I Still Need to Breathe - June 7, 2020

In Seminary I had to take a class called “The Church in the Social Context” I enjoyed that class because of the professor, Dr. Magdellanes and the material he had us review. We watched this video where they took the Mitochondrial DNA of different people. The Mitochondrial DNA is the DNA passed down through the mothers side, it was interesting because when two white people would compare their DNA, or two black people, they thought they would have a common ancestor, but it turns out that that the people had more ancestry in common with people that did not look like them then those who did. White, black, brown, didn’t matter, the DNA was putting all kinds of people together and they had no idea. There are other services out there, Ancestry.com, 23 and Me, etc, that will trace your DNA and let you know just how far up your family tree goes. Taking a test like that will let you know that we all have common ancestors. Just like we look at our physical ancestry we look at a royal ancestry that we have and that is one of God. We are all God’s children. Today’s lectionary passage is for Trinity Sunday and covers the creation story, I only want to talk about 2 parts of it today. But the cliff notes version of my view on the other scriptures that go with the passage is that I don’t see the seven days in the story as seven 24 hour segments of time. God is powerful enough to do it but did not have to. The bible says in 

2 Peter 3:8 New King James Version (NKJV)

8 But, beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.

Faith is not against science, they are two separate disciplines, teachings, systems, whatever you want to call it, God’sv  time is not our time, God’s ways are not our ways. The most important part of that whole creation story to me is the part that says in the beginning, God. God was there from the beginning and that is all that matters to me. Next part that is important to me is the ‘Let us make man” plural on purpose, you won’t find the word Trinity in your Bible only passages of scriptures that allude to it. Let us make man in Genesis, In the beginning was the word and the word was with God and was God in the gospel according to John, and others. But the text I read for you before preaching today says let us make man in our image. Man is for mankind, as some translations put it. Either way in our image, we are made in the image of God, that is the common royal ancestor we all share. The same one who breathed life into Adam and breathes life into all of us. That is why it hurts my heart to see how people are acting these days. Some of the problems we have had are because we refused to see the God in others. They can’t be my brother or sister, their skin color is different. They don’t believe that we are all made in God’s image.

I know I can yell, I especially yell when I talk about Jesus. There are times I had to go out my way to temper my tone because I didn’t want to be viewed as an “angry black man.” A few years back I went to vote, showed up with my voter registration card and ID in hand, the lady at the desk said I was not in the system and tried to give me a provisional ballot, I showed her my card, she said I still wasn’t in the system, asked me to stop yelling and put her hands up. I wasn’t raising my voice, never did, but the perception was there the moment she saw me. I have to walk around wearing a mask. 

We Wear the Mask

BY PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR

We wear the mask that grins and lies,

It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,—

This debt we pay to human guile;

With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,

And mouth with myriad subtleties.

Why should the world be over-wise,

In counting all our tears and sighs?

Nay, let them only see us, while

       We wear the mask.

We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries

To thee from tortured souls arise.

We sing, but oh the clay is vile

Beneath our feet, and long the mile;

But let the world dream otherwise,

       We wear the mask!

People have set images in their mind and what doesn’t fit gets dismissed. That’s why we can have people online doing the “George Floyd challenge” taking pictures kneeling on their friends necks making fun of a man killed by a police officer but people are more mad about Colin Kaepernic kneeling during the national anthem. People dismiss the claims of racism. 

There are those who will try to say the issue is not race but education. 

Study after study shows that Black children received harsher punishments for offenses than their white classmates 

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/black-students-punished_n_7449538

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/06/education/black-students-face-more-harsh-discipline-data-shows.html

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/black-students-punishment-betsy-devos_n_5ac539b6e4b056a8f597f2a0

I have colleagues and former coworkers who have to deal with their children being called names like black dirt, and the student doing the name calling goes unpunished, or just gets a talking to, while the same student that just got called the names will be officially written up for talking in class. I have worked with the NAACP for students who are suspended because “they smelled like weed” the teacher somehow smelled the child on the other side of a basketball court and the school district upheld the suspension even though the boy passed 3 drug tests. 

There are those who will say the issue is not race but economics. 

Imani Rose, a young lady I met while working with the Drama Ministry at my home church has grown up to have several business. I saw her instagram post where she was in tears. Imani has been vocal in about the protest on her social media page. Imani was crying because someone gave her money and told her to clean up her Instagram page, and be a builder not tear people down. This customer was trying to pay Imani to shut up. 

