Hunger Among Us

One, two, three, four, five, six!

Someone’s hungry in the mix.

One in six has an empty plate.

One in six has a belly ache.

One in six cannot concentrate

Due to inadequate food intake.

Hunger in America is reality,

Not confined to pockets of society

And not quarantined in certain neighborhoods.

Multitudes have limited access to food goods,

Not just the homeless and those out of work,

But in every strata of society, hunger lurks.

Because of food insecurity,

Meals are eaten with great irregularity.

Hard-working adults, children, and seniors who simply cannot make ends meet

Are forced to go without food for several meals, days, or even weeks.

Some elderly lack access to food due to no transportation,

While others can’t prepare food because of physical limitation.

Still others are so frail they need help to be fed,

And they hope that by compassion someone would be led

To come meet their need,

That someone would have the heart to feed

The hungry,

And that the cause of the famished would take priority in this country.

The hungry lack money, means or resource to acquire food.

This leaves hungry as their constant mood.

And their bodies feel the uneasy and painful sensation hunger brings,

That, along with so many other detrimental things.

The immune response of the hungry is adversely affected.

They are among those most commonly infected

With all manner of bacteria, virus, and disease,

Making an open door to infect the general population with ease.

In children, hunger limits cognitive and behavioral development.

Hunger steals a child’s future mental health and academic achievement.

Hunger inhibits a child’s ability to grow and learn

And restrains what they, even as adults, can earn.

Hunger eats away a child’s future economic productivity,

Which becomes a drain to our national prosperity.

Hunger causes fatigue and irritability.

Hunger is known to be a culprit behind despondency.

Hunger gives a rise in criminality,

Which brings hurt, harm, and danger to every community.

In the elder population, hunger promotes senility.

Hunger eats away their strength and usurps their vitality.

Poor nutrition leads to increased vulnerability,

Which becomes more critical for those with disability.

In addition to children and elderly, there are so many more

In need of food among the desperately poor.

The number of people abound who are in abject poverty,

As the culture of America is one of inequality.

Between the haves and have not is a great divide.

The gap between the wealthy and the forgotten increasingly opens wide.

The working class, for their labor, receives so little pay.

The little money they may have is quickly taken away.

The minimum wage level is not gauged to inflation

And is used by businesses as a form of oppression.

The top echelon of business has the power to allocate the profits of enterprise.

And yet they allocated these profits to themselves -- to others’ demise.

Corporations and the rich lobby Congress and establish their priorities,

Including tax breaks, bailouts, and even subsidies,

While not generating enough jobs to employ everyone.

Sending American jobs overseas is what they’ve typically done.

They let hunger grow in America even more

While turning a blind eye to America’s burgeoning poor.

Work-support services, including flexible and affordable child care

And public transportation are less available everywhere.

So the few jobs offered become harder to keep.

One job lost means many won’t eat:

Making it hard for me to understand how the full can go to sleep.

The health and medical needs of the hungry are compromised.

The hungry, as a group, are the new disenfranchised.

Hunger in America today is nothing but a pawn in Washington power politics.

Those with food fail to realize that hunger in America makes each one of us sick.

The poor are always with us, that is just the truth.

But is that reason not to take hold of Poverty and pull out hunger as its tooth?

Hunger is like an uncontrolled cancer that will eventually kill its host.

Knowing we could have cured ourselves is what hurts the most.

We produce more than enough food in America to feed every man, woman, and child.

Yet half of it is thrown away, and that is putting it mild.

We must lobby Congress to address poverty and its consequences no matter how futile that may seem.

And bring hunger relief to the forefront of the political scene.

But if we can’t count on Congress to do the right thing,

Then we as a people need to be the ones to bring

About hunger relief.

We as a people, working together, can eradicate hunger is my firm belief.

Hunger is my problem, and it’s your problem too.

There is something each and every one of us can do.

We must engage communities in helping care for one another.

We need to see each and every hungry person as our brother

And as our individual responsibility.

For each of us, this means advocacy

And coalition

To bring about hunger abolition.

It means by word of mouth telling others what hunger is about.

It means engaging the media to get the word out.

It means not letting a crumb go to waste.

It means getting food to the hungry in haste.

It means inviting the poor to our table.

It means volunteering our time, effort and money where able.

It means each and every one of us must get involved

Until the whole matter of hunger is resolved.

Let compassion demonstrate our humanity,

Then we can shout with joviality,

“One, two, three, four, five, six,

Hunger among us has been fixed!”

Power of the Resurrection

To move, to flow

To change, to grow,

I have come to know

The power of the resurrection

While even in the body.

Formula For Manifestation

 (Mind+Heart)*Action/Testing = Manifestation

See it in your mind, believe it in your heart, act on it as though you have received it, even hold to it through times of testing to then receive the full manifestation of it.

Blood Cries

A black boy in search of food, whose life has just burgeoned,

Walks home in the rain, only to encounter bias with a gun. 

Point blank, the message is clear. There is no place to run. 

His cries for help fall on deaf ears.

He stands to face his worst fears.

His only justice is his mother's tears.

His life - taken, but purpose is not done. 

