Birmingham pastor pays off $900,000 in medical debt for residents with album proceeds

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (WBMA) — A local pastor and gospel music star is doing his part to give back to the city that raised him.

Pastor Mike McClure, Jr. of the Rock City Church is using his album proceeds to help people in Birmingham.

"People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care and in the midst of these difficult times, I was trippin on how can we be a blessing to those in need," he says, and it came to him.

He could use the proceeds from his hit single to pay off debt.

A song that came to him during a church service.

"We were in church one Sunday and I'd just sung this song out of the blue... I said 'and it's gonna be big', everybody started shouting and crying and it just so happened the number 1 radio promoter in the country was at our church that Sunday," says McClure.

And the rest is history.

Pastor Mike Jr.'s "Big" topped the Billboard Gospel charts for 10 weeks straight and with $900,000 of his album profits, he decided to do something 'big' for his community.

"Being from Birmingham, I made God a promise that if he ever blessed me, that I would in turn bless others. So, I'm just so grateful and humble to keep up my end of the promise," McClure says.

He teamed up with RIP Medical Debt, an organization that allows donors to forgive billions of dollars in medical debt.

Every $100 donated clears up $10,000 in medical debt.

McClure was able to help 542 families.

"I don't know who I helped, so that's incredible. I didn't get a list of names like Ms. Gooden, Ms. Mcclure, Mr. Parker, we just got zip codes so all the way from 35208, 35211, 35243 and it let us know how many people in those different zip codes were in medical debt," he says.

He and members of the rock city church, have also fed the hungry during the pandemic and handed out thousands of masks to citizens and churches heading back to their regular services.

To him, community is everything.

"I am utterly grateful to be part of such an incredible city, we're not divided, we're all coming together to help those in need and if we can keep that same energy, I think that Birmingham can be a place of reconciliation and change. Get ready, because what God is doing in Birmingham is going to be big," he says.

Mcclure has been nominated for several gospel music awards, he'll be at the Stella Awards airing on BET in just a few weeks.