Redemption for Disposable People (Love's Got Everything to Do With It)

Almost fifty years later and the bank of justice still appears bankrupt.

The blank check drafted “inalienable rights,” returned, stamped insufficient.

We hum praise songs, shout Hallelujah’s, run to church houses, lifting up our hands

While brown and black bodies, are shot dead, mass incarcerated, economically deprived and class anemic- indebted to “the man.”

Like strange fruit hanging from poplar trees

Disposable people, these black and brown bodies

Draped in darkness and suspicious in hoodies

Walking purposely with iced tea and candy

Still keep black and brown parents on their knees

Preachers only preaching pray and that Jesus can save us

As the world wilds out, time we are reintroduced to the raw side of Jesus

News media, police, teachers, neighborhood watchmen portray us

As menaces to society, girls and boys in the hood with no purpose

Invisible, disposable, Stephen Bantu Biko, Emmitt Till, Aliyah Shell,

Trayvon Martin, Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, Denise McNair

Many other names could be added to this roll of deaths because of skin color about which few apparently care

But the reality is that beyond name calling, symbolic protesting, getting angry, gets us nowhere.

So what do we do, how do we grow through this? I hear your questioning stares.

The answer is we begin by making those around us care.

We begin by speaking the difficult truths others don’t want to hear

We refuse to hold our breath, bite our tongues so that we abate white fear.

We return to the mantras of the past, of those like Ida B. Wells, Angela Davis, Marcus Garvey, Dr. King, and Huey Newton

We speak the truth in love and refuse to be relegated to the margin.

We remind our communities that while many have accomplished modicums of privilege

That there is no privilege when those kissed by the sun remain on the receiving ends of injustice.

This is a global cry to the corners of the world where brown and black peoples live

Toulouse, France, South Africa East and West Cape

Joburg, Nairobi, Kenya, Chicago, Cook County and Lake

Start where you are, having hard conversations about race, power and privilege.

Converse on how we can all work to create a better future for our kids.

So that not another black, brown, latino, asian, or white parent has to bury one of their kids.

Like many of you reading this, the past few weeks I have witnessed the effects of untreated grief, unenforced justice and mounting tensions surrounding the case of Trayvon Martin.  Like many of you, I’ve (finally) been inundated with his story so much so that the last thing I wanted to do was read one more blog post about him.  I had mixed feelings about wearing a hoodie to church to show my solidarity and how “hip” I am to the world around me.  I said I didn’t want to preach a sermon that had any mention of this tragedy, but the Spirit wouldn’t let me leave it alone.  So, with reluctance, I preached the following sermon, not about Trayvon Martin so that we all could hear it, feel good about ourselves with our internal intentions to do something meaningful, or our bold photographic, symbolic protest on Facebook, or Twitter, but rather so that as the Spirit speaks we can become equipped to put our faith in action.  So that we can learn, how followers of Jesus’ faith should respond to a world that trends Trayvon Martin, Troy Davis, Aliyah Shell and others for a season and then is heard no more.  So that black and brown peoples of the world, and those white friends and family who come alongside us with sincerity of heart, can truly begin to lay hold to the message of Jesus- that may not always be fully found in the hegemonic, patriarchal co-opted pages of our Christian canon- but that message of the tradition from which Jesus preached that demands us to do justice, love mercy and to walk humbly with our God.

Sermon excerpt ~

Sermon Title: "Love's Got Everything to do With It"

Scripture Lesson: Ephesians 4:14-16; 25-27.

How does it feel? That feeling, that moment, when something horrible and inappropriate has been said in your presence and deep down on the inside you want to say something, but you don’t want to be the one to usher in that awkward moment where someone is made to feel uncomfortable for how they feel.  You know, that feeling, that moment, when you’re with your closest friends- many of whom happen to not be of the same ethnic origin as you or your family members- and something is said on the news report, or you see an insensitive commercial, or someone laughs at a joke like Robert De Niro’s about the nation being ready for a white first lady, and you start to feel that lump in your throat, that heat across your forehead that says- that’s not right. But what do you do? What do we do? We move on, with a laugh, or a smile, or a moment of awkward silence and the hope that everyone just moves beyond it because the United States of America is post-race and so long as we don’t discuss it, that’s the narrative we’ll all just stick with until the good Lord calls us home.