Black Wall Street, 99 years ago, because of segregation an all black area of town in Tulsa Oklahoma started to thrive, they called it Black Wall Street, Black owned Doctors offices and Real Estate Businesses all in the Greenwood area of Tulsa.  On May 30, 1921, Dick Rowland, a young African American shoe shiner, was accused of assaulting a white elevator operator named Sarah Page in the elevator of a building in downtown Tulsa. The next day the Tulsa Tribune printed a story saying that Rowland had tried to rape Page, with an accompanying editorial stating that a lynching was planned for that night. That evening mobs of both African Americans and whites descended on the courthouse where Rowland was being held. When a confrontation between an armed African American man, there to protect Rowland, and a white protestor resulted in the death of the latter, the white mob was incensed, and the Tulsa riot was thus ignited.

Over the next two days, mobs of white people looted and set fire to African American businesses and homes throughout the city. Many of the mob members were recently returned World War I veterans trained in the use of firearms and are said to have shot African Americans on sight. Some survivors even said they saw people in airplanes dropped incendiary bombs.

The narrative tries to get changed but Lebron James gets his own house spray painted with the N word, and when he starts trying to speak on racial inequality, they say he hasn’t experienced racism because he is rich. Then they tell him to “shut up and dribble.”  But when Drew Brees is asked in the height of the country protesting, about those who kneeled or will kneel during the national anthem and he says something to fit the conservative narrative, the same people who told Lebron James to “shut up and dribble” say that Drew Brees "is allowed to have an opinion” 

When people protest police brutality people make it about the flag, say that they have "relatives that served” I have relatives that served too, and when they came home from the military, they were not treated as good as yours were guaranteed. I have members of this church who served and got called names when they came back home from war. I have members of this church that were beaten by police during the Texas Southern University riots, police shot up the campus and arrested all the black men on campus because they thought one of them had shot a policeman, turned out that policeman was shot by another police officer. 

I could go on, Micheal Taylor in Indianapolis, when I was in elementary school he was 15 years old, handcuffed in the back seat of a squad car, the police said he shot himself in the head, twice. Took close to 20 years for justice, Robbie Tolan whose mother my wife and I worked with in the media ministry at our home church, accused of stealing his own car, is handcuffed face down in his momma driveway while his mother is getting slammed up against the garage door is shot and has his professional baseball career ruined by the Bellaire Police department. 

57 officers in Buffalo resigned from their unit after two of their colleagues were suspended for pushing down a 75 year old man, another officer tried to help him up and the officers pushed him aside.

Don’t tell people how to protest. Stop bringing up Martin Luther King Jr. in some sort of condescending tone. I’m watching people try to tell MLK’s children about him like they knew him better than his kid did. People love Martin Luther King Jr. now, but according to Gallup in 1966 more than 60 percent of people had an unfavorable opinion of him, and even more had an unfavorable opinion of the peaceful march on Washington.

The problem is that we are all made in the image of God but some people refuse to see it. 

 If all lives mattered we wouldn’t be here. But we see the image of God others, and we prop them up.

Give me liberty or give me death. Manifest destiny, from sea to shining sea, even though there were already people on this land. We speak ill of looters, but then go to Museums full of artifacts. People are chastising the destruction of property but when a boat at a dock had some tea on it, that tea ended up in the water. England loyalists tarred and feathered during the revolutionary war. We have slave owners on our money, streets named after them. The same people that penned the words “all men are created equal", and “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” owned other human beings. There are confederate soldiers statues that people fight to keep erected. The daughters of the confederacy rebranded the civil war as the war of northern aggression.

Gaslighting to call you racist for pointing out racism, I’ve walked in my own neighborhood had people trying to take pictures of me, and when I posted the issue online. I got called racist, along with stupid, a crybaby, race baiter, then my mailbox got filled with firecrackers. I have called the police and still had a gun pointed my direction, I have had conversations with people about a video shoot, and a police walk up in the conversation because she heard me say the word shoot. The effect of repeatedly being treated as less than weighs on you. You’ve never experienced it so it’s crazy to you.

Black lives matter, blue lives matter, all lives matter if you have problem with the first one but not the other two, you problem is with the black part of it. That’s why people can tear gas and shoot rubber bullets at peaceful protesters to clear the way to a church for a Bible photo op. Because you don’t see the God in others. The same breath breathed into Adam by God was breathed into me, I am made in Gods image. 

The phrase made in our image is a call back to the Kings of the time of the writing. When the kings ruled the land they would make sure to have statues of themselves put all over the land they ruled so you can see whose land this was and who was in charge. These images were literal representations of the ruler. When you wanted to know who the king was you looked at the image, when you wanted to know what the king looked like you looked at the image. If you want to know who our King is, look at the image, if you want to know who our king loves, look at the image. God made me, God, loves me, God cares for me even if you don’t. 

