N

I hope ya’ll still there and still slightly curious about what I’m going to write next.  I have a lot to say and like I’ve been saying in all my spooky undertones, I feel like Mars (again). I’m changing and I think I’m beginning to feel like God loves me a lot. 

But here’s my random as ever rant for today!

Some people really have the entitlement game down kids! I was on the train coming here… [Don't ask where...you know full well I'm in Starbucks. Where else can you take advantage of free wifi while drifting into a caffeine induced coma and look at home doing it with the rest of the Starbucks zombies?]  Anyway, I try to stay off the subway as much as possible.  There’s something about that window seat above ground on the Select buses the MTA is ramming down our throats.  I just feel a lot more at peace on the bus! Today, I gave up some of my peace and pandora tunes to take the straight route here.  Tell me how now that I’m an infrequent rider I am able to sort of bump into the same crazy people on the train?

There is this one lady who we’ll call the give-up-your-seat captain! Last time I rode the train she was chastising an insouciant young woman in her twenties.  I think it was for the best that the girl was oblivious to what was going on.  She sat straight ahead and looked that perfect cross of aware and in a zone.  You know that thing New Yorker’s have branded.  It go, I’m chillin’, no mean mugging, just bumping my music in the earphones and minding my business. Mind yours! Yeah that’s the NYC neutral mug, but don’t get it twisted, the guard is still up! O…K…now, Captain move it or lose it was on a mission to secure a seat for the gentlemen I initially believed was her husband or in the very least traveling with her.  As soon as she got in the subway car she starts in on this young lady.  Idk…something about if she was sitting there, she’d have given up her seat.  I think someone else may have gotten up though, but I’m not completely tight on the details because it was awhile ago.  Anyway, I perceived that the Captain was a racist. Yeah, I said it!  I rode that conclusion home because I’ve observed other white women appear to use their white skin privilege to do things like this in the past.  It’s infuriating! Alright, so the young woman was African American and nothing really came of it except that I was on the edge of my seat angry because the old Captain was unwilling for awhile to let it go. Plus, it turns out the guy is NOT even with her!

Fast Forward to today. SAME LADY! LOL She gets on the same car as me and promptly begins to say to any and everyone in her come on guys tone,”he would like to sit…”  Two people moved pretty quickly and she and her traveling companion (no more assumptions from me about her tolerance for so called minorities or marital status, sorry!) I’m like, what the? She and buddy cozy up in their seats and she’s smiling from ear to ear. 

Am I bugging or is she doing too much? I get that the law is that if requested patrons of the MTA are required to give up their seats to the elderly or handicapped, but do you ever bristle when you see people going hard to promote their rights? Why do you think that is? How do you even promote rights in a non offensive or non belligerent way…with humility?

And let me get back to minding my own business…lol

N

No I wasn’t born in Ghana/But Africa’s my mama/and I did not end up here from bad karma

I’m An African by Dead Prez

There aren’t many times that I can agree whole heartedly with DP, but this one gets a ‘Like’ from me.  It never ceases to amaze me how the Lord plops me into atmosphere’s entirely different from the ones I’ve lived in…

I’ve had the privilege of being in the company of not a few U.S. patriots.  It’s made me consider my upbringing a lot.  Here are a few of the things I’ve noticed:

• I’ve nursed a hostility and distrust of police officers for much of my life
• I’ve been highly suspicious if not blatantly confused as to the merit behind joining any branch of military
• I’ve never felt fully American
• As would possibly follow from the above, I’ve never felt threatened by America’s enemies
• I’ve never felt as though the Constitution of The United States of America spoke to me or my community
• I’ve always been reticent about casting my ballot one way or the other
• The Civil Rights Era…try as I may, *gosh* it seems so far removed from me
• I am a Democrat by default…my mama votes that way, so I picked up the mantle
• I don’t trust any politician
• I’ve never found myself sandwiched between the views of so called Conservatives or Liberals – frankly, I’ve never cared!
• I’ve never viewed the above as mostly Christian or non-Christian
• I am basically apathetic about the political process
• As ignorant as I am about the happenings, I find party lines to be lame and second only to small talk.  I hate both.

