Month: August 2025

Love or Fear Pt 1

August 27, 2025 — Leave a comment

I spoke last post about being free. Let me explain what true freedom is.

FIRST thing God did was show me the power of choice. I am not a product of my enviroment, but a product of my choices. That’s why I can look at the injustices of the world and know I can overcome all that.

That’s why I can look at black people as a whole and call what amounts to excuses to live down as just that, excuses. You might not like it, I’m not asking you to like it. Doesn’t make it any less true.

Second thing God taught me, there are really only TWO choices you can make on a daily basis. One of fear and one of love. Those are the true measuring sticks of life. What is the foundaitonal reason for doing this or that? Is it born of love or is it born of fear.

Third thing God taught me is love. What is it? What is it made of? What is the substance of it? Boil it all down to this one simple thing. Love is a verb. Sure, we relegate it to some low space on the emotional spectrum, but it’s more than that. LOVE IS A VERB. That is, if you want to put it in the human space. It’s a verb.

Definition of verb: a word used to describe an action, state, or occurrence, and forming the main part of the predicate of a sentence, such as hear, become, happen.

You can tell if a person TRULY loves you by their actions. Are they consistently in a loving state? Do they help build, or form, a loving enviroment around you?

Then God goes and tells us what make up those loving actions.

You see, someone may say that they don’t want anything to do with the Bible or God because of any numerous amount of reasons that have something to do with the Bible (trust me, no one ever points out how God leaves them to have their own free will to choose, but then again, how do you convince someone they’re usually always choosing their own destruction)

When, let’s be honest about it for a second, the Bible is a book full of instructions on HOW TO LOVE!!!

The biggest showing of love being that of sacrifice without expectation. I mean, how often do we speak on Christ dying for us, according to God’s Will. That is was God’s love for us that demanded this payment, but God’s love also demands we freely choose Him. Because love isn’t FORCED. It’s a choice.

MisDirection

August 15, 2025 — Leave a comment

Spirit filled people, you all are different. You don’t panic, you don’t get upset, you don’t yell and scream. You already know how this story will end but you also still have to read through the chapters to get there.

Spirit filled people understand the foolishness of God is still higher than the wisdom of man. No need to throw your arms up in frustration, keep your peace.

Just observe and watch. I can say I forgot that for a bit and did indeed look like a fool. But, I also got to observe. And I realized just how fractured people can be. Even hypocritical. I got to compare how I was to what I am and what I hoped to be.

And I remain disgusted by what I was, enjoying who I am, and hopeful to what I will become. more open to learn, more likely to listen, more knowledgable of what I consume. Still very much a procrastinator.

I spoke with God the other day and asked for forgiveness for being lazy and slothful. Because, the more I thought about what I should be doing versus what I am doing, I find myself not doing what I should but doing what I shouldn’t. This beings to mind what the Apostle Paul was speaking of when he said that the things he wants to do, he doesn’t. But he does the things he doesn’t want to do. (had to go back and fact check myself on this because, anytime you start to quote the Word of God, you tread on dangerous waters)

Let me explain the part in parenthesis real quick.


The Word of God is the most powerful book in all of existence. So powerful, people have used it to gain power over others. It has been misquoted and deciphered incorrectly so much that you can point to major points of history where it was at the center of it all. Honestly, you can look at pop culture and see how it was used as a plot device in movies, music, and other forms of media. But let’s be direct on this.

Even right now, the Bible is being misquoted and misinterpreted for people to use it as a license to live their lives contrary to God. Let me further explain. My favorite book of the Bible is the Book of Romans. Within this book (it’s actually a letter), The Spirit leads the Apostle Paul to explain the fall of man, the need for the Law of God that was delivered by Moses. How the Law exposed sin, how the Law still came up short, and why we ultimately needed Jesus.


During the course of giving this amazing explanation, Paul is lead to ask an important question (this comes after what I have always felt was a powerful chapter in Chatper 5, let me go reread that real quick)

After reading Chapter 5, and part of Chatper 6, the point remains. Shall we, who have accepted Jesus as Lord and Savior, continue to sin so grace may abound? No. How shall we, who though baptism, have partaken in the death of Christ which means we have died to sin. Who have, through baptism, risen to life in Christ, now continue to do the thing we have died to?

To die to sin is also to seek repentance. To repent is to “turn away”, why seek to return to the life you have “turned away” from? Doesn’t mean you will be perfect. You will NEVER be perfect. But you shouldn’t continue to seek willful disobedience to God as you did prior to salvation. Through Salvation though, you will learn thew truth of sin, death, and eternity.

Fragmented Thoughts

August 13, 2025 — Leave a comment

I remember my first REAL taste of being black in America. Living in Texas (somewhere between 8 and 9 years old) and got called the “n” word. Was never exposed to any historical information about the word itself, even though I loved history, but I remember it.

My first proud to be black moment was when Harold Washington passed away. It seemed like the world around me stopped to mourn a black mayor. Didn’t fully understand it then, but I did over time.

My first negative experiences with the police usually involved a black cop. But I will NEVER forget how a white police officer jumped out of his car on a bunch of 7th graders while old white people were standing on their porches waving their phones at us and threatening us. The first person to ever pull a gun out on me was a white cop. Just because 6 of us were walking in a group from school. None of us knew the “grouping law” (I can’t remember the name of it exactly but we also called it “mob action”) limited groups to no more than 4 or 5 people.

I don’t miss how Riverdale police was when I was in my early teens.

Or how I watched, from my grandmother’s front porch, as what felt like the entirety of 111th Police station (this isn’t a small police station by any means) showed up on 116th street after their officers called for help (they didn’t need it)

Or how a shooting happened at a house party on the corner of 116th and no police showed up but we knew there was an officer sitting in his car on 115th and Harvard (which we found they were STILL THERE after the shooting)

How we KNEW the police would only ride down 119th and 115th but never the blocks. (the stuff we knew)

I also know people who have had to bury loved ones due to the violence being perpetrated within our own neighborhoods. I also understand why someone, out of desperation, would want extreme measures handed out in order to get rid of the element that is causing the issue. Funny thing is, in growing up on the southside of Chicago, I understand why those old white people were so upset about a group of black kids walking their street.

I never said it was right, I said I understand.

For them, it was the thing they moved further south to get away from, following them further south. For us, we was just happy to see the end of a school day. For them, it was the beginning of the end.

Over 20 years ago, I heard Ice Cube refer to something called “The Nigger Trap”. I could see his point. Incarceration rates, new laws being put in place, and so forth and so forth. As I got older, I started to REALLY understand it. Follow along with me real quick because African American History is riddled with these tales.

The promise of riches. At the end of the movie, “Panther” they show a black man meeting with some random looking white men. The black man agrees to start selling crack cocaine in AA neighborhoods. Thus, this is how crack became a problem in the black neighborhoods. But what if he would’ve said no?

What if, instead of chasing riches, he said no. Then, he told others about it scheme meant to destroy our neighborhoods? Maybe we would’ve gotten another black wall street?

Speaking of which,