JEREMIAH 17:5 This is what the LORD says: "Cursed are those who put their trust in mere humans and turn their hearts away from the LORD.

     The other day I watched a video about how "the white man" "white society" "white corporations" "white supremacy" and/or "the establishment" succeeded in brain washing, enslaving, and hoodwinking people of color with religion.  They stated that people of color were tamed and subjugated with JESUS.  People of color were taught to not fight back but to "turn the other cheek", they were brought into submission by being "taught the meek shall inherit the earth",  and be satisfied with "it's all gonna get better, by and by".  People of color do not need to be rich, live in better housing, eat better food. They don't need to have better health and not be afraid to die because soon "there will be no more death, no more tears, no more sorrow, no more pain when we ALL get to heaven".  Is there truth in this? YES. The video bothered me for a while.  I began to think, is this true, is Jesus just something "they" made up to keep us in line.
     I became disturbed as I pondered this supposed "truth".  I looked a little closer at people of color and saw the continuous struggle.  I thought about how many people of color buy things, over spend, are more concerned about bling than saving, are more concerned about driving fancy cars that investing, are more concerned with looks, clothes, and jewelry than education.  People of color are not usually taught to open businesses, create good credit scores, pool their resources, and to not drown in debt.  What a sad state of affairs if this video is true.
     While much of the aforementioned is true, I could not bring myself to totally abandon the idea of Jesus. No JESUS?  The more I thought about Jesus just being something to contain us, the longer I pondered on this whole idea of Jesus as a farce, the more I considered the idea that Jesus was just a ploy, the more I contemplated that perhaps I too had been hood winked, the lonelier, the sadder, and the emptier I felt. Is this what they call at the cross roads? It was time to decide, but how? I did the only thing I knew how to do. PRAY. STUDY. PRAY. WAIT.  I had to pick up the bible and hold it in my hands as I read and studied the Word.  I had to rely on God to lead me to the passages that held the answer.  I had to shut my mind and open my heart.  I had to wait for the revelation of the Holy Spirit.  I waited for that feeling of love, warmth, and peace that only He could bring.  Then it came to me...
     It came to me in the form of Psalm 81 'Ye are Gods, we are children of God." (Psalm 82;;6)  Could I deny myself? Do I not exist? I am a god, meaning an offspring of God, He breathed life into me, He created me, I am just as much a part of Him as He is a part of me. Just like our birth father's DNA is in us, God's DNA is in us.  If there is no Father, Son and Holy Spirit then there is no ME. I had to cease to try to understand on my own accord and start to understand that GOD  is beyond the understanding of my finite mind.  I HAD to trust the Lord with all my heart and lean not on my own understanding (Proverbs 3:5).  I now knew that I could not be wise in my own eyes (Proverbs 3:7) and I would once again feel that peace that supasses all understanding (Phil 4:7).
     God spoke to me in a way that I COULD comprehend.  He showed me the great Christian leaders.  He showed me that they were not weak or pacifists.  They bucked the system, fought for change, and human rights.  Bishop Desmond Tutu, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Teresa, Richard Allen (founder of AME Church), Toussain L'Overture (lead Haitian slave revolt), Frederick Douglass, Thurgood Marshall and the one who's hair was like wool...Jesus Christ.  Jesus who walked among the people, made the blind see, the lame walk, fed the hungry, calmed the sea, cast out demons, walked on water, loved the unloveable.  The one who LIVED AND DIED AND WAS RESURRECTED SO THAT WE COULD BE FORGIVEN FOR OUR SINS (1Cor 15:3-8).
     It came down to this.  It's a choice.  A choice to believe with my heart and not my head.  A choice to  trust and believe that Jesus is Lord and He died so that we may be saved (Romans 10:9-10).  If I don't trust Him, then who am I going to trust? The establishment?
JEREMIAH 17:5 This is what the LORD says: "Cursed are those who put their trust in mere humans and turn their hearts away from the LORD.       

Have you ever thought that just perhaps, God has forgotten you?

Have you ever thought that just perhaps, God has forgotten you?  You try (I say try because none of us are perfect) to live a righteous life.  You try to have morals and fight on the side of justice.  You try to live in a way that you think is pleasing to the Lord. But then it sometimes seems as if God does not hear you.  You go to church.  You pray and expect results.  You meditate on God's word and expect an answer.  You study His teachings and expect to "hear a word from the Lord." Yet, nothing happens, sometimes things even get worse.

