Saturday, October 22, 2005
Don’t ever think that you are not convicted in what you do. God knows us better than we know ourselves. Being raised in the church, my mother knew this passage. But her carnal desires overruled what she knew morally and biblically to be true. Our desire to be loved, wanted and accepted will cause us to go against not only society, but also against God if we allow it.
We must always be diligent in our struggle against worldly things. We must realize just how important it is to remain the Brides of Jesus while we wait for the husband that God has chosen for us. We must learn to be still, be patient, and be diligent. How can God bless us with the desires of our hearts if we are not willing to wait on him. Often times we block our own blessings by trying to make God conform to what we want instead of waiting on what he wants for us.
One of the stories circulating through my family is that the reason there are no pictures of me as a baby is that I was the ugliest baby that they had ever seen. But also that I was a very sick baby. My family lived in a very poor area of Memphis.
The people who lived there had built all of the houses on Donald road. Now when I say built, I don’t mean in the sense that a contractor came in a put these houses together. The houses and in a lot of cases, shanties’ on Donald Road were built by hand by their inhabitants. My Aunt Dottie told me that they built the house in which they lived. There was no inside plumbing. They had potbellied stoves throughout the house for heat and they often slept three or more to a bed. Separate beds were just not an option.
The families that lived all around them had livestock that lived in the yards and they grew most of their own vegetables. Most of the women were day-workers in the homes of the more affluent residents of Memphis and the men found work were they could.
I don’t know if it was because of my mother’s destitute condition, or because of a lack of medical expertise, but my mother was told that I was dying and that there was nothing that could be done to save me. During the fifties the journey north for most African-Americans, or Negroes, as they were then called, meant a journey to a more prosperous life. My journey north was not a journey to a better life, but a journey to my death.
My mother would later tell me, she could not bear to watch her baby die. So I was delivered into the care of my wild and rebellious grandmother, Madea. Now understand that although she had forsaken the care of her own children, she loved them very much. I was a child of one of her own. She decided that she could not accept that her own grandchild was pronounced dead before even given a chance at life.
Now this is where my story becomes convoluted. It was rumored in my family that my grandmother sometimes practiced black magic. That she knew people who could fix things with roots and such. The story that has always been told was that upon my arrival in Detroit, my grandmother took me to a pharmacist who made up something for her to give me that ultimately cured me. Now I personally believe that it was divine intervention that saved me.
Something that I have always felt for as far back as I can remember, is that God has always had his hands on me. I have always believed that in this situation and well as others that I will mention later, that it is only because of God’s grace, that I am here.
Galatians 1;15
But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace
I am not sure how long I lived in Detroit before my mother decided to come north to live as well. What I do know is that she ultimately did. My first recollection of life here in Detroit is at the age of five. By this time, my mother has met my stepfather, married him and I had another sister. We lived in a two-family flat. My mother, stepfather, brother, sisters, and I lived downstairs. My Grandmother, lived upstairs with her family. There is nothing significant about that time other than the fact that I have come to realize that’s when I believe my mother had started the journey to her healing.
You see ladies, no matter what you believe you are going through, God can still deliver you from past sins. Do you know how much of a blessing that was for my mother to find a mate that was willing to take on the responsibility of my mother and her three illegitimate children?
I was never told the circumstances on how they got together, but I know that in the natural, it goes against a man’s basic nature, to become a father to those that are not his own. I had always felt that my stepfather loved my mother very much. And although he was not a man who showed physical affection to us, I always believed that he had accepted us as his own. We had always been raised to feel that we were all his children. Not one of us ever felt that he loved his own two children anymore than he loved us.
It wasn’t until we got older and questioned the fact that our last names were different than the youngest two, that we were given the information about our heritage. My mother had never tried to hide that fact from us and because of how we were raised we felt then and even now that the man that we called Daddy, was our one and only father.
Isaiah 49:13
Sing, O heavens; and be joyful, O earth; and break forth into singing, O mountains: for the LORD hath comforted his people, and will have mercy upon his afflicted.