That breath of life is in me and I am made in the image of God. But we need others to see that we are made in the image of God too, it is not enough, to just not be racist, you must help confront the oppression as well. It is not enough to “not see color” which has problems in itself, God made me black, if you don’t see color you overlook me, I need you to see me and recognize the uniqueness and appreciate it. Speak out against racism, speak out against oppression. Truly act like you see God in others and not just in those who look like you or act the way you want them to act. 

Not everything that is faced can be changed. But nothing can be changed until it is faced.

James A. Baldwin 

Genesis can’t be just words on a page, we truly have to believe that we are all made in God’s image, that we all carry the breath of God in us. He loved us so much he made us in his image and he loved us so much that even when we failed, he sent his son to save us.  

I Need to Breathe, May 31, 2020

8 minutes and 46 seconds. 

That's how long Derek Chauvin held his knee on George Floyd's neck, as alleged by the Hennepin County Attorney's Office criminal complaint against the former Minneapolis police officer. "The defendant had his knee on Mr. Floyd's neck for 8 minutes and 46 seconds in total. Two minutes and 53 seconds of this was after Mr. Floyd was non-responsive.” According to reports, he repeatedly called for his mother, said please, and said I can’t breathe...

I need to breathe, Ahmaud Arbery jogging on Holmes Road near Brunswick in Glynn County, Georgia, while jogging on Holmes Road trying to improve his lung capacity, had the cops called on him and chased down by people attempting to make a “citizens arrest” two citizens decided to be judge, jury, and executioner for the high crime of trespassing, looking in a house while it was still being constructed. 

I need to breathe, Breonna Taylor sleeping and breathing peacefully in her home in Kentucky one evening and police knocking the door down without identifying themselves and shot her 8 times, Breonna’s boyfriend Kenneth Walker returned fire and he is in jail being charged. What happened to the castle doctrine and stand your ground in that case?

I need to breathe, Amy Cooper a white woman walking her dog in Central Park in New York did not like that a black man named Christian Cooper while bird watching asked her to put her dog on a leash. Instead of leashing the dog, or even just saying mind your business and keep moving decides to argue with him and then call 911, change her voice from calm and collected to heavy breathing and screaming in the video you can see her saying “I’m taking a picture and calling the cops,” then later Amy Cooper is heard saying in the video. “I’m going to tell them there’s an African American man threatening my life.”

I need to breathe, we are in the midst of a pandemic that has infected over 6 million people worldwide, 1.7 million in the United States, has killed over 368 thousand worldwide, 107 thousand in the United States. A disease that ravages the respiratory system. Some people just get a little tired and go on with their lives, others lose their lung capacity others are put on ventilators and many have died in a short amount of time. 

I find the connections in all of these situations going on 

I. The appearance before the ten (20:19-23) 

1. The fearful ones (20:19a): 

The disciples are meeting behind locked doors for fear of the Jews. 

For fear of the Jews, I used to think this was an issue of faith, and the disciples were scared of the Jews because they didn’t believe in the risen savior but there is more to it. The disciples were Jewish too, they were afraid of the authorities. It wasn’t safe to be a so called Christian during those times. These disciples just saw their leader executed like a common criminal, Jesus followers were not welcomed warmly where they went. They upset the order, they upset the status quo, and those who were in charge wanted to stay in charge and did not like their authority being challenged. They don’t want you to overturn the empire, they don’t want you to change the social norms, they didn’t want Jesus challenging the social, economic, and political power structures that he did so they killed him, and killed others who followed him. 

I wondered why would the disciples be afraid of the the Jews, they were Jews themselves. But then I realized, you can be a human being and be afraid of other human beings because they will figure out a way to separate themselves from you and oppress you for it. I can be a Christian and be scared of other Christians. Those who are silent when their brothers and sisters are persecuted. I’m looking at you so called Evangelicals. But then again, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. made an often repeated observation that “the most segregated hour in this nation” is Sunday at 11:00 am. 

And while we are on Dr. King, I wish so many people would stop trying to invoke his name when they don’t know much about him outside of him having a day they don’t celebrate and the “I have a dream speech.” I’m watching so many people invoke his name in the midst of riots like they knew the man or would care what he had to say if he was still alive.

In 1966, for example, in a Sept. 27 interview, King was questioned by CBS’ Mike Wallace about the “increasingly vocal minority” who disagreed with his devotion to non-violence as a tactic. In that interview, King admitted there was such a minority, though he said that surveys had shown most black Americans were on his side. “And I contend that the cry of ‘black power’ is, at bottom, a reaction to the reluctance of white power to make the kind of changes necessary to make justice a reality for the Negro,” King said. “I think that we’ve got to see that a riot is the language of the unheard. And, what is it that America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the economic plight of the Negro poor has worsened over the last few years.”

