1. When you look back at your life, what are two leadership traits that have served you well?
Mark Cuban: I think caring about people and curiousity, always trying to learn more to be better
2. What should young adults look for, when deciding on a career?
MC: I don’t think they need to find careers. I think they need to find a job and start learning and see where it takes you. I think that everyone should be a free agent, always looking for a way to put themselves in a better situation. If you end up with the same company for 30 years that’s great. But it’s not a necessity
3. When deciding who to work or partner with, what are some nonnegotiable’s for you?
MC: Being nice. Being inclusive. Being knowledgeable. Loving your product so much you are the best salesperson for it
4. You are a man of conviction and character, why is maintaining that important to you?
MC: It’s so much easier when you do the right thing
5. What advice, do you give young investors who want to start investing? What should they look for?
MC: Pay off your credit cards. They suck your savings dry. Save enough to be able to live off of for at least 6 months first. Things go wrong. You want to have that rainy day money available. Then find a low cost SPX mutual fund and take a percent of your salary and invest it every month and then forget it’s there. The longer you can go without touching it, the richer you will be
6. What advice, would you give younger Mark Cuban?
MC: Don’t screw it up. It turns out pretty good 🙂
7. How important is your faith?
MC: I try to never take this life for granted. It’s a gift and I try to enjoy it with my family every single day
Cece Winans is one of the most celebrated Gospel music artists of all time. She has won fifteen Grammys in addition to Dove Awards, Stellar Awards, and many others. As she surpasses the achievements of some of the great artists and exemplars of the faith she looks up to such as Andre Crouch and continues to push her contemporaries and fellow Detroit natives the Clark Sisters, you would think her most important legacy would be music. However for CeCe Winans, the greatest legacy any believer can have is passing on their faith to the next generation. CeCe Winans explores her journey of lifelong faith and her pursuit pass it on to the next generation in her new book Believe For It.
CeCe Winans had an upbringing that most people could not imagine. She was raised in a home with ten siblings who formed multiple musical groups with faith in Jesus Christ at the center of their lives. She was raised in the Church of God in Christ, and like many of her contemporaries brought up in a strict but loving Christian home. She highlights that it was a very intentional decision by her parents to create a home filled with love and faith after neither of them had grown up that way. CeCe contends that it is the intentionality alongside the handwork of raising children to be strong believers that can make a difference for young believers today.
In her book she does not simply tell stories of singing and success. She provides practical principles that she is applying in her own home and church today to ensure her faith in Christ is passed down. Each chapter is broken into easily digestible principles and interlaced with testimonies and stories from Winans’ life. True to her Sunday School roots she ties everything back to scripture as she talks about the importance of starting with faith in the home that translates into the world.
What is fascinating about CeCe Winans sharing this testimony now is that she is the co-pastor of Nashville Life Church that her and her husband started in her living room that is filled with young adults. Churches across the country are struggling today with how to pass on faith to the next generation, how to do multigenerational ministry, and how to preserve the traditions that have preserved us for generations while remaining relevant. And through this book CeCe Winans gives simple and practical keys on how her and her family are doing it. She regularly engages in these topics on her YouTube show Generations, but through the book we get the depth, structure, and narrative that helps us apply the lessons to our lives.
One of the most important keys is relationships. CeCe Winans was shaped by her relationships with her family, church family, and community as a child. Her relationship with Jesus was profoundly shaped by her relationships with other believers. As we embrace new technologies, strategies, and demographics we cannot forget the value of relationships in helping us grow and persevere in faith. I love this book of wisdom. Wisdom is gained from experience and discernment, and as I read it I was able to do both as I consider the impact I have on my own children’s faith. Her legacy for music is also a legacy of sharing faith in God. There are many more keys CeCe shares and her voice through this book is wisdom the Church needs today as we share our faith with the next generation. You can find the book everywhere books are sold this week and check out her latest award winning music video below!
It could be daunting to take over the reins as lead pastor for a church your famous parents planted in 2012, but for Alvin Love III, 35, it was a natural progression that was initially inspired by a powerful encounter he had on a visit to Melbourne Life Church in Australia.
“It was something that was just surprisingly personal and I guess invasive a little bit. I felt like God was looking at me and only me. And that was the first time for me to where I just felt that much attention and that much focus from God and it stopped me in my tracks. I was only planning on staying in Australia for three months. I decided to stay nine months because the discipleship course that the church offered was a nine-month class,” said Love.
From that encounter, Love began sharing his experience with his friends and family and what he felt was in his heart. He learned that a number of his friends were also taking steps to a deeper connection with God. Over the next year, pastors and leaders from Melbourne Life Church came to Nashville and ministered to him and his friends at his parents’ home. It was their ministry that launched Nashville Life Church with 38 members and Pastors Alvin Love II and CeCe Winans as Senior Pastors. Now, in 2020, with about 400 members, he and his friends are leading the congregation. Although some changes are happening, they are learning as they go.
