A Strict Diet

I’m on a very strict diet and I’m lovin’ it!

This diet clears your vision, sharpens your mind, and improves your heart function.

On this diet, you can engorge yourself on truth and snacking on it is encouraged.

However, there is one restriction:  You cannot drink from the cup of brainwash*.  I won’t use the succinct phrase that describes what I’m trying to say because of the tragic and dark event from which it was derived: The 1978 Jonestown Massacre.  I also prefer not to risk getting a cease and desist letter from that company that makes powdered drinks. 😉

If you drink from that cup, your vision will become distorted, your mind will become delusional, and your capacity to love and accept others will diminish.  If you’re not careful, you could become a spiritual zombie:  Spiritually dead, but giving the semblance of life.  

I love truth and because I know the Word of God, Christ and what He represents, I completely and unapologetically refuse to drink from the cup of blind, unquestioning loyalty to any human.

 

* Drink from the cup of brainwash:

•  Accepting blatant lies as truth.   
•  Accepting wrong actions and behaviors as being correct.
•  Accepting the twisted interpretation of cherry-picked scripture used to promote an agenda.
•  Giving blind obedience or loyalty to a cause, agenda, or human.

I Am Your Sister

If your birth sister or brother came to you and said, “I’m hurting.” Your concern and empathy would immediately engage, and you’d do whatever you could to stop their pain.  If they were in a vulnerable place, you’d try your best to protect them.  You’d sincerely and unceasingly pray about their plight so things would improve for them. 

We are grafted into the same family by Christ.  I am your sister.  Where is your Christian empathy for me and my pain? 

People of color are your brothers and sisters.  We’re sharing our pain with you and telling you that we have been hurting for a long time because of the way we’re treated and want things to change.  Instead of empathizing with us, you dismiss us and tell us to get over it.  Some have even said we shouldn’t think or feel the way we do and should be “like” a certain black young lady in the public eye who—for whatever reasons—has chosen not to say things to make them feel uncomfortable.  You vilify and spew hateful words at us for even daring to vocalize our pain.  In some cases, it’s spiritualized and wrapped up in visions and prophecies that have supposedly come from God.   

We are your brothers and sisters. Where is your Christian love and empathy for our pain?

My heart is heavy.  It’s not just because of the state of this nation and the plight of people of color.  The response of some Christians adds significant weight to that heaviness.  I’m overwhelmed by the level of callousness and hate some are demonstrating toward people of color.  I do mean some Christians for there are some who truly walk what they talk and have love big enough to cover all ethnicities.  

Your media posts are revealing.  I believe the Bible says it better than I can, so I’ll let it speak…

James 3:11 “Doth a fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter?”

Luke 6:45 “A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is good; and an evil man out of the evil treasure of his heart bringeth forth that which is evil: for of the abundance of the heart his mouth speaketh.”

If nothing else, I thank you for revealing—and in some cases—confirming your true heart.  I’ll end there…

  

A Hard Truth: Justice, Equality and Fairness

All three should be a given for all humanity, but they are not.  People of color have been in a painful struggle against racism for ages.  I have shopped with it, worked with it, dined with it.  I’ve even sat in church with it...it's everywhere.  Some folk are audacious enough to blatantly demonstrate their bigotry.  Others are not, but we still pick up on its presence in the smirks, slights, innuendos, exchanged looks, twisted interpretation of scripture, etc.  Yes, we see it all.  What’s happening now is the struggle has reached the point of ENOUGH...again.  

When I see people of color being mistreated and brutalized, the pain cuts deep and my thoughts are that’s somebody’s baby and could very well have been my son, my grand baby, my brother, other relatives or even…me. 

Anyone—and I don’t care who you are—who chooses to ignore this kind of wrongdoing, approve of it, or make excuses for it is complicit and is a part of the problem.

Lawful and peaceful protest is one effective method folk can utilize in the fight for justice, equality, and fairness.  We have an additional powerful method.  Our black ancestors protested, marched, and even died for it because they understood its collective power.  What am I talking about?  Your right to vote.  If you haven’t been voting, start.  Use your vote to change the political landscape of this nation that has embraced and normalized racism and allowed bigotry to flourish unchecked.

Protesters, please be wise and watchful for everybody walking with you is not for you.   Some are there to neutralize you and your voice by any means necessary, including the devices of rioting, vandalism, and looting.  Consider this:  If you are sitting in a jail cell in November, that’s a guarantee of one less vote.  Look out for each other.  Keep the cameras rolling to document what’s happening around you so you can continue to prove instances of brutality and your innocence of criminal behavior.  It is making a difference.

I hope you will join me in praying for calm and protection for the peaceful protesters across this nation as they cry ENOUGH and ask for justice, equality, and fairness for ALL.