What is bugging me out is that I am beginning to see that I and many other Americans who hold to these sentiments above are quite possibly in the minority.  Many Americans are second, third, or fifth generation flag wavers.  So?

So, I’m examining my suspicions, fears, and ignorance.

I’ll let you know how it goes.  Talk to me about your journey, why don’t you?

Always had a sort of hankering to say that about my home.  I feel that way.  No matter the cycles my life has taken, no matter the cities I’ve lived in, no matter how clean the suburbs or how white the church buildings I’ve entered in for worship appeared, there was always this feeling…it’s like a swift wind that passes by on a summers night.  It’s telling you that fall is on its way, the season has changed.  That it has.

Home to the hood – at least for a moment.  Home to my beautiful nieces, one I have yet to meet and two who are growing so quickly, it literally makes me cry.  One has fancied her aunt ‘N’ to have “made it out.”  Ha!  On to talk about what that means to her and to entertain her strange interest in Marilyn Monroe? *sigh* Anticipating hugging my mother more and being a part of God’s redemptive plan for my city.

Admittedly, one can argue that the energy in a room is quite high and the aroma of sweat…and perfume, is it(?) might lend many to believe that high praise may have happened, but really? Really?!

Catharsis

Doing some light reading on the word catharsis.  It’s a nice word to say on the tongue, isn’t it?  Feels rather, uhm…cathartic.  Anyhow, turns out that we owe a debt to Aristotle for employing catharsis as a literary effect in his work entitled, Poetics.

Hear this you hip hop heads!  Rappers are not the only ones with “beef.”  Nor did you invent “answer records.”  Okay, maybe you did sort of invent the latter, but the concept of response is old.  Apparently, Aristotle wrote Poetics in response to Plato who believed that poetry encouraged men to be hysterical and uncontrolled.  Yeah, I have to admit that Def Poetry makes me a bit crazy! lol Why does everyone sound like Sonia Sanchez?  I surmise biting to be appropo in the misty world of poetry.  

Alright, so Plato —>poetry=hysteria.    

Aristotle —> poetry= < hysteria or less emotional. 

Aristotle felt it gave people “a periodic and healthy outlet to their feelings.”  In Tragedy in Relation to Aristotle’s Poetics, F.L. Lucas states that it is the “human soul that is purged of its passions.”  And straight off of the wiki files, catharsis “refers to the sensation, or literary effect, that would ideally overcome either the characters in a play, or an audience upon finishing watching a tragedy (a release of pent-up emotion or energy).”

Even more interesting, is how the German poet and playwright Bertolt Brecht employed catharsis in his dramas by leaving significant emotions unresolved as a way to move theatre patrons to social action.  I’m not 100% sure of what this looks like and quite honestly, wiki has really just opened up a can of worms for me with this word.  I have a lot more research to do on it as well as this Brecht guy, not to mention Aristotle and Plato!  But I imagine if Brecht was as tiny as Spike Lee and could fit into his bite-sized Air Jordan’s  in 1989′s Do The Right Thing, we may have seen him demonstrate such a use of carthsis when Lee portrayed as (stutter) MMMookie threw a garbage can into the window of Sal’s Pizzeria after the restaurant was stormed by an angry Buggin’ Out, played by Giancarlo Espisito and his squadron of 4 because Sal wouldn’t “put no brotha’s on the wall!” Of course, then we have the the akward spat he and Sal had before he scraped his final pay off the sidewalk after Radio Raheem is killed by brut police force.  Pretty much all hell breaks loose. 

Even if you weren’t particularly moved to any action beside going to the bathroom, you probably felt a slight sense that you and your crew should do something, right?  Hopefully.