When I was seven, my family moved into the house that we would live in until the time each of us became old enough to leave. The house that we moved into in Highland Park was in a very nice neighborhood. It was a neighborhood of single-family homes and was populated with two parent households and children in just about every house. I had some of my fondest memories in Highland Park and made some of my best friends there of which I am still in contact with. It was a very idealistic time.
The parents in the neighborhood were friends with each other and families did things together and with the other families in the neighborhood. Your friend’s parents looked out for you and in essence treated you as if you were an extension of their own family. “It takes a whole village to raise a child.” We definitely lived that credo in our neighborhood.
It was during that time that I developed some of my issues. I don’t know if it was hereditary, because of my illness, poor hygiene or just something that was meant to be. I had always had very bad teeth. My teeth had grown in double, two teeth sitting on top of each other. And to make matters worse, they were very soft, which meant that they broke easily.
Even though we had dental insurance, I did not visit the dentist until I was 13. That visit resulted in my having all of my front top teeth pulled and replaced with a partial denture. But backing up a bit, because my teeth looked different, I had to endure unmerciful teasing from the other children. Not so much my friends in the neighborhood, but the kids at school. To top it off, I was little which made me an easy target.
I remember that during the fifth and sixth grades I either had to run home everyday or fight. I was never an aggressive person, so I would rather run than fight. That drove my sisters crazy. We had always been taught to look out for one another. If someone picked a fight with any of us, the other sisters were obligated to step in and protect each other. My other sisters, especially Nita didn’t believe in running from a fight. You had to stand your ground.
The constant teasing and harassment caused me to become shy and withdrawn. I only felt safe when I was at home in my neighborhood. One other thing that made me stand out as being different was, that I would often choose stay in my room and read a book rather than go outside and play with my siblings or the other children in the neighborhood. Although my family and friends understood, they too thought that I was a bit odd. It was not natural for a child so young to always have her nose in a book instead of playing with the other kids. But I found the comfort in my books that I couldn’t find being out in the world. Books didn’t judge you, tease you, or make you sad. Books were my truest friends. My books allowed me to escape from my world of pain and travel to far away places where everyone was happy and always got along with one another.
I later realized that all of the teasing and humiliation that I had to endure as a young child was part of the reason that I had always thought of myself as being ugly. I allowed others to judge how I felt about myself based on a physical flaw. Can you believe that? Young children in their naive ness can hurt others so deeply by the things that they say and do that some people can never truly recover.
As a child and even later in life, I had a hard time making new friends. I always felt self-conscience about myself. But I eventually discovered that I am okay. There was a time when I felt ugly and uncomfortable around others. Then I learned to like myself. I really do think I am a nice person. At least I try to be. I make a consorted effort to treat others the way I want to be treated and try to raise my own children to be the same way.
One thing that I realized about life is that no matter how nice you may try to be to everyone, there will still be those who don’t like you just because of who you are. I have accepted that fact too. I can’t make everyone happy. Those who will like me will and those who choose not to like me won’t. No matter what I do. What does matters is that I am a child of the most high king who loves me just as I am. God has commanded that we love our neighbors as God loves us. If they choose not to love us back, that is their issue, not ours.
Leviticus 19;18
'Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against one of your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.
My seeds of self-hatred had been planted early, when I was yet a child. It wouldn’t be until I was a grown woman, married, and divorced until I found God who would remove those weeds that were strangling me, that I would truly begin to heal and learn to love myself.
We must always be diligent in our struggle against worldly things. We must realize just how important it is to remain the Brides of Jesus while we wait for the husband that God has chosen for us. We must learn to be still, be patient, and be diligent. How can God bless us with the desires of our hearts if we are not willing to wait on him. Often times we block our own blessings by trying to make God conform to what we want instead of waiting on what he wants for us.
One of the stories circulating through my family is that the reason there are no pictures of me as a baby is that I was the ugliest baby that they had ever seen. But also that I was a very sick baby. My family lived in a very poor area of Memphis.
