Go through while you are going through

I have never had the luxury of being able to relax and just simply change seasons.  I have always had to burn the candle and both ends.  I am going through a trial at the same time that I am transitioning.  This winter taught me this.  I had to go through a hard winter that was long and full of snow.  I did not have the opportunity to wait until the snow was shoveled or the ice melts before I had to just get in my car and go to the store.  I learned that you have to take some precautions, but the main thing to do is just start doing it.  Even taking the trash to the trash bin was a twenty minute chore.  I did not like it.  I tried to wait out the storm.  I tried to wait until it got warmer.  I tried to wait until I was leaving to go somewhere else.  I tried to place it in a room and shut the door.  I tried and I tried, but then, I simply gathered my coat and gloves.  I warmed up the car.  I shoveled the drive.  I made sure that I had my medications and then I opened the door.  It took me five times as long to do this than when the sun was shining, but I did have to do it.  I did not have the luxury of waiting until the snow went away.  Sometimes, you have to go through while you are going through.  You have to move at the worst time in your life to move.  You have to move when the winds are blowing against you.  You have to cross the sea when the billows are raging.  Half the battle is in the opening the door.  It is in the battle that you learn how to swing for all you know.  Don't be afraid to move when the waters are flooding.  Go through while you are going through.

With all I have.

This morning, I was thinking about the parable of the ten servants.  Each servant received the same amount of pounds, ten pounds.  The only instruction they were left with was to occupy until the master came back.  The unprofitable servant made up a "nifty excuse" as to why he did not prosper with what he had.  I think African-Americans have been conditioned to always explain failure by what you don't have.  We also diminish the works of those who seemed to find prosperity despite not having all that they needed.  I think there is a valuable lesson that is missed in this passage.  Despite not having everything you need, he still expects you to multiply what you have.  If it is inferior, work with what you have.  If it is all you have, work with what you have.

Do you hear what I hear?

This afternoon, my mind is on a lighter note than they heavy stuff of this morning.  When I was young, I really thought that I was mature.  At the age of twenty one, I felt like I had died a thousand times.  I felt old, but what  I was, was different.  I was a different immature, but I was truly immature.  I was nosy, I was mysterious and there was a whole lot I did not know.  Now, that I look back at my college years, it was like I had emerged from hibernated in a cave.  I listened to The Winans and Take 6 and Ben Tankard because they were pushing the envelope in gospel music.  I also chose choirs that black people thought too conservative because that sounded like me.  I was outside of the box.  In my twenties, I kept listening, but I favored gospel music that was vaguely R and B.  I chose music that you could sing to God and man.  I took songs that you normally sing to man and sung them to God.  I was longing for relationship of some sort and the music gave my feelings somewhere to go.  As I continued to mature, I listened to music of the refined person.  I had nothing else left to prove, but I did not want to be seen as "ghetto" and loud.  I listened to Jonathon Butler and Earl Klugh.  I favored Peter White and The Ahn Trio.  As I headed down into the stretch of my life where people say you become settled in your ways, I did not need to prove a point to anyone.  Somewhere at forty, I fell in love with country and classical music.  I like the fact that country music is not trying to be something that it is not.  At least I did not think so.  I embraced the part of me that others would hide.  I embraced being hopelessly country.  I embraced my hatred for anything loud.  I resurrected the part of my life that is a Church of God in Christ Missionary and married it to the part of me that is a Reverend.  I kept wearing the skirts but I put it on with red lipstick.  I was uber loyal to the church, but I also learned to take a vacation.  My music now reflects the fact that I have more to offer life than comparing myself to others. I listen to music with no words and sometimes I even listen to artist no one knows but me and God. It is good to know that I changed and that it was a change for the better.  You can see it in my music choice.  I am laughing now.  I'll end this with a smile.  It really has been a wonderful life.

The reason why I left you.

Your fear was the reason I left you.

You stifled my feet
So that I was hen peck
chained my thighs
and put your foot on my neck

You took my money
and stole my time
and defaced my work
while I was in my prime

You minimized my gift
pushed me in the background
and when you needed a jewel
you wanted me around

You left me to myself
you ignored my cries
and everything you said you would do
were just lies

I got tired of all of the theft too
That's the reason why I left you.

Whose Kingdom are you building anyway?