Anyway, the point is this catharsis thing is kind of interesting.  Lots of church folk have to fess up here, huh?  Some of what is being disguised as praise is really just a release of pent up emotion and passion, albeit frustrating or howering angst from the tragedy of our lives.  It feels good to let go.  But what is so different about sweating to the universal beat of an ill trained drummer and trance-like organists’ dinking on white and black keys and Richard Simmons sweating to the oldies?  Work-outs give me carb fits and it’s no coincidence, I’m sure that Napoli’s Pizza is directly across the way from the gym.  That ain’t right, ya’ll! But if good work-outs alone give me no restraint against carb cravings then what in creation is to prevent a Christian or non-Christian for that matter from leaving a sweat session at church, (being informed that they have duly worshipped God) and diving head first into a cesspool of sin?  It ain’t the clanging of that organ, that’s for sure.

Carthatic experiences are not sufficient to keep me from reviling God’s name.  They don’t even mean I’ve worshipped him. 

Crazy Praise

So, what’s up with all the crazy praise?  I mean, what profit does running around a building bring to your life after you’ve gone home Sunday afternoon?  What’s up with the screaming, the howling, and the charismatic wop?  Are you more victorious in prayer, killing sin, loving others, forgiving those who hurt you, giving, seeing and savoring Christ?  

I wonder about these so-called churches that maybe employ catharsis as a worship style to entice people to do something after they’ve felt a release of this pent up energy.  Give, give, give!  Your mind clear enough to “tithe” your entire pay check yet?  No?  “Cue Drummer!”  *Clank, clank, clank, clank!*

Why not expend that energy into crazy living? Just sayin’

I can’t say that Manuel Scott grew up in the pj’s, but if you know him or have heard him speak, you know his heart is definitely all about giving prudence and knowledge to those who deseperately need it!  Proud of you brother!  We need more men who will stand up and extend their arms, gifts, talents, etc. to those who not knowing their potential mourn in their various ghetto’s… 

*This might be the exact stereo system my mom owned.  I’ll never forget I went to a friends birthday party in college and her mom still owned one that worked.  I’m not sure what I was more delightfully shocked about, the fact that she was playing a Clark Sisters album on it or the dinosaur itself.

SPEAKING OF DINO’S  

ANYONE STILL OWN A 45 ADAPTER INSERT?

Hooray if you do and okay by me if you don’t.  Still, when we buy something from the store don’t we typically expect to get what we paid for?  When we bust our butts at the 9 to 5, we want our just due.  We wanna hear those sound effects from cashing checks that Dougie Fresh rapped about on pay day even if we use electronic transfer aka direct deposit, right? 

Sometimes I think about the absurdity of human entitlement in this sin bred world.  It especially humbles me to acknowledge that I deserve everything I’ve worked for in the way of covenant curses, sin, condemnation, death, eternal torment, and separation from God.  After all, these and more are my wages, my just deserts.  I should expect the full payment for such intense labor.  Anything less would be, well unfair and maybe injust.  Or would it?

If in my wildest dream, I actually owned a b&o stereo system and found that not only does it virtually bring a Bob Marley concert to my living room, but pray tell, it also washes dishes, what would that unexpected, yet odd feature be to me in this fairytale?  What a bonus!

Imagine, if you will the bonuses sin and more clearly our sin nature has afforded us.  After a bad day you will have exhausted yourself, I’m sure.  Truthfully, after a good day, you should be sobered.  How many times throughout these days will you have had to battle the feeling that this or that thing is just not fair?  Did you feel entitled to respect today?  What about a bit of peace and quiet?  A day at the office where everything runs smoothly.  What about joy?  Did you really expect that 95 year old lady to skip you at the grocery store and roll her eyes at you when she did? Ah! Sin has a senior card too. “Step right up front sin.  This crotchety old lady is ripe for belligerence today!”