Martin Luther King Letter From Birmingham Jail quote: 

I must make two honest confessions to you, my Christian and Jewish brothers. First, I must confess that over the past few years I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate, who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by a mythical concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a "more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.

In other words stop telling other people how to protest especially if you are not going to actually address the reason that they are protesting. Treating police brutality and racism as separate isolated instances even though these things have been ingrained into the founding of this country and are promoted as early as preschool only helps the oppressors. 

When Amy Cooper can call the police and yell and scream that she is being attacked by knowing what happens to black and brown men when they encounter the police, and people are more concerned about how she treated the dog, then the fact that she is lying to the police about what a black man is doing to her helps the oppressors. Saying you have a problem with both Colin Kaepernic kneeling and the officer kneeling on George Floyd’s neck then proceeding to talk about Kaepernic for the rest of the time. 

This conditions people to side with the oppressor, and discount those being oppressed, why is it that when a black man is killed, I have to hear people go out their way to justify, he should have just complied, he stole a candy bar when he was 17, he is a thug, he fit the description, more black people kill each other than the police do anyway. Black on Black crime is a myth. 

Just preach the Bible pastor. 

Amos 5:24 New King James Version (NKJV)

24 But let justice run down like water, And righteousness like a mighty stream.

Proverbs 31:9 New King James Version (NKJV)

9 Open your mouth, judge righteously, And plead the cause of the poor and needy.

Isaiah 1:17 New King James Version (NKJV)

17 Learn to do good; Seek justice, Rebuke the oppressor; Defend the fatherless, Plead for the widow.

James 1:27 New King James Version (NKJV)

27 Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.

Matthew 22:34-40 New King James Version (NKJV)

34 But when the Pharisees heard that He had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. 35 Then one of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, testing Him, and saying, 36 “Teacher, which is the great commandment in the law?”

37 Jesus said to him, “‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and great commandment.39 And the second is like it: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.”

2. The faithful one (20:19b-23)

 

    a. He comforts them (20:19b-20): Suddenly Jesus appears, showing them his hands and side. 

Once they saw the scars, once they saw the nail pierced hands 

    b. He commissions them (20:21-23): They are to become his Spirit-filled witnesses. 

The text says as the Father sent me, I also send you. The disciples had to get out of the room they were in, get out of the state of mind they were in, and get out among the people to spread the gospel of Jesus Christ. 

It is going to take a miracle and it is going to take some movement. 

Be angry now, but be just as angry in November. Be angry every year after that in the polls not just presidential elections. Donald Trump doesn’t hire police officers.

Do you know who is on your school board, do you know when they meet. Does you kids teachers know you?

I’m just as angry as you, if not more, but I also get angry because my NAACP Unit meeting is only going to have 5-6 in it. 

Jesus breathed on them, and Jesus sent them. 

Final Instructions, May 24, 2020

On top of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem is a very small Crusader-era church called “The Chapel of the Ascension.” The Chapel of the Ascension is not popular and crowded Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which marks the site of Jesus’ crucifixion and burial, people flock from all over to see the site. But The Chapel of the Ascension.” this little chapel sees few visitors. Administered by Muslims since the end of the Crusades, the chapel marks the traditional site of Jesus’ ascension into heaven. Muslims believed that Jesus was a prophet, so they maintain the site and allow Christian pilgrims to see what’s inside. According to tradition, you can see the place where Jesus footprints were. We talk a lot about the crucifixion and resurrection but not much about the ascension. 

The passage I read in your hearing Jesus is giving final instructions before he goes back into Heaven. Acts is written by the same author of Luke. The first chapter the author starts by recapping what happened in the Gospel gives a quick 3 verse cliff notes version before we get to the instructions. Jesus spent 40 days with the disciples teaching them again about the Kingdom of God, in an upper room, a sort of callback to where they had the last supper. Jesus is giving the 11 apostles, and other people some final instructions before he leaves. 

We should be used to getting instructions before something takes off. When we go into this store, don’t ask for nothing, don’t touch nothing, don’t get loud, keep your hands to yourself, and if you show out, I will show out too. Jesus gives some less forceful instructions. 

Don’t worry, Watch, Wait, and Pray

There is plenty of reasons to be worried, it is not easy being a follower of Jesus Christ during these times, their leader and savior was just executed like a common criminal, everyone scattered, then Jesus comes back, now he is leaving again. That is something to be worried about. The apostles still have to navigate being a believer where the government basically said, "is this your king?" Keep bringing them and we will show you what we do to them. 