When Joseph was in Egypt he gained the favor of Pharoe.  Not only he, but his descendents after him.  They grew to be a strong nation with many people.  After this, a Pharoe who did not know Joseph saw the multitude of Hebrews in Goshen and he made them slaves.  My thought today is on Kingdom builders.  When someone is building God's Kingdom, movement is not restricted.  God's Kingdom is not just in one place.  God's Kingdom is so vast that you cannot restrict him to the four walls of your choice, but many people make the Kingdom of God whereever they are in the Kingdom.  Out of fear and not faith, people choose to bless those who stay in that place and curse those who leave.  It was fear that drove Pharoe to become restrictive.  Some people fear that their positions are in jeopardy.  Some people fear new people will displace the old.  Some people fear that their way of live is going to change.  Some people have a natural dislike for talented people because of their own insecurities.  It is because of these reasons and many more that one person seeks to build their kingdom on the backs of others instead of on the principles of God.  There are some places that don't suffer from this and you can freely move in and out as God's will dictates.  Then, there are other places where you just have to divorce the place.  Your name is mud when you leave the place because of how they think.  The brainwashing did not work.  You did not buy in.  You did not invest in the place.  Just the thought that someone can think that way says how much they have usurped the will of God to pertain only to things that pertain to them.  In a dark way, that is the begining of a cult.  It is the need to feel superior to other churches and organizations.  Cults build by fear and insecurity.  Let's not offend a righteous God by making him the God of a fishbowl.

I'll Get It Myself

When I was a neglected child, I learned that my parents were incompetent in their parenting.  Their needs came before meeting the needs of their children.  At the age I am now, I can accept that without anger.  My response to that as a child, was that I would have to take care of myself.  The problem with that ideology was that there was no way in the world I could take care of myself.  I was a child and that fact alone said that I would need some help.  I needed money.  I needed resources.  I needed mentoring.  I could not have become what I am today if someone did not just stop and give me what I needed.  I confess that my own attempts to supply my needs were inferior.  The clothes, that I could afford, were no match for my mentors who could afford to give me clothes far more expensive than I could buy.  I needed someone to invite me over for meals that I could not cook.  I can even remember a sorority sister who taught me how to put on my makeup.  I had no experience doing such things.  She also taught me how to really do Christmas.  I could not do that myself.  The bottom line is that my life would be severely inferior if I tried to do everything all by myself.  This is why mentoring is such a wonderful thing.  I get to do the giving now.  I get to makeup the plain Jane's and I get to supply the leather shoes.  I know that you just can't get everything by yourself.  No man is an island.  Everyone needs somebody.  I a smiling now and about to cry.  I think I will................

Better or Bigger

I have been seeing a trend in churches that I believe displeases the Lord.  I have always read in the scripture where God and His principles makes better people.  Those “better” people make “better” families and then those “better” families make better churches.  Out of meeting the need to make better people, churches expand and make better programs so that lives can simply be better.  Now, we are in the age where making better people can take a back seat to making bigger churches.  Everyone wants the mega church with big screens and smoke during praise and worship.  It is nice, but is it making better people.  There are churches where you can get a title if you stand in the middle aisle too long.  It makes the church look better, but it does not produce better people.  Sometimes, I look at pastors and I can see their own kingdom dancing in their eyes.  God's Kingdom is placed on the back burner as they build and seed their own fields.  When I look at the people, especially the leadership, I see some seriously inferior people in places where there should be excellence.  I see sin in places where I should see forgiveness and a fruitful life.  I see people who are not the best people, but they are in the best places.  You can't build a house out of inferior materials.  When the storm comes, the house will be in Kansas and the people will be running for the ditches.  A well constructed church is not about how many turkeys you hand out, but how many lives are changed.  In the book of Revelations, he did not come to judge the church on how many times it had a building program or how many Christmas contadas it had.  The church was judged because of the condition of it's members who had lost their first love, suffered evil to be taught in the midst of a righteous God and were lukewarm when they should have been hot or cold.  We often hear that the church is not bricks and mortor, then we get enchanted by trying to be bigger.  Bigger is not better, it is bigger.  God deliver us from just getting bigger and then we then can get better.

What I learned being poor

I was raised poor and had to unlearn the culture of poverty.  It did not take me long, since my mother's family was well off and my father's family I don't know.  I think there are some things we have to remember about the culture of poverty, if we are going to change things.

1.  In the culture of poverty, time means nothing. 
2.  They spend every dime, money is not saved.
3.  The standard of living is basic and not excellent.
4.  Luxuries are clothing, shoes and electronics, not homes.
5.  A mindset of learned helplessness keeps you thinking things will never change.
6.  Education is not encouraged.
7.  Promiscuity is overlooked.
8.  Teenagers can be viewed as adult once they have a baby.
9.  Frequent moves to look for cheap rent.
10.  Hypersensitive to violence.
11.  Petty crime overlooked.
12.  Aid is expected.