You try to stay the course but you feel your resolution wavering.  You tell yourself "keep the faith", "the race is not for the swift", "fight the good fight" or like in that old Negro spiritual you sing, "I know I'll understand it by and by." And as much as you fight the feelings of doubt you sometimes feel it creeping into your mind.  You say to yourself and sometimes out loud, but Jesus said... all I need is a mustard seed of faith and I can move mountains.  So, why isn't my mountain moving? But the Bible says...knock and the door will be opened.  So, why is the door closed, locked and bolted shut?  But the Lord said ask I shall receive.  So, I'm asking and asking and all I hear is silence.  I'm doing all these things, and nothing is happening.  Has God forgotten me?

Well, the answer lies not in what we are doing, or what we think we're doing to please Him.   I was in that situation and that was when God showed me Psalm 77. Like the psalmist my spirit began to faint, I was too troubled to speak, my spirit groaned and cried out in distress.  Like the psalmist who laments in verse one;

I cried out to God for help;

I cried out to God to hear me.

When I was in distress, I sought the Lord;

at night I stretched out untiring hands,

and I would not be comforted.

The psalmist complains for several verses.  However, if we continue reading we find the sorrow in his spirit starting to turn around.  He begins to remember all that God has done for him in the past.  He begins to remember all the times he was saved, bailed out, relieved and comforted.  As he searches for the unfailing love, favor and compassion he was once given, it forced him to remember exactly that...IT WAS ONCE GIVEN. He did it before, He can do it again.  As the psalmist cries out for Merciful God, his song changes and he sings;

"Then I thought, To this I will appeal:

the years when the Most High stretched out his right hand.

I will remember the deeds of the LORD;

yes, I will remember your miracles of long ago.

I will consider all your works

and meditate on all your mighty deeds.”

The psalmist cries and complaints turned to remembrance and finally in the last verses they turn to praise.

Your ways, God, are holy.

What god is as great as our God?

You are the God who performs miracles;

You display your power among the peoples.

With your mighty arm you redeemed your people,

the descendants of Jacob and Joseph...

He ended the song with recounting God's parting of the sea and leading the people by His mighty Hand to safety, and the fulfillment of His promise. Has God forgotten us? No but, like the psalmist we groan and complain and question, where is God?  But instead we must encourage ourselves, not to give up hope.  We should ask God to forgive us for not trusting Him enough.  We must turn our cries and doubts to praise and thanksgiving for all the times that God has seen us through. He, after all is our Grace for today and our Hope for tomorrow.  God has not forgotten us. He knows us by name, the Father knows what we need before we ask Him and, most importantly of all we know that the Bible teaches us that “God is not a man, that He should lie, nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?"  In knowing this we also know that, No! God has not forgotten us.

Poor Not Lazy Proverbs 21:13

Today on face book someone posted Proverbs 21:13 " Whoever shuts their ears to the cry of the poor, will also cry out and not be answered." As I read his post about helping people out and he is inclined to help those in need.  He also stated that he verifies the need. I read this and my mind went to people that I have helped and continue to help to this day.

  

I am often taken advantage of because I do not "nag", I do not demand, and I continue to treat the person(s) as I always have.  I often tell myself "THAT'S IT, NO MORE LENDING! whenever I am having a particular financial hardship, or I feel as if the person(s) is taking my kindness for weakness (I remember my step father once describing me as a cornered rat, I'll scurry away until you trap me in the corner, then I will bare my teeth and fight to the death).  Recently, one such person(s) who owes me a good deal of money, called me and asked me to pay a bill that is in his name but I used the service.  Now me, I would have said, since I owe you, I'll just pay the bill (which is much less than he owes).  But not him, he called me several times a day until he reached me.  What makes a person do that? What makes a person think that what they owe is moot?  Well, I was angry and out of character (but no where near how some would have behaved), I simply said when I get, I'll pay it and hung up.  

But back to the Proverb.  I have no problem giving to the POOR.  I give to Children's Hunger, Autism, Muscular Dystrophy, every catastrophe we Americans have suffered lately (Sandy, Boston etc.), the man/woman in the street, among others. I can truthfully say that I give  to the poor with clean hands and a clean heart. I have a few friends, that I can see myself in (I guess that's why we're friends) who give over and over to the same people all the time.  They are never repaid, and appreciated only WHILE they are doing the giving.  These people my friends give to are not POOR.  They are LAZY. They do not work, have no motivation to work,  further their education, have no life plan, and just mooch off of people.  I would venture to say, that these are NOT the people this proverb is referring to. Helping this sort of person is like using a teaspoon to dig yourself out of a ditch.  