Daily I fail.  No, scratch that.  Moment by moment I fail, thinking that everything I have or go through I deserve.  I don’t doubt it, I know I should swallow the whole kit and kaboodle, but sometimes a believer needs to be reminded that we don’t always get everything we deserve.  Sometimes, when you feel crushed and defeated, think about the one who took what you deserved and gave you what you did not have, but so desperately needed. 

Thank God for his Grace in his Son.  Thank God he is just in that he does not repay us for our evil, but in satisfying the Father’s wrath through the sacrifice of himself has bought our redemption.  Let us rejoice and partake of the covenant blessings we do not deserve saints.

I know, you’ve done it all and then some, but “C’mon Son!”  Give it a *rest…in Him. 

*Hebrews 4:3

1992 was also the year of the “Rodney King uprisings” and the year Washington Post journalist David Mills interviewed Souljah and we got such great quotes like,

“I mean, if black people kill black people every day, why not have a week and kill white people? You understand what I’m saying? In other words, white people, this government and that mayor were well aware of the fact that black people were dying every day in Los Angeles under gang violence. So if you’re a gang member and you would normally be killing somebody, why not kill a white person? Do you think that somebody thinks that white people are better, or above dying, when they would kill their own kind?”

It was that first sentence that Clinton capitalized off of.  If you’re interested in taking a trip to the 1990′s to shovel about the dust of the past and you’d like to get some reading done, click here to read the entire article that made history.  Click here to read Souljah’s response.

Wow! All of that to say, that I was influenced in a major way by Souljah.  I shared her anger at the plight of impoverished black people, the injustice, the brutality and hatred poured out on my community by the NYPD and America at large.  She declared that we were at war and I believed it.  She exuded the strength of a strong fort of Soweto youth fighting for freedom and I tried to emulate it.  It may have been ’92, but my mind was experiencing the glories of the militant past of the ’60′s and the path of iconic figures like the Black Panther Party and Malcolm X.  And to make matters even better, she was just like me, from the pj’s and proud of it.

Join me on this journey as I share my life with you (just a little bit).  You’ll get some BC days and present day glories and battles from my Christ has redeemed me days.  Maybe you can help me name these memoirs… what do you think about princess of the ghetto? Kind of reminiscent of JJ on Good Times, isn’t it?

I’m from East Harlem where the bodegas stay open all night with a bit of window service and very little english speaking cashiers.  What’s that all about?  It’s Spanish Harlem and that’s just the way it is.  So, you tuck your frustration in your pocket and try your hand at this sort of free style sign language.  Point to strawberry soda there and yodels over yonder.  If it’s not that big of a deal you might settle for the 7UP and just be glad you were able to walk away from the corner without getting your brains splattered all over the side walk, word.

But before I was talking about Sister Soulja and how she solidified my refusal to be ashamed of where I come from.  Let me be clear, she did, but that doesn’t mean I loved it all the time or at all.

I’m a huge Nas listener.  What I mean is that I love listening to his perspective on life.  No, it isn’t remotely Christian, but I appreciate it for what it’s worth.  On his Street’s Disciples Album he says,

By the time of age nine I’m already decidin’
If I can protect mommy from the hood by fightin’
Or usin’ a knife or a gun when I’m twenty-one
By by then them hoods woulda pushed their way in our apartment
And we die then, so I been a young nervous wreck in the projects
Watchin’ them older niggaz pass pot and they high man
I’m just a young boy, snot nose, hair nappy
Cops ride by squeezin’ their trigger fingers at me
So I would go to school and try to get good grades
Teacher wrote mommy and kicked me outta school for havin’ braids
So she cussed them, said “My son ain’t no motherfuckin‘ hoodlum”
They judged us, thinking that we dumb ’cause where we come from
Got a little older and now I see
Young niggaz wanted by the powers that be (powers that be)

That track is entitled Reason and I quoted it because it reveals the mind of a nine year old boy growing up in the projects.  It’s a heartbreaking reality and I’m probably going to surprise some people, but everybody didn’t grow up in the ‘hood’ wanting to sell drugs and lack ambition.  Some children have been hostages in the war of terror before someone coined the phrase war on terror!