“I’m very different from my parents, but our church has been a collaborative effort. My dad and mom brought me pretty close to the core of what was happening. So though I was never the leader from a governmental and even spiritual point, I’ve always had a prominent voice in the building of the culture and what we have. I think the change is less because I’m in charge and more because I’m evolving and we’re getting better and better,” said Love.
It’s a multicultural church and very diverse in a lot of ways; not just racially, but politically, philosophically, and economically. As would be expected, that naturally has caused some division within the church that Love has had to address head-on. Rather than pick a side or using his platform to speak politically, he emphasizes not letting politics divide the church.
“There’s always been Democrats and Republicans. There’s always been all types of people, and that’s okay. I don’t think that your Christian faith has to dictate where you lean politically, however, as believers, we should never let politics serve as a tool to divide the church that God has called to be one,” said Love.
So what does he believe they should be focused on? What Love says are the “basic beliefs — being a community of faith amidst the social, health, and political unrest. They had to do things a little differently with COVID. Previously, they’d gather more with 12-week small groups. Now, they’re focused on being a source of life and faith for people wherever they are, whether at work, in the neighborhood, or elsewhere. He encourages his members to reach out to people who aren’t part of their church community, or perhaps they’re at the edge of not believing at all.
“Our faith can be that boost they need to come closer to God. I think fear is at an all-time high. I think suicidal thoughts, and mental illness is at an all-time high. And that’s what we’re seeing in our own city. And I think, if nothing else, just the idea of having faith and believing that things are going to turn around and believing that God is still in control and he still loves us, “ said Love.
Love says even as a pastor he has been affected by the woes of 2020 — the isolation, the discouragement, and looking at an Instagram feed and only seeing re-postings of shootings, and deaths, and COVID numbers going up. A lot of the depressing news happened in the months leading to him transitioning as the senior pastor. Not to mention, he had to navigate CDC guidelines for churches and determine whether they should even meet in person. He gets what people are feeling, but he’s trying to lead by example.
“I have been hit by pressures, and I’ve been vulnerable to anxiety, but it’s the fight to stand on the rock of God’s Word that has allowed me to not only still be standing, but to still be thriving, and to be able to preach, and to be able to live life and have joy is a testament that this works, God works. And the Holy Spirit is definitely a sustainer.”
If not for the movie The Best of Enemies, W.L. “Bill” Riddick would be relatively unknown. I attended a screening for The Best of Enemies, starring Taraji P. Hensen and Sam Rockwell, and was enchanted by Bill’s character commandingly portrayed by British actor Babou Ceesay. I jumped at the chance to speak with Bill—to hear his story, how his Christian faith informs his work, and if his use of a collaborative process known as charrette (to unite opposing sides) could be used to solve conflict in these times of racial, gender, economic, and educational injustice.
A humble man, Riddick is an unsung hero who leads a charrette co-chaired by an unlikely pair — civil rights activist Ann Atwater and KKK leader C.P. Ellis — in the desegregation of the Durham Public Schools in 1971. With a career in human services that spans over fifty years, Bill’s story did not start or end with the charrette in Durham in 1971.
For those of our readers who may be unfamiliar with you, tell us, who is Bill Riddick?
Bill Riddick is a man born in the ’30s. My parents were tenant farmers. I got the opportunity to go to A&T State University, worked for a couple of years, and then went back to NC State University for a Masters Degree and then started a career. I spent my last eighteen years at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill working in student health. So, he’s a good guy. A Christian man who has a lovely family and all is well right now.
I was going to ask this later, but I’ll ask now. Can you share how your faith has informed your work throughout the years?
Like most Southerners, I grew up in the church because it’s the only social institution in the community. I kind of lost my way for a few years and when the charette started, my faith was there, but my behavior wasn’t there. So when I look back on it, I realize that the Lord gave me every word, led me every step, gave me every idea, and He chose me as a vessel for these two people. But I didn’t ask Him at that point. But I understand it now.
You understand it now. Yes! There’s something about looking and tracing not only the trajectory of your life but also the hand of God in your life. You can see how God was moving even when you didn’t realize it. So, tell us how you became acquainted with the charette process?
I was working at Shaw University and we did a charette and it fell apart. About halfway through it the person who was leading the charette told me that I was the reason that it was falling apart. I finished it. It turned out to be good. I got invited to Indianapolis and then to York, Pennsylvania, and then, of course, to Durham.
How did you get to Durham? Who invited you? What were your expectations walking in?
I got there through a friend of mine. His name was Wilbur Hobby from the North Carolina AFL-CIO. We had made a good friendship in some other work we had done together. When he called me, I knew it was serious. I knew that he was asking me to do something that was impossible because he was just that kind of guy. (chuckles) I had some reservations about it, but I knew that he was a good person and he wouldn’t put me in anything he thought I could not do. So that gave me the energy to sort this thing out.
So did you think it would work?