The people who lived there had built all of the houses on Donald road. Now when I say built, I don’t mean in the sense that a contractor came in a put these houses together. The houses and in a lot of cases, shanties’ on Donald Road were built by hand by their inhabitants. My Aunt Dottie told me that they built the house in which they lived. There was no inside plumbing. They had potbellied stoves throughout the house for heat and they often slept three or more to a bed. Separate beds were just not an option.
The families that lived all around them had livestock that lived in the yards and they grew most of their own vegetables. Most of the women were day-workers in the homes of the more affluent residents of Memphis and the men found work were they could.
I don’t know if it was because of my mother’s destitute condition, or because of a lack of medical expertise, but my mother was told that I was dying and that there was nothing that could be done to save me. During the fifties the journey north for most African-Americans, or Negroes, as they were then called, meant a journey to a more prosperous life. My journey north was not a journey to a better life, but a journey to my death.
My mother would later tell me, she could not bear to watch her baby die. So I was delivered into the care of my wild and rebellious grandmother, Madea. Now understand that although she had forsaken the care of her own children, she loved them very much. I was a child of one of her own. She decided that she could not accept that her own grandchild was pronounced dead before even given a chance at life.
Now this is where my story becomes convoluted. It was rumored in my family that my grandmother sometimes practiced black magic. That she knew people who could fix things with roots and such. The story that has always been told was that upon my arrival in Detroit, my grandmother took me to a pharmacist who made up something for her to give me that ultimately cured me. Now I personally believe that it was divine intervention that saved me.
Something that I have always felt for as far back as I can remember, is that God has always had his hands on me. I have always believed that in this situation and well as others that I will mention later, that it is only because of God’s grace, that I am here.
Galatians 1;15
But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by his grace
I am not sure how long I lived in Detroit before my mother decided to come north to live as well. What I do know is that she ultimately did. My first recollection of life here in Detroit is at the age of five. By this time, my mother has met my stepfather, married him and I had another sister. We lived in a two-family flat. My mother, stepfather, brother, sisters, and I lived downstairs. My Grandmother, lived upstairs with her family. There is nothing significant about that time other than the fact that I have come to realize that’s when I believe my mother had started the journey to her healing.
You see ladies, no matter what you believe you are going through, God can still deliver you from past sins. Do you know how much of a blessing that was for my mother to find a mate that was willing to take on the responsibility of my mother and her three illegitimate children?
I was never told the circumstances on how they got together, but I know that in the natural, it goes against a man’s basic nature, to become a father to those that are not his own. I had always felt that my stepfather loved my mother very much. And although he was not a man who showed physical affection to us, I always believed that he had accepted us as his own. We had always been raised to feel that we were all his children. Not one of us ever felt that he loved his own two children anymore than he loved us.
It wasn’t until we got older and questioned the fact that our last names were different than the youngest two, that we were given the information about our heritage. My mother had never tried to hide that fact from us and because of how we were raised we felt then and even now that the man that we called Daddy, was our one and only father.
Isaiah 49:13
Sing, O heavens; and be joyful, O earth; and break forth into singing, O mountains: for the LORD hath comforted his people, and will have mercy upon his afflicted.
When I was seven, my family moved into the house that we would live in until the time each of us became old enough to leave. The house that we moved into in Highland Park was in a very nice neighborhood. It was a neighborhood of single-family homes and was populated with two parent households and children in just about every house. I had some of my fondest memories in Highland Park and made some of my best friends there of which I am still in contact with. It was a very idealistic time.
The parents in the neighborhood were friends with each other and families did things together and with the other families in the neighborhood. Your friend’s parents looked out for you and in essence treated you as if you were an extension of their own family. “It takes a whole village to raise a child.” We definitely lived that credo in our neighborhood.
It was during that time that I developed some of my issues. I don’t know if it was hereditary, because of my illness, poor hygiene or just something that was meant to be. I had always had very bad teeth. My teeth had grown in double, two teeth sitting on top of each other. And to make matters worse, they were very soft, which meant that they broke easily.
Even though we had dental insurance, I did not visit the dentist until I was 13. That visit resulted in my having all of my front top teeth pulled and replaced with a partial denture. But backing up a bit, because my teeth looked different, I had to endure unmerciful teasing from the other children. Not so much my friends in the neighborhood, but the kids at school. To top it off, I was little which made me an easy target.
