Emily Graves spoke with Tribe of Judah

In 1980, Ben Priest met Jesus Christ as his personal Lord and Savior on the streets of Houston, Texas. After living many years in rebellion as an outlaw biker addicted to drugs and alcohol, Ben prayed a simple prayer. "Jesus, if you can help me, I'll give my life to you." Jesus saved Ben and filled him with the Holy Spirit. He was healed of kidney and liver disease and for the first time in years, he was in his right mind.

At the time of his salvation, all Ben knew was motorcycles and street life, and that he wanted to be used by the Lord. Jesus gave him the vision for Tribe of Judah Motorcycle Ministries and also blessed him with a motorcycle which became a pulpit.

Tribe of Judah is now in 11 nations and Emily Graves spoke with the Chapter President for the UK, Bob Bennison, to find out more.

Emily: What is the Tribe of Judah?

Bob: We are an evangelistic group of men who go into the biker community to bring the word of God and to show people the love and sacrifice of Jesus. We show these men that there's a different way of life than the one they're choosing to live. That's really about it. We believe that Christ has set us free and want to show them that there's a way they can be set free from their particular, shall we say, substance abuse, or so on.

Emily: So when and how was Tribe of Judah set up?

Bob: Over 30 years ago. It was set up by a man called Ben Priest and he came out of the biker community. He found Christ in a miraculous way and got saved from drugs and so on. He felt the only way he could relate to people was to go back into the biker community and the only way he could do that and to be accepted by them was to dress the same and ride the same kind of motorbikes.

Emily: And so a lot of what you guys also do is share your testimony?

Bob: That's all it's about: it's just sharing testimony. To share testimony, you can't just walk into some of these people's faces, you have to win favour with them. They have to learn to trust you. I think a friend of mine said many years ago that you have to build a bridge that's strong enough to carry the Gospel. Jesus was a friend of sinners and in a sense that's what we try to do. We try to become friends of sinners and go where they go, but not behave in the way they behave, to say: Look, you can have a good time, you can ride motorbikes, you can have a good laugh - but you don't have to necessarily continue in your sin; hopefully most of us don't.

Emily: So why is the ministry called Tribe of Judah?

Bob: That's interesting because you might have to do a little bit of a Bible study. If you're not familiar with your Bible, there were several tribes of Israel with different names and the tribe of Judah was a people of praise. They were the musicians and they were the singers and they were the first in to warfare, so instead of sending in the guns and what we would do today with the tanks, they sent in the musicians and singers and they used to praise God. Praising God brought panic on the enemy and then the warriors could go in and clean up. Ben chose that name because the people of praise were the first into somewhere. So we go into those places where maybe nobody else has ever been.

Emily: This may sound like a very silly question, but when you say 'praise', does that mean in the work that you are doing that you guys will sing before you do anything?

Bob: Well, yes in a sense. We have monthly prayer meetings and we spend some time worshipping God and praising God and praying into situations. We don't just wander into somebody's clubhouse without being prepared beforehand; we don't wander into the pubs that they go into without being prepared. We don't necessarily wander into the pub singing hymns, it just doesn't work that way - they would look at you a bit strange. But we do prepare beforehand by worshipping, praising God, giving thanks to God for what he's done for us and then, hopefully, take that joy in with us wherever we go.

Emily: The Tribe of Judah is a worldwide organisation, but it started off in the US?