Would that this were the abundant life to which Jesus has called us in John 10.  Nay, in all these things, this was never the vision God had for people who claimed to be followers of Jesus. In 2012, black and brown bodies all over the world are disproportionately the recipients of deadly force at the hands of law enforcement officers.  Black and brown bodies all over the world are disproportionately impoverished, publicly demonized and on the lowest of the class/privilege scale.  Even when black and brown bodies work their way through the halls of academia in the most prestigious universities in the land, hold high positions in the senate and win the election to the office of President of the United States, even then black and brown bodies are treated with a disproportionate amount of disrespect and condescension.  Yet, for all that we witness, all that we endure on our jobs in corporate America, all that we endure in the halls of our universities and colleges, all that we see happening in our houses of worship, we silently permit others to label our people, misrepresent our heritage, and even murder our children with little public outcries and inconsistent follow through.

And I get it, some of us are just barely making it ourselves and we don’t want to rock the boat.  I get it, some of us are even really comfortable and we prefer to drive our families home to our gated communities in our imported automobiles and seclude ourselves away, but this is not the time.  The gated communities are becoming the sites of abuse.  The tension within corporate halls could be cut with a knife and we have been silent.  We have been mute and now, the Spirit is saying no more! Unbriddle your tongues! Never again!

In 1993 a young brother who has gone down in Hip Hop as one of the prophets of the movement, TuPac Amaru Shakur, penned a song “Holler If Ya Hear Me” that undeniably became for many youth of the nineties an anthem of liberation and resistance.  TuPac’s message resonated with so many youth of his time because his message was authentically responsive to the crisis of his time.  He said: Will I quit, will I quit?

They claim that I'm violent, but still I keep representin, never give up, on a good thing Wouldn't stop it if we could it's a hood thing And now I'm like a major threat Cause I remind you of the things you were made to forget

He propelled young people to go against the systems that failed them, that were and are still intentionally established to privilege rich white males.  He knew his life and spoke out of his own words- not some words a system granted him permission to speak.  Not some words some institution placed on his lips. 

As people of the way of Jesus Christ, we too have been given this charge.  In the fourth chapter of Ephesians, the Bible says “We must no longer be children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people’s trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming.”  Yet amidst scheming folks, in response to the schisms in the church at Ephesus, the writer of Ephesians writes these words reminding the church to grow up! I do believe that these words speak even in our present reality.  Stop being silent when injustice walks himself to your doorstep.  Grow up!  Take a stand for those whose voices have been silenced by death.  Choose life.  The first step in choosing life is to SPEAK!

We have all at one point or another been in the presence of someone who has done something or said something that we did not agree with.  Perhaps a joke was told that simply was inappropriate and although we may not have laughed at it, we didn't tell the impromptu comedian that her words were inappropriate.  We've been in meetings and overheard plans that didn’t make a bit of sense and stared at others around the room as everyone silently resolved that what was said didn’t sit well with the majority, but yet we’ve remained silent.  If we are going to choose life, we must SPEAK! Speak up when local injustices are perpetrated against others in our presence.  Speak when our church, school or other leadership wily-nillyly hands down directives that don’t flesh with the Word of God, aren’t life sustaining, life giving, life affirming! SPEAK!