Some girl or boy has and many still are living under the same fear and stress as Nas.  One day they will be able to empathize with that person from a distant and far off land- on earth – [we call it "foreign," right?]  who is asked all manner of insensitive questions about where she comes from.  She might be able to hold that comrades hand and respond graciously when asked, “how did you make it out?”

Hopefully she will not hold her head in shame, but just tell her story and not be judged by where she comes from…

The page read, “Treasures of the African Americans, History Can’t Take Away What God Has Given to You.”  So, I was intrigued and not just because the DVD’s were free either.  I ordered 3  because I was so sure that other friends would enjoy this gift, but before I gifted them to anyone I was going to watch it first.  Good old hedonism!  Anyway, I got my copies in the mail and eagerly popped it in the DVD player.  After a few moments, I paused it, grabbed a pen and paper and started writing, word for word (as much as possible) what I was hearing.  I probably had a smile on face up til the point that I paused the video.  I want to share with you why my mood changed.

The speaker was a white guy named Arthur Burk who spoke to a largely if not completely black audience.  His purpose was to teach black Americans what treasures they possessed.  What had God intended in creating black people?  I suppose because he spoke to a room full of Americans, he went the route of discussing the purpose of African Americans.   He made six points that I will share with you.  The following are the apparent gifts that African Americans have and their contribution to the rest of humanity (as dude saw it) and particularly to white people, ie “European-Caucasians.”

African Americans [AA] have:

1. “Introduced us [white people] to the Holy Spirit to give revelation of himself through the world that the white man can’t get.”
2. On meditation of Scripture v. studying Scripture: “God has designed the European-Caucasian mind to study the word of God using the Greek Logic model of the New Testament.”
3. “[AA's] have an understanding of the spiritual dynamics of rhythm… black people have written in their spirit a knowledge of the beats of heaven and the ability to take our spirits to places in heaven.  We can’t get there with a white man’s beat.”
4. “[AA's] have an incredible understanding of dignity, and [AA men] have the ability to express dignity through their clothing.”
5. “The black culture is renown for its sexual prowess… God has designed you to be sexually intense and to be sexually immense and to teach the rest of us what it looks like for sex and spirit to meet in holy union in the presence of almighty God and to redeem sexuality that our white culture has degraded through Hollywood in the last fifty years.”
6. [AA's] have an unique understanding of protocol for royalty.

Just a few reflections, I will tackle them briefly and point by point below:

First of all, I don’t get how he got away with saying any of this stuff especially to a room full of AA’s.  Read black people: *In my best Denzel Washington is Malcolm X voice* “You’ve been hoodwinked, bamboozled, led astray, run amok!” I sincerely believe that this room thought that what was being presented was meant to encourage them to some sort of strange cultural entitlement.  How?  What about this list sounds even remotely flattering?

Enough with the monkey business! Whose going to come up with a scholarly approach to the question of the gifts that the races of mankind are given?  That was actually a trick question.  Don’t answer it!  The foundation is shaky just like the theory of race.  Race is a social construct with no essential biological reality.  Burks’ premise is flawed.  He’s making allusion to illusions.  Researchers argue that the term “race” is in fact, meaningless.  The Bible, oh The Bible! The Bible teaches us that we are all of “one blood.”   Adam is your poppa and Eve is your momma! 1 Corinthians 15:45, “The first man Adam became a living being…” Ken Ham feels about like this:

Personally, because of the influences of Darwinian evolution and the resulting prejudices, I believe everyone (and especially Christians) should abandon the term “race(s).” We could refer instead to the different “people groups” around the world.   Are There Really Different Races?

1. Any apparent “introduction” to the Holy Spirit, his person and work that does not come from the Son of God is hocus pocus.