I can see myself clearly in them, I give advice (that I dont follow) because we are cut from the same cloth.  We try to be hard hearted, but it is not in our nature.  The apostle Paul writes in Roman 12 "We have different gifts, according to the grace given to each of us. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with your^[a] faith; ⁷ if it is serving, then serve; if it is teaching, then teach; ⁸ if it is to encourage, then give encouragement; if it is giving, then give generously; if it is to lead,^[b] do it diligently; if it is to show mercy, do it cheerfully." So during these times when I fall into a state of regret and make false promises to myself of "never again", (I do this when I am need and cannot see how I will get out of my predicament). I will remember this proverb, because I know that I DID NOT and CANNOT shut my ears to the poor, therefore I CAN cry out and I WILL be answered.

HAVING TO CHOOSE

Sometimes we have to make a choice.  We have to choose what is good, what is right, what is perfect.  The only perfect person is the Lord.  This is why, when the Holy Spirit gnaws at us, we have to choose.  He will not let us rest, He will not let us have peace.  We can no longer live the way we once did, or the way the world says is OK.  We can no longer live in the flesh and WE MUST live righteously.  We MUST walk with integrity.   Actually, at this point it no longer becomes a choice, it becomes a necessity.

Those who do not walk in the light are not able to understand this necessity, this lack of choice.  When you reach this crossroad, this is where the Ruths and Naomis are separated.  Ruth was willing to go where her mother-in-law, Naomi went.  She was willing to accept Naomi's God as her own.  She even went so far as to say please stop asking me to leave you, because she was not going.   

If we are unwilling to walk with our friend, no matter where the Lord takes him or her, then that is where our roads part.  The parting does not have to be in animosity, it does not have to even be any conflict.  It is a reality.  Two people cannot walk on different roads and still hold hands. We have to be willing to follow where the Lord is leading us, even if it means losing that friend.  We must also be willing to give our friends also the freedom to choose, to walk with us or to go their own way. 

The apostle Paul understood this the most when he wrote in Romans 7:15 "For what I am doing, I do not understand. For what I will to do, that I do not practice; but what I hate, that I do".  In other words, as a Christian we do the things we know as Christians to be sinful because of the flesh, even as we try fight not to do them.

We may lose some friends along the way, we may gain some friends along the way. But wherever this choice or lack thereof choice leads us, in order to find peace, we MUST follow it.

More Than You Can Bear

You ever feel all used up, at the end of your rope. Well I feel that way right now. I am surrounded by people that no matter what I do, or how I try to help, they always want or need more. My aunt tells me I need to learn the shortest complete sentence in the world. "No". I actually thought I had it mastered but alas, no, I haven't. When it comes to myself, I am the master of deny. I love to tell myself what I don't need to buy, eat, drink, wear, or do.

However, when it comes to others, I am the master of "lets do this, lets make it happen". I really don't mind the cost of things, but it all becomes too costly after awhile. It costs me energy, it cost me peace, it costs me grace. You may ask how could it cost me these things. Well, it costs me energy because even when I don't really feel like doing something for someone else, I do it. But in the end it feels like I've drained every part of me. It costs me peace, because now I'm in the position that I'm doing something that I really did not want to do, however, because I am a woman of my word, I do it, but there is no enjoyment in it. Lastly, it costs me grace, because, I'm doing the thing with animosity, worry, discontentment and most of all without love.

Someone once said, I do things for people because I like the control. That is the farthest from the truth. I do things for people because A)that's the type of person I am, B) because if you are a part of my life I want you to be as happy as I am and C) the Lord has blessed me and I want to bless others. The problem is this. Reciprocity. Just once in a while, I'd like to ask something of someone and actually receive it. I want it given in love and not payback. I want it given because they want me to have it. I want it given because it is the right thing to do.

So, what is the lesson here? If it feels like a burden it is. Don't do more than you can, don't do more than you're able, and don't do it, if it is not being done with love. Otherwise, it becomes to much for you, and I know that the Lord does not give me more than I can bear.

2 When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you;
and when you pass through the rivers,
they will not sweep over you.
When you walk through the fire,
you will not be burned;
the flames will not set you ablaze. Isaiah 43:2

You Are So Beautiful To Me

Hello Readers,

I know it's been a while since I have written anything. A lot has gone on since my last post. My eldest son turned 25 years old and my youngest son turned 21 years old and graduated from school. He is now in an adult program for the developmentally challenged. However "sad" this may seem to others, we view it as a milestone and an achievement. So suffice it to say, I feel blessed.