Even though Jesus has been with the apostles the text says they still misunderstand the Kingdom of God, Jesus talks about the Kingdom of God and they ask when is the kingdom of Israel going to be restored. They were looking for the messiah to overthrow the government and while the government was overthrown, it was not the way the apostles thought it would be. They are also waiting in uncertain times. But Jesus gives them these instructions and the apostles do their best to abide by them. Don’t worry, watch, wait, and pray. 

Don’t Worry

It's hard not to worry in uncertain times, to feel uneasy, uncertain, uncomfortable. It's hard for some to not worry when times are good. Don’t negate your emotions, but change how you respond to them. In times of worry, change  "what if, to "how can I?” the Bible says in Roman’s 12 not to conform to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Don’t waste time on the what if, but spend more time on the problem solving. Rahm Emmanuel former Mayor of Chicago and chief of staff to President Obama said not to let a good crisis go to waste. Yes these are bad times but they don’t have to be all bad for you. Now is the time to reframe your thinking and see how you can come out better. What if the apostles just said “well, Jesus is gone now, I’m going to go back to fishing, tax collecting, or whatever” some did but then when they saw Jesus satin they stayed the course after he ascended. The apostles had to stay the course, if they did not, we would not be here today worshiping him. Uncertainty is a fact of life, save your energy by not worrying about things that are not in your control to begin with. 

2 Timothy 1:7 New King James Version (NKJV)

7 For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.

Isaiah 41:10 New King James Version (NKJV)

10 Fear not, for I am with you; Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.’

Watch

Jesus ascended, and the apostles, and others were looking at Jesus. I can understand the apostles looking at Jesus, but Jesus gave them some instructions about bringing on the Kingdom of God. You have to be watching the right thing. The men in white asked them why are you looking up? Churches and church folk can be looking at the wrong things sometimes. We worry about hymns vs contemporary, whether or not our names get on a plaque, or if somebody is going to sit in our assigned pew. Neighborhoods around the church buildings are changing and the people in the building on Sunday don’t look anything like the people who live in the neighborhood surrounding the church. We are worried about not being able to go to a building on Sundays when the church is not the building but the people. We have to watch the right things. The people who did the best in the California gold rush were the ones that sold shovels and pans. We have to make sure we are watching the right things. We need to watch the word of God and the work we have been called to do as believers. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of God stands forever.

Wait

We all hate waiting, Today, we have multiple entertainment options right at our fingertips to keep us occupied while we wait. But despite all that technology, waiting is still hard. Before this pandemic we hated waiting we would wait at airports (security lines, boarding lines); we would wait in waiting rooms; we would wait in traffic; we wait at the post office; we wait at the bank; we wait for a human when calling customer service. We wait ... and our patience runs thin. We wait now waiting to see if it is safe to go back out, waiting to see when our church is going to go back to in person worship services. The reactions to waiting has disappointed me to be transparent. I’m watching some of my colleagues have trouble with the waiting. So much so that some not all but some question their faith, and complain about their freedoms. Really, this is what it took to get you riled up? Segregation didn’t do it, redlining didn’t do, predatory lending,Jim Crow laws, police brutality, food deserts and hunger, poverty, homelessness, school to prison pipelines, none of that bothered you. But now because you can’t go to your favorite restaurant, you wonder where God is, you cry about your freedoms… way to look out for your fellow man. I’m not saying you can’t have a crisis of faith and have questions, just that I find it funny that this is what gets you riled up. We all hate waiting but you have to wait and keep waiting.

Isaiah 40:28-31 King James Version (KJV)

28 Hast thou not known? hast thou not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, fainteth not, neither is weary? there is no searching of his understanding.

29 He giveth power to the faint; and to them that have no might he increaseth strength.

30 Even the youths shall faint and be weary, and the young men shall utterly fall:

31 But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings as eagles; they shall run, and not be weary; and they shall walk, and not faint.

Pray

Now is the time to be praying, praying more than ever. 

Philippians 4:6-7 New King James Version (NKJV)

6 Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; 7 and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

Know that the same way you saw Jesus leave is the same way you are going to see him return in the meantime, don’t worry, watch the right things, wait on the Lord, and pray. 

The church is not a building The church is not a steeple The church is not a resting place, The church is the people

A people with power from the Holy Spirit, power to make it through these times. Jesus is not gone forever, Jesus is just working from home. 

Pastoring During a Pandemic

I've Got to Tell Somebody - May 17, 2020

Unwritten Rules, May 3, 2020

Can You Still Thank Him? April 26, 2020