Well, in doing a charette, the first thing you do is put together a steering committee. And once you get the steering committee, you then look at the opposite of the issue. And that’s how I got to Ann and that’s how I got to C.P. I got to CP because he knew Wilbur. And when I called Wilbur’s name, he gained enough respect to call me other than what he did. (chuckles) But at least he knew that I had somebody in my history, or in my present life, that was a friend to both of us.
What would you say the film got right and what didn’t we see in the film that you think was important to the process?
I think the film got the major points right. This whole movie is real. Robin Bissell did a great job of picking the parts that were big parts and had to be shown to the public. But to have gotten one day of the back and forth, and how we had to argue about stuff, especially those first four or five days, would have been something the audience would enjoy. But that would have been a three-hour movie by itself.
As I watched the film, I kept thinking, “So I know the ending, but this is incredulous!” That had to be some experience for you, but I’m sure there had to be others. So outside of Durham in 1971 what would you say the most memorable charrette was and what made it memorable?
Well, if I take Durham out of it, I really enjoyed the one in Indianapolis. We got the community together to offer what it would look like in a low-wealth community. And that school, the way we designed it started at 6 o’clock in the morning and ended at 11:00 with women bringing “well” babies to the clinic and all that stuff. I have no idea whether all that was accomplished, but the city was very pleased with what we had done to put together a high school that served the community—where people didn’t have to go downtown for services.
I read your bio and I know a little bit about your background and it sounds like you’ve done amazing work, hands-on Justice work, which is still much needed. We’re still living in very tense times, and there are disparities across race, gender, socioeconomic status, healthcare, education and more. Do you think that a charrette is a tool that can still be used today, and if so, in what ways?
Well, the charrette was set up to be a 10-day process. Nobody in America today would have time to do anything for 10 straight days. That’s not going to happen. I do think, though, that the issue of bringing people together to look at the same problem but who see it very differently is something that we are going to have to start doing in our country. We bark at each other, but we don’t sit down and truly listen to what the other person is saying. That was the intent of the charrette; That we will listen and respond and listen and respond until we come up with a solution. We just don’t have the attitude, nor the time, to do that kind of thing today.
As you were saying that, I was thinking of the Disciples in the Upper Room. There’s waiting and patience and willingness to bear your thoughts and feelings and deeply listen and work through the conflict that is necessary.
That is true. We’re going to have to start looking at issues that affect a lot of people and do something about it really, other than giving it lip service. And I also think the key might be the religious community. Because I honestly believe, first of all, that God is not happy with us—with the divisiveness and putting each other down. I think He is very much unhappy with that. I believe that this is a time for faith-based institutions to come together, to say, “Look, you know we can do this! We can. Not only do we have the power of God on our side, but we can do things much like the Civil Rights movement. I think if Martin King wasn’t a God-fearing man that he would not have been as successful as he was.
Yes. Absolutely. Do you have any parting words of wisdom or advice you would share with our readers who are mostly millennials—the younger generation, though I believe the oldest millennials are about thirty-nine now, so not so young. What would you share with our readers in terms of using their faith in the work of justice?
I believe that if you go to the movie and see it, you take the time the next day or two just to look at yourself in the mirror and decide what your biases are that might harm other people. Make a pledge to yourself to become a better person, to say, “I’m going to treat people the way I want to be treated—no matter what their color, age, ethnicity, and all that stuff —I am going to give everybody the right to stand on the surface that they stand on.” I think if we do that, millennials particularly won’t get caught up in these lines of disliking this person and liking this person.
Rev. Donna Olivia Owusu-Ansah is a preacher, chaplain, teacher, artist, writer, thinker, and dreamer who loves to study the Word of God, encourage others, and worship God. Rev. Owusu-Ansah holds a BS in Studio Art from New York University, an MFA in Photography from Howard University, and a Master of Divinity, Pastoral Theology, from Drew University. You can check out her website at https://www.reverendmotherrunner.com.
It could be daunting to take over the reins as lead pastor for a church your famous parents planted in 2012, but for Alvin Love III, 35, it was a natural progression that was initially inspired by a powerful encounter he had on a visit to Melbourne Life Church in Australia.
So what does he believe they should be focused on? What Love says are the “basic beliefs — being a community of faith amidst the social, health, and political unrest. They had to do things a little differently with COVID. Previously, they’d gather more with 12-week small groups. Now, they’re focused on being a source of life and faith for people wherever they are, whether at work, in the neighborhood, or elsewhere. He encourages his members to reach out to people who aren’t part of their church community, or perhaps they’re at the edge of not believing at all.
Rev. Donna Olivia Owusu-Ansah is a preacher, chaplain, teacher, artist, writer, thinker, and dreamer who loves to study the Word of God, encourage others, and worship God. Rev. Owusu-Ansah holds a BS in Studio Art from New York University, an MFA in Photography from Howard University, and a Master of Divinity, Pastoral Theology, from Drew University. You can check out her website at