These children (I have two) are so beautiful. They are handsome, physically (you are unable to tell they have mental challenges)and they have beautiful personalities. They are loving and easily pleased. They do not care about name brands, cell phones, the internet, etc. They simply enjoy being with their family and friends. They hug and kiss you, when young men their age would shun mom's demonstrations of affection. They willingly go to Walmart and even push the cart. They tolerate mom's buying them new clothes and wanting to take a picture of them wearing them. They welcome new people into their lives and are a great barometer of who is a good person at heart. I could go on and on.

I once read a poem and it described having a disabled child like landing in a country you did not buy a ticket to. Perhaps you wanted to go to the Caribbean and found yourself landing in Holland. The writer so aptly wrote. If you spend all your time agonizing over not being on the beach, then you will miss all the beauty Holland has to offer.

Although, it is sometimes still difficult to see my two handsome sons with this mental challenge and sometimes wonder what they would be like if they were so called "normal". I believe that my boys (they are still my boys)are a reflection of the love I have for them. I have learned to trust God and "lean not on my own understanding"(Proverbs 3:5). God is my strength and my refuge (Psalm 46:1), and because of Him, I am able to live life to the fullest, love with all my heart, and laugh with the deepest part of my soul.

"The heart of the discerning acquires knowledge, the ears of the discerning seek it out'. Proverbs 18:15

They call the day Saint Valentines Day, and it is celebrated annually on February 14Th. It is a day where love and affection is expressed between companions, husbands and wives, girlfriends and boyfriends, parents and their children, and between friends. We send and receive cards, flowers, and candy.

I love to receive all these expressions of love but I prefer for my significant other to do it when he feels like it, and not wait until a day that society has designated. So, I asked myself how did this all start? What was the origin of Valentine’s Day? I must tell you, I really did not like what I found out.

Some say Valentine’s Day started as a pagan holiday. Pagans are sometimes defined as people who are polytheistic, or believing in more than one god. So as I did my research, already the holiday already did not sit right with me. This holiday was connected to fertility and amorous love. Several types of gods were worshipped in connection to this day; the Greeks had Pan, the Semites had Baul or Nimrod who is actually mentioned in the Genesis 10:9, the Romans had Baal, Saturn or Lupercus.

During the early Christian church days, the religious hierarchy tried to get rid of the holiday, but the people refused to give it up. So the church succumbed and tried to turn it into a religious holiday where-in the Virgin Mary was honored. The Catholic Church also tried to change it, and make it a day where Christian martyrs were honored, so they practiced their rites on Feb 14Th in an effort to make the people give up the holiday.

Another popular story is one of a Roman Priest named Valentine. Valentine was imprisoned and executed for performing marriages and refusing to give up Christianity. Roman Emperor Claudius II who was cruel and engaged in several bloody losing battles. He forbade young couples from marrying because he thought that then the new husband did not want to leave his wife. Personally, I think people were tired of dying in his losing battles. Anyway, folklore tells us that the Priest would secretly wed the young couples. Claudius’ soldiers caught him, and threw him in prison. While in prison Valentine befriended the jailers daughter and before he died on FEB. 14Th 296 AD, he wrote her a note and signed it “love from your Valentine”. Hence, Valentine's Day.

While I was doing this research on St. Valentines Day, the Lord pressed this on my heart. “YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL AND ALL YOUR MIND.” As a Christian, I know “we shall have no other gods before Him (Exodus 20:3)and this practice began with worshiping gods. can you imagine? They want to give me Cupid, when I have Christ’s love!

At one time Valentine’s Day was important to me. But as I grow in Christ, I know what is important. This ambiguous holiday designed to make the rich richer is based on our need for love. I came to better understand that God is the source of all our love, and loving God and loving others are interrelated. We cannot have one without the other, and more importantly the bible tells us, “we love because he first loved us.”

I know that it is stressful enough for some who are alone. It is a reminder that they do not have that one person who loves them. So if this is you, remember that God is your provider. "God has not forgotten even the sparrows and we have more value than many sparrows" (Luke 12:6) Do not be disappointed when you do not receive a card, flowers or candy and are feeling unloved, because you have God's love(1 John 4:16. After all, the bible tells us that "God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him, shall not perish but have eternal life”.

WHO CAN LOVE US MORE THAN THAT?