Speak what?? SPEAK GOD’S TRUTH.  Ephesians 4 furthermore suggests that when we don’t speak the truth, God’s truth, IN LOVE we are behaving immaturely, as children and perhaps even making room for the devil to wreak havoc in our lives, in our churches, our places of employment, our family!  Ephesians 4:15-16 says “But speaking the truth in love, we must grow up in every way into the One who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and knit together by every ligament with which it is equipped, as each part is working properly, promotes the body’s growth in building itself up in love.”  I believe that part of the reason we struggle with issues of social injustice, divisions in church, in our families, our jobs, our nation is that people have become mute.  People have stopped critically engaging the systems and institutions through which they live.  The Bible says when the people stop speaking the truth in love, there is a crippling of the system, the body is no longer joined together and is crippled from working properly! The promotion of the body’s growth is hindered when we cease to speak the truth in love.  When we passively accept what superiors say without question, we do a disservice to the body.  The Bible says, we ought to speak, and to speak TRUTH, in love.

John 4:24 records that the hour is nigh when true worshippers will worship God in Spirit and truth.  Most faith folks can "worship in Spirit." We fervently sing “To worship You I live, to worship you I live, I live to worship you.”  We can shout Hallelujah up and down the halls of any church we find ourselves in, but it's that "worshiping in truth" part that gets us.  If we are going to be able to speak God’s truth in our own words we must realize (and live in) the truth of our own lives.  The truth is that contrary to what we present when we walk through the hallowed halls of our places of worship, very few people reading this are sanctified to the core. Many profess to be "Holy Ghost filled," and "fire baptized," but let the wrong person wrong us on the wrong day and the reality of who we really are might just peek out from under our sanctified skirts or our pious pant legs.  Let the wrong church member say the wrong thing about our idea, or our vision, or our leadership style, or even something as insignificant as what we chose to wear, and the reality of who we are- the heart of who we are, just might creep out.  And if it doesn't creep out when we cuss "bless" them out, it sure enough comes out in the parking lot ministry meeting, or the restaurant, dining room or bedroom meetings after the church meetings.  Our closest friends and loved ones get the ear full of how we really feel about as Marvin said “What’s going on” and we choose to let situations, issues, people, to fester and boil, aggravate us, fuel our passive aggression, our mean spiritedness, until they die.  But they don’t die easy, they linger on beds of affliction that we nurse with our own emotional attachment to the feeling of our own personal hurt.  If we are going to grow, we must be able to choose life.  In choosing life we must realize the truth of our own lives.  When we can admit our own shortcomings, our frailties, our needs, our own personal stumbling blocks and issues, we can acknowledge the fact that no one is perfect- not even George Zimmermann.  Even in our imperfection, we must be held accountable when our imperfections cause us to make horrible mistakes in judgment that lead to us doing harm to others.  We are a world full of imperfect people striving to be perfected through the works of the Holy Spirit in our lives.  But we all must also be accountable to and protected by systems of justice.  An arrest and due process of Mr. Zimmermann demonstrates the former.

If we are going to Choose Life, we must not only speak, we must not only speak God’s truth, but we MUST be able to do so in Our Own Words!  We must be able to identify our own words. Who are you??  Diana Ross sang it this way- "Do you know where you’re going to? Do you like the things that life is showing you? Where are you going to? Do you know?" Who are you?

One of my favorite scripture passages is the Acts 7 story of the seven sons of Sceva.  The Bible says they are trying to cast out demons in the name of Jesus whom Paul preached about and in the midst of their casting out, the demons say to the seven sons of Sceva “Jesus I know and Paul I know, but who are you?”  We can be so busy in church declaring and decreeing stuff, casting out demons, calling forth holy boldness and go right back home to messy lives and messy situations and wonder why it seems we have so little power to change things.  Like David trying to wear Saul’s armor to fight Goliath, when we don’t know who we are and whose we are, we set ourselves up for failure every time!