What I learned
1.  Don't waste time by always being late.
2.  Save a percentage of your paycheck as no touch money.
3.  Don't allow mediocre to be called excellent.
4.  Put your money under your feet and not on your feet.  Get a home.
5.  Get positive, stay positive
6. Get an education at all cost.
7.  Don't have sex until you can pay for the consequences.
8.  View your teenagers as big children because they are still children.
9.  Establish longevity somewhere.
10.  Establish that violence is not your answer.
11.  Stop talking about the law, but obey the law
12.  Expect nothing but be thankful for everything.

99 1/2

The Bible states that some me will stand before God and recite all the good things they have done.  God's answer is that He does not even know them.  Human beings can be a trip.  In the face of being wrong, they often want to recite all the things that they do right as if one can cancel out the other.  It does not work that way.  The place where you are obedient does not cancel out the place where you are disobedient.  The place where you are disobedient makes the places of obedience null and void.  In this sense, we can't pick and choose which law of God we obey and which we choose to ignore.  Uzzah disobeyed one law in the midst of them obeying laws.  They were bringing the ark of the covenant back to it's rightful place.  They were praising God at it's coming, but they put the ark on a cart.  After the death of Uzzah, David got the book of the law and found the correct way to bring the ark back to it's rightful place.  Imagine that.  No deaths that time.  I don't care about how many people you feed or how many turkeys you hand out or how much money you give in envelopes.  If you are doing that to make up for the fact that you treat people like crap, keep your money and your turkey.  Don't use your successes to cover the fact that their are issues you aren't going to deal with.  Sooner or later, you will find that the 1% that you ignore and borderline paleate will be the reason that no one will even remember the 99% you did good.  The old folks used to say 99 and a half won't do.

An Old Fool

She  was an old foolish woman
The kind plagued with the too's. 
Her weave too long, her shoes too high, her pants to tight.
You get it.

No degree from a univeristy could erase the ignorance
that flowed like sewage from her mouth
Her breath stank
You smell it

She always thought she looked good
But in reality she was rode hard and hung up wet.
She was a lady and a tramp.
You see it

And now she is old as the hills
Without the sense God gave a goat
to stop wearing, in July, her fur coat
You feel it

When she dies, we all will cry for fifteen minutes
and stuff our mouths with chicken.
Her legacy lay in the tacky way she lived, loved and died.
Your words are harsher than the storm of 62, but
You mean it.

Survival Mode

I teach damaged children.  For the most part, they are children who did not get their needs adequately met.  These are the babies who cried in the crib and stopped crying when they realized that no one was going to come.  In healthy relationships, the mother or the father tend to the child and the child realizes that all of their needs are going to be met.  In the damaged child, they realize that their parents will not meet their need and they begin to try to meet their own needs in primitive ways.  A child cannot earn money, so they steal.  A child does not have power, so they manipulate.  A child cannot create their own reality so they fantasize.  A child also tantrums.  They go into panic mode and if not attended to properly, can do things that are absolutely ridiculous because they panic.  I have met adults in the same cycle.  They spend their whole lives in survival mode.  Extreme poverty, unsafe environments and lack of parental support have left some people still trying to make a dollar out of fifteen cents.  Survival living is living on the most basic level in life.  The standard is not what is best for me or even what is good for me.  The standard is just what will keep me alive.  Unfortunately, these people then feel like they have the best on the most basic of levels because they are not starving.  They are in panic mode most of the time.  Most people are in their thinking brain and they move to the emotional stage for only a moment before they return to thinking.  The damaged person stays emotional and moves to panic when they think that they will have to live without their needs being met.  When the need is met, they don't come back to the "thinking" brain, they come back to the emotional brain.  That is the part of them that remains slightly "pissed" because they know they don't have paradise, but it sure ain't hell.  Heaven is called unrealistic and never achieved when you are in.............................survival mode.

Uzzah

I used to really feel bad when I read the story of Uzzah.  All he did was reach his hand to steady the cart, but lost his life.  I believe that we can be sincere, but sincerely wrong.  There is nothing wrong with simply saying, I want to help, I just don't know if this is the excellent way to do it.  Even in the way we go about things, there has to be a time when even your best has to be objectively evaluated and refused if it simplyis not good enough.  I have been taught all my life to accept it if it is the best that can be done.  If that is your standard then knock yourself out.  If the standard is that it has to be the best then keep it there, and refuse the lesser if it indeed is inferior.  I guess sometimes you don't want to hurt anyone's feelings.  The standard was not changed because Uzzah was sincere or because he was helpful or because he was ignorant or because he had "a good heart".  He died................end of story.