what the bible is asking us to act. it is outside of us. but the word of god is supposed to be in us and we are supposed to apply our lives and our action on behaviors based on the truth and heroes in the

bible. if a hero does something that is not godly, we are not to replicate it because it is in the bible. the text has to be challenged , it has to be wrestled with , within the confines of where we are living. i don't believe god would come to me and speak to me in a mandarin language. i don't understand mandarin. god will speak to me in the language and context of which i understand and use me where god would want me to be used. >> i think the bible is alive . because 3000 plus years ago it spoke to the people then added still speaks to us now. and that is what makes is a dynamic. >> i want to clean this up. i think god does speak to folks who speak mandarin. >> we have one more segment. and thank you so much for all that you shared. please join us in our last segment with

reginald lyles. and we speak about scripture and how important it is to our lives.

we are so grateful for reginald lyles as we speak about the bible and the scripture . we want to say in these last few minutes , how does that word speak to us nowadays? >> we live in difficult times, as you know. we have a person in the white house who is

antithetical, as far as i am concerned and mean-spirited and causing a lot of pain. so the scripture will educate us on folks like that. and tell us not to give up hope or faith that god is still in the blessing business. and that these better times are on the horizon. >> what about those who are considered evangelical, who overwhelmingly support the president? >> i don't know how you can overwhelmingly support someone who lies and has the horrible moral lifestyle that this one has. i pray for my evangelical brothers that they will wake up. they are not supposed to follow that type of leadership. >> think that is pretty

provocative and challenging. i don't censor anyone who comes on my show. i want everyone to hear what you have said. and i appreciate your thoughts. >> if you are following someone who can separate babies from others, something is wrong with your application of jesus christ and his love for his people. >> how would you apply it in terms of seeing the scripture in light of that. you quote scripture quite well. what are some of the scriptures that would back that kind of injustice, against injustice. >> first of all , you know what is good. justice, mercy , walk humbly before your god. michael 6:4. he is not doing justice . he is in oligarch . and mean-spirited. and he has

caused more pain than not. >> why do you think micah put justice first before love and humility. >> i believe justice is the foundation of love. you have people who could love a lot of things, gambling, drugs, money. but justice is the foundation, which the house of love is constructed upon. if no justice exists, then you cannot love a person. that is why understand the song, what does love have to do with it? >> how can anyone disagree with that. that was dr. king. i understand why people welcomed or asked you to be the spokesperson for brothers to brothers. thank you, reginald. >> thank you. >> i will see you soon . i will be at brothers to brothers. >> come early and have a meal with us . thank you for being with us. i am ron swisher. see you next month.

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