Somebody reading this is wondering how do I find my voice?  How do I walk in the fullness of who I am?  Well, first we must get connected to the One who gives our lives full meaning.  If you don’t have a saving relationship with Jesus, I’d like to suggest to you that you’ll never fully know who you are.  Jesus says “I’ve come that you may have life and have it more abundantly.” Apart from Jesus, our lives have very little meaning.  Sure people outside the faith accomplish great feats everyday, but I’m a living witness that every day with Jesus is sweeter than the day before.  Knowing Jesus has given my life meaning beyond my wildest imagination.  For me, Jesus is the One who’s relationship with us is not about how many services we attend, or how many Bible verses we can recite, or even about how bad we can make others feel about what they’re not doing in their lives.  A real relationship with this Jesus, speaks up for others when everyone around them is laughing about them.  A real relationship with this Jesus doesn't just wear a hoodie to church on Sunday, or in a Facebook picture, and carry skittles and iced tea in protest.  A real relationship with this Jesus writes letters, boycotts companies and demands justice where individuals can and should be held accountable.  A real relationship with this Jesus isn’t concerned about how many digits are to be found in their checking and savings account balances, but is concerned about the check Dr. King so poignantly preached about back in 1963 when he said "I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation.

When he said In a sense we've come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the "unalienable Rights" of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note, insofar as her citizens of color are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked "insufficient funds."

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation. And so, we've come to cash this check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice."

The coming weeks will be filled with enough tension, hatred, and mean-spiritedness, covered in racial overtones and accusations about what should have been done, who's the blame and how our systems have failed us.  Some of those words will be filled with truth and the truth will be a painful pill to swallow.  Even in the midst of the pain, we must resolve to speak the truth to one another in love.  We must tell Tina, that she was wrong.  Love, agape love, really does have everything to do with it.  We can see our way through this.  Trayvon, Aliyah, Emmitt and other's lives will be remembered with dignity and purpose when we follow Beyonce’s lead and put God’s love on top and let that love lead us into new life together.

We must make every effort to support our faith with goodness

 Goodness with knowledge, self-control and endurance

Endurance with godliness and mutual affection

Affection, agape love, get us in the right direction.

Proud to be an American...

I'm Black and I'm proud.
I was born in the United States of America.
I am however challenged to live fully in my beautiful black skin in the United States of America and heartily declare "I'm proud to be an American."

Seeing What's Real (Embracing Spirit Filled Life)

Yesterday I found (and read) the diary I started in 1985. As I read through the pages I was amazed at what I lived through, but even more amazed with the evidence that I have had twenty six years of unresolved issues.  As a young person who literally "grew up" in the church I religiously listened to my spiritual leadership and blindly accepted what they taught.  I got saved, began attempting to proselytize friends and family members to keep them from ending up up in hell.  While I still profess faith in Jesus and attempt to live out that faith in relationship with every person, creature, and aspect of creation in meaningfully healthy ways, I am most certainly not the same. What happened?  I got older, went to seminary (twice) and began studying on my own, I began realizing that blindly following anyone is a surefire way to lose sight of what real.

Panties and Powder

The other day a colleague of mine tweeted that he was planning to unload some "baggage" in his life. I metaphorically replied "make sure you don't leave behind your toiletries and undies." As the metaphor played out in my mind I thought "wow, I think I need to unpack this a little more because I'm sure it didn't translate via tweet. Soooooo, here it is :)

"It's All Good!"

Romans 8:26-28 in the New Revised Standard Version says "Likewise, the Spirit helps us in our weakness, for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to God's purpose."

Have you ever become so discouraged about how something has turned out in your life? Have you watched a loved one make choice after choice after choice that just seemed to clearly be bad choices? When you look back over your own life and rally think things over do you ever think "I shoulda, woulda, coulda if I just had another chance?" Dear friends, in this life we will make a lot of choices. Some we will boldly declare and feel a deep conviction that it's right and good; yet others we may timidly, or even half-heartedly make, and hope for the best. And yes, friends, if you haven't done it already, live a little while longer and we'll make some choices that are absolutely not the best given the options in front of us. But as the writer of this Romans passage reminds us- likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. Even in our prayers we don't have the right words every now and then, but don't stop praying- pray nonetheless! Choose, live, be, and do- nonetheless! Live into your choices and trust God that the Spirit will intercede on your behalf.