Claude Banks No More

Losing Yo Self while Tryna Save Yo Self

Growing up, I would watch Martin Lawrence movies religiously. It didn’t matter if it was “Blue Streak”, “Bad Boys”, “Big Momma’s House”, or “National Security.” As long as it starred Marty Mar, I was game. Considering all the Lawrence movies I’ve seen, it shocked me when I realized that “Life” was not in my repertoire. So I had to change that, and I did, a few years back. Besides Lawrence, the movie features the biggies like Eddie Murphy, Bernie Mac, Anthony Anderson, and so many others. It was a tremendous display of comedic genius, and it succeeded in making me feel the weight of terror and the joy of freedom.

The movie “Life” tells the story of an audacious pair for whom things turned quickly in a 1932 New York. It’s about two charming and handsome Black men from the big city. Ray Gibson (Eddie Murphy) and Claude Banks (Martin Lawrence) who got caught up with the wrong man, Spanky Johnson (played by Rick James), the top bootlegger, and they would have to pay their debts to him via bootlegging. Their job of purchasing a bunch of booze from a designated seller in Mississippi proved to be easy… until Ray heard the music.

Lively and enticing as ever, Mississippi night club life lured Ray and Claude to abandon their leader’s property and indulge their cravings. Predictably, the plot thickens, and the two free men, after leaving the bar, end up getting framed for murder and imprisoned for life. Now Lawrence’s character (Claude) is fed up because Murphy’s (Ray) always finds a way to be naively optimistic about everything and recklessly confident in his interactions with the other inmates, no matter how intimidating they were.

The directors show this by creating a scene where Claude and Ray are in the lunchroom with the other convicts. And here is where Goldmouth, the monstrously-sized (yet so lovable) character played by the late Michael Taliferro, threateningly asks Claude, “You gon’ eat yo cornbread?”

Without any apparent thought, Claude is prepared to give up his cornbread.

Now, Claude is in a predicament. He is in a prison that models the practices of plantation enslavers, and he is there without deserving to be so. The last thing he needs is trouble over cornbread while tryna find a way out. So, in an effort to perform proper triage, Claude starts to pass down the bread and good ole Ray interrupts and rebukes him by saying, “No, don't pass your cornbread to him. That's your cornbread. . . If you let him have your cornbread, you're gonna be ironin' his drawers and clippin' his toenails.”

Now, this gon’ seem like a stretch, but Imma take it there. I know what it’s like to be Claude.

I’ve never been incarcerated nor framed at a life-altering level. But I know what it’s like to live with fear in a society of Goldmouth’s that think they can just take your cornbread; they know they can extort you without repercussions (some of them might even be in the same socio-economic positions—and have the same racial makeup—as you). This fear has led me to fashion a life that caters to the demands of whatever setting I inhabit, which for most of my life has been white evangelical spaces.

Now, I’m a second culture kid. As familiar as I am with Midwestern Conservatism, I also am very Ethiopian. I was raised in a house in which I heard the Amharic language daily, always ate the food of the motherland, enjoyed our exhilarating weddings, and served in an Ethiopian church with my Ethiopian friends up until I was 15 years old.

It’s only been the last 8 years where I’ve strictly been in spaces that have, however invitingly and smilingly, told me I’d be fine if I just stuck to their script. If I just traded the spices of East African hospitable Christianity for the blandness of a prim and pristine Western one, then I’d be safe. I believed them. I started eating Raisin Bran in the morning instead of Chechebsa. This switch-up, I thought, would be salvation.

In trying to save myself, due to fear that my upbringing was inherently, intellectually inferior, and that my Blackness was societally reprehensible, I lost myself—thinking the whole time this was the will of God. Isn’t denying my dignity walking in the likeness of Christ? Considering the interests of others as higher than mine? I reasoned that giving up my cornbread was the best way to love my neighbor.

I’m still processing the events of my life that have led me to stop believing that the epitome of love is rooted in self-eradication. I’m sure some of it has to do with my college experience at a PWI that just got exhausting and lonely. A big reason, though, is that God sent me friends like Ray who taught me the difference between sacrificial love and self-erasure. They taught me that my time and my belongings were worth being protected from bullies or those who smiled big but always wanted to argue about the dignity of Black folk and “reverse racism.” Like Ray, my friends intercepted my willing passing of my dignity down the table of white acceptance to those who loathed empathy and would only listen to distort my words and crush my intentions.

One of the most powerful words ever shared with me was (kinda ironically) at a predominantly white megachurch where I worked by a lovely white woman who was also on staff there. Noticing how my gifts and “capacity” were utilized soon after my arrival at the church, she told me, “Zeru, be careful, everyone is gonna wanna piece of you.” She wasn’t telling me anything different than my family and Black friends had been saying all along, but it wasn’t until then that I realized I had been conditioned (and enjoyed!) being useful for Jesus and others. I’m still fighting my tendency to belief that self-exertion and production for others (especially the enfranchised) are the tell-tale signs that I’m valued, but these friends have exposed that lie and helped me to slowly grow into who God’s made me: valued in spite of my contributions; capable of saying no even to those whom I fear; able to say yes to the Spirit who yearns for me to rest in the quiet and to love from delight and not utility.

As a young, Black man who’s been burned more times than I realize, I want more for my siblings of all shades, but especially for those of mine because of how much we’ve had to prove our love for Jesus in order to serve in positions we wouldn’t have been able to if we had remained ourselves. It’s been a tough journey, you know? Exploring moments of spiritual fruit in my life while being curious about what it’s actually cost… Fam…

However, I’m hopeful of what Jesus has for me in these coming days. I’m hopeful for what he has for you, friend. For years I’ve been enchanted by Paul’s words in Philippians: “I consider everything a loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things.” The things Paul lost were in relation to high, religious status, authority, and reputation. I’ve tasted that in a small way, and more than ever, I’m wanting to lose that in order to taste true fellowship with Christ. You see, I thought, in order to know Jesus, I had to save my self from myself. Jesus is saving me from tryna be another, teaching me I’ve lost nothing by gaining him and being myself.