I remember that during the fifth and sixth grades I either had to run home everyday or fight. I was never an aggressive person, so I would rather run than fight. That drove my sisters crazy. We had always been taught to look out for one another. If someone picked a fight with any of us, the other sisters were obligated to step in and protect each other. My other sisters, especially Nita didn’t believe in running from a fight. You had to stand your ground.
The constant teasing and harassment caused me to become shy and withdrawn. I only felt safe when I was at home in my neighborhood. One other thing that made me stand out as being different was, that I would often choose stay in my room and read a book rather than go outside and play with my siblings or the other children in the neighborhood. Although my family and friends understood, they too thought that I was a bit odd. It was not natural for a child so young to always have her nose in a book instead of playing with the other kids. But I found the comfort in my books that I couldn’t find being out in the world. Books didn’t judge you, tease you, or make you sad. Books were my truest friends. My books allowed me to escape from my world of pain and travel to far away places where everyone was happy and always got along with one another.
I later realized that all of the teasing and humiliation that I had to endure as a young child was part of the reason that I had always thought of myself as being ugly. I allowed others to judge how I felt about myself based on a physical flaw. Can you believe that? Young children in their naive ness can hurt others so deeply by the things that they say and do that some people can never truly recover.
As a child and even later in life, I had a hard time making new friends. I always felt self-conscience about myself. But I eventually discovered that I am okay. There was a time when I felt ugly and uncomfortable around others. Then I learned to like myself. I really do think I am a nice person. At least I try to be. I make a consorted effort to treat others the way I want to be treated and try to raise my own children to be the same way.
One thing that I realized about life is that no matter how nice you may try to be to everyone, there will still be those who don’t like you just because of who you are. I have accepted that fact too. I can’t make everyone happy. Those who will like me will and those who choose not to like me won’t. No matter what I do. What does matters is that I am a child of the most high king who loves me just as I am. God has commanded that we love our neighbors as God loves us. If they choose not to love us back, that is their issue, not ours.
Leviticus 19;18
'Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against one of your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.
My seeds of self-hatred had been planted early, when I was yet a child. It wouldn’t be until I was a grown woman, married, and divorced until I found God who would remove those weeds that were strangling me, that I would truly begin to heal and learn to love myself.
Saturday, October 01, 2005
My Mother
My father like so many other fathers, cared so little about his own child that he never made the attempt to get to know me or know what my life had become.
Psalm 146; 9
The LORD protects the strangers; He supports the fatherless and the widow, But He thwarts the way of the wicked.
My mother, Barbara, looked a lot like her mother. She too was light skinned, tiny, with a big beautiful smile and a rebellious nature. I believe my mother had become promiscuous at such a young age because she was looking for something that she felt was missing in her life. The love and affection of her own parents.
My mother, at such a young age knowing that both of her parents were alive and didn’t want her, what a heavy burden that must have been for one so young to have to carry. If her own parents didn’t love her enough to want her, how could God?
Aah, but here are these young men in her life telling her how cute she was, how desirable she was, and how much they wanted her. You see, back in the forties and fifties, especially in the south light skinned Negro women, were thought to be more attractive than their dark skinned counterparts.
2 Samuel 11;2,3,4
Then it happened one evening that David arose from his bed and walked on the roof of the king's house. And from the roof he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to behold. So David sent and inquired about the woman. And someone said, "Is this not Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?" Then David sent messengers, and took her; and she came to him, and he lay with her.
Ladies, as you can see from this passage, men will lust after women and do what ever it takes to get you into their beds. For those of you who may not know the complete story, David who was king of Judah, had seen Bathsheba, someone else’s wife, bathing herself up on the rooftop one evening. He immediately started lusting after her. Bathsheba was married to Uriah, a soldier in King David’s army. Even though David knew that Bathsheba was married to another, it didn’t stop him from wanting to have Bathsheba for himself. When David found out he had impregnated Bathsheba, he decided to have Uriah killed and take Bathsheba as is own wife.