Burk thanks William Seymour and his Azusa Street Revival for ushering in this understanding of the Spirit.  Briefly, Seymour was instrumental in advancing the doctrine of the “baptism of the Spirit” as believed by Pentecostals.  Ironically, Seymour is hailed as leading interracial worship services in 1906, at a time “when there were more lynchings of black men then in any other year of America’s history.”

Barring the doctrinal differences I have with Pentecostals, namely the view that espouses that baptism in the Spirit is evidenced by speaking in tongues, I can appreciate the significance interracial worship would mean in 1906.  Sadly, the true significance cannot be fully appreciated in a context that seems to lift supposed racial identity as a catalyst for spiritual growth or awakening.  A worshipper at Seymour’s revival was quoted as saying, “The blood of Jesus washed the color line away.”  Well, Burk and the hundreds of people applauding him have just reintroduced it.  But Ephesians 2:11-22 is sufficient to correct this error.  Are we not one in Christ?  The people of God enjoy the spiritual benefits of the reconciliation that Christ made when he satisfied the Father’s wrath on the cross.  “So, then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but your are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.” WWPS?  What (else) would the Apostle Paul say to this?  Romans 10:12, “For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

Scripture teaches us well, (1) the Holy Spirit is the gift to all believer’s as they trust in the person and work of Christ for salvation.  Read John 14:15-31, he is given to us from the Father in the name of the Son.  Seymour is not the conduit of grace, Christ is.  (2) The work of the Holy Spirit is to convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment… he will guide you into all truth, for he will not speak on his own authority , but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.  He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it you.” [John 16:8-14] The Holy Spirit that Burk speaks of glorifies AA’s (even if it’s condescending).  Burk states, “the races are not equal.  You do not need equality.  You need access to what God designed you to receive.  The black folk have this huge untapped potential to see things in Scripture that we white folk will never see.”  (3) The Holy Spirit of the Scriptures is the life giving Spirit who glorifies Christ and is given to all men who are Christ’s sheep at the moment of rebirth.

2. I can’t even begin to talk about how insulted I was by this comment.    Burk refers to seminary as “the white man’s seminary.”  They teach a “white methodology, a white understanding, a Greco Roman mind set.”  The good news is that God has designed the AA to meditate on Scripture and to understand the Old Testament Hebraic mind set far better than we [European- Caucasian] do.  How laughable is this?  Burk doesn’t explicitly state this, but I couldn’t help but question his motive behind this statement.  Does he feel the AA is incapable of grasping seminary level work since he reduces the “Hebraic mindset” to merely meditating on Scripture and extracting Biblical principles?  Of course, to have a handle on either Greek or Hebrew thought would require rather rigorous academic pursuit that many graduating AA’s and Caucasian’s have excelled in.  Guess the proof would be in the pudding there.  But again, I think that Burk makes the mistake of linking Greco Roman with the modern “white man.”  If white is Irish, Polish, Dutch, or Slavic, that ain’t Greek and it ain’t Roman either.  The thing is, notions of the “white race” much like those of the “black race” are misnomers.

3. Just when I didn’t think it could get any worse Burk locks in on dancing and spiritual rhythms.  ”In Africa and in America beats have been produced that have a highway into the demonic.”  He goes on to say that AA’s have a “big anointing,” which allows them to have a bigger influence for producing music that is evil.  The AA must redeem that gift for rhythm and beat to become a spiritual thing… undoing “the mischief done in the past and bring into the body of Christ the beat that will usher people into the presence of God.”  Now I know what to do next Sunday…

Gimme a Break!  No, I mean literally, until next time.  I can’t take much more of this.

By the way, I still have these DVD’s and can’t decide if I should throw them away or save them for white elephant gifts at someone’s next Christmas party.  Always thinking ahead (smile)… unless of course you’d like one *wink*

Okay, here’s the preview you all have been waiting for.  Looks like the whole thing is uploaded on youtube… Ta ta! til Part 2.