2 Samuel 12;9
Why did you despise the word of the Lord by doing what is evil in his eyes? You struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and took his wife to be your own. You killed him with the sword of the Ammonites. After Bathsheba was done with mourning the death of her husband, David sent for her and she became his wife and bore him a son.
Even men of God will give in to sexual temptation. Ladies, if a mighty man of God would commit such a great sin like that and do something that he knew was wrong, what makes you think that a man who has no knowledge of God’s word will do. When we start looking to the world to fulfill our empty hearts, we can only find heartbreak.
My mother, a young girl of 13 started being a mother long before her time because she was looking to fill an empty void in her life. I never had an opportunity to talk to my mother about this. Maybe she felt that these men she slept with could replace the love she felt she wasn’t getting from her parents. Maybe she felt that only her children could give her the kind of love she had been missing. Or maybe she just didn’t feel she was worthy of God’s love. Only she can answer that question.
By the time my mother was eighteen she had three children by three different men, none of whom where her husband. Now understand, this was during a period of time when being an unwed mother was one of the most disgraceful things that a young woman could do. Not once, twice, but three times did my mother go against the strict rules of the church and society in her forlorn search for love.
John 4;17,18
"I have no husband," she replied. Jesus said to her, "You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true."
Psalm 146; 9
The LORD protects the strangers; He supports the fatherless and the widow, But He thwarts the way of the wicked.
My mother, Barbara, looked a lot like her mother. She too was light skinned, tiny, with a big beautiful smile and a rebellious nature. I believe my mother had become promiscuous at such a young age because she was looking for something that she felt was missing in her life. The love and affection of her own parents.
My mother, at such a young age knowing that both of her parents were alive and didn’t want her, what a heavy burden that must have been for one so young to have to carry. If her own parents didn’t love her enough to want her, how could God?
Aah, but here are these young men in her life telling her how cute she was, how desirable she was, and how much they wanted her. You see, back in the forties and fifties, especially in the south light skinned Negro women, were thought to be more attractive than their dark skinned counterparts.
2 Samuel 11;2,3,4
Then it happened one evening that David arose from his bed and walked on the roof of the king's house. And from the roof he saw a woman bathing, and the woman was very beautiful to behold. So David sent and inquired about the woman. And someone said, "Is this not Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?" Then David sent messengers, and took her; and she came to him, and he lay with her.
Ladies, as you can see from this passage, men will lust after women and do what ever it takes to get you into their beds. For those of you who may not know the complete story, David who was king of Judah, had seen Bathsheba, someone else’s wife, bathing herself up on the rooftop one evening. He immediately started lusting after her. Bathsheba was married to Uriah, a soldier in King David’s army. Even though David knew that Bathsheba was married to another, it didn’t stop him from wanting to have Bathsheba for himself. When David found out he had impregnated Bathsheba, he decided to have Uriah killed and take Bathsheba as is own wife.
2 Samuel 12;9
Why did you despise the word of the Lord by doing what is evil in his eyes? You struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and took his wife to be your own. You killed him with the sword of the Ammonites. After Bathsheba was done with mourning the death of her husband, David sent for her and she became his wife and bore him a son.
Even men of God will give in to sexual temptation. Ladies, if a mighty man of God would commit such a great sin like that and do something that he knew was wrong, what makes you think that a man who has no knowledge of God’s word will do. When we start looking to the world to fulfill our empty hearts, we can only find heartbreak.
My mother, a young girl of 13 started being a mother long before her time because she was looking to fill an empty void in her life. I never had an opportunity to talk to my mother about this. Maybe she felt that these men she slept with could replace the love she felt she wasn’t getting from her parents. Maybe she felt that only her children could give her the kind of love she had been missing. Or maybe she just didn’t feel she was worthy of God’s love. Only she can answer that question.
By the time my mother was eighteen she had three children by three different men, none of whom where her husband. Now understand, this was during a period of time when being an unwed mother was one of the most disgraceful things that a young woman could do. Not once, twice, but three times did my mother go against the strict rules of the church and society in her forlorn search for love.
John 4;17,18
"I have no husband," she replied. Jesus said to her, "You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true."