His blood cries out from the ground that swallowed it,

Stands as witness against the one that shed it,

Lays guilt on a nation that refused to protect it,

Resounding loud and clear as a clarion.

If this be the house of justice, let it be torn down, every stone of it,

For plague is spread in the walls of it.

Let this house be scraped, cleaned, and then rebuilt,

That blind Justice in her purest form may find rest in it,

And the work of peace begun.

Meditations on Isaiah 5

God’s vineyard, which He had planted in the most fertile ground, held his choicest vines: a superior variety from which God expected bountiful clusters of luscious, sweet and succulent grapes.  (Is. 5:1-2)  Such is Judah and Jerusalem; such is the church today. These are his peculiar people, his treasure, and his inheritance; from which God expects fruitfulness. He looks to find hanging from her limbs the fruit of justice, goodness, righteousness, and peace. (Eph. 5:9-10) 

Yet what he finds is the fruit of injustice, evilness, unrighteousness, and war.  He finds his people consumed by the love of pleasure: alcoholics in need of drinks; addicts in need of drugs; and whoremongers in need of sexual perversion. He finds his people without regard for the Lord neither His works nor His deeds and blind to the fact that their actions will call for his judgment. 

The people feast upon evil while Hell enlarges herself and opens her mouth without measure to feast upon those who sin against God. They have become so depraved that sin seems normal, acceptable, even preferred. Among the people, those who are good are considered evil. 

The people refuse light and choose darkness. They give honor to drunkenness, drug abuse, gluttony, and all manner of sexual perversion. Indulgence is exalted as their god. The people give dishonor to God. The heroes of the people are those or that which gives the most powerful stimulation: that buzz; that high; that trip; that ultimate feeling of satisfaction; and that climax. They continue to press the limits, even unto death. 

Wealth is exalted as god. The people are lovers of money. They oppress the struggling middle-class and turn deaf ears to their cries. They are blind to poor. They create war to line their own pockets and create the fatherless and orphans among the people and make no provision for those wounded in war. Workers are not paid fair wages for their labor. Every man is found trying to reach the top by any means necessary. Ethics and fairness are lost concepts. The wealthy buy justice and make law. They hold government and the church hostage. They kindle the fire of God’s wrath.

Unto Judah and Jerusalem, God sent a terrible earthquake. So many people died in a single day that bodies of the dead lined the streets and laid there unburied. And yet the people did not repent. Even today, God has sent storms, tornadoes, earthquakes, and fires, and still the people will not repent, but rather grow more perverse, more evil, and more unjust.

So God prepared an enemy for war. They were fit, alert, well-prepared, and ready to march: such a contrast to the easy-going, unprepared, careless, and fun-loving attitude of the people of God. Judah and Jerusalem were prepared for captivity. They became captives of the Babylonians. They became captives of the Media-Persians. They became captives of the Greeks. And they became captives of the Romans.

Think not that God has not prepared an enemy to war against the church. He has prepared the Anti-Christ. He has prepared the Beast. He has prepared the False Prophet. The church is made ready for martyrdom.

Happy Father's Day!

Luke 15: 11 -12 "And [Jesus] said, A certain man had two sons: And the younger of them said to his father, Father ..."  Often when asked, "Who is he?"  The response is a description of one's occupation, such as, he is the mayor, he is a lawyer, or he is a doctor.  In this case, a man's whole identity was tied up into being a father.  There is no mention of a mother.  We don't even know if she is living. Neither do we know if the certain man was the biological father, although we often assume that he was.  Nonetheless, his sons could have been adopted.  Regardless of how he acquired two sons, we know for a fact that he was consumed into loving them, providing for them and instructing them.  All that he did as an occupation was for the care and provision of his two sons.  He was so much "father", that his identity overshadowed that of his two sons, for his two sons were identified as sons of the certain man.  The name, reputation and substance of the father was that of his sons.

I am thankful today to be a son of God, the Father, and I wish every Father everywhere a Happy Father's Day!

No Longer a Babe

From a babe, you’ve spent your time in your mother’s home

Growing and learning; there to hone

Your skills and understanding gain.

Knowing you would be born again.

As a caterpillar morphed to a butterfly,

Earth’s no longer home, but now the sky.

No more mother’s apron string, for now you have your own.

Decisions you shall make, and consequences bear alone.

You’re from childhood to adulthood birthed.

So take to the heavens and rule the earth.

^“ For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.  For as the rain cometh down, and the snow from heaven, and returneth not thither, but watereth the earth, and maketh it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower, and bread to the eater: So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.”  (Is 55:9 –11)

The rain and snow come down from heaven to earth, as being sent with purpose.  That purpose being to water the earth.  And in that place which is watered, the seeds sprout buds.  That place becomes bountiful and flourishes.  It produces an overabundance of seed sufficient for making bread to eat and having seed leftover for sowing again to make ready that place for when the rain comes again in its due season.

Liken unto the rain is the word of God which is sent with purpose.  And likewise the word of God will accomplish God’s purpose and will do so abundantly.  God’s word is sure and his work is abundant: such is His nature and character. 

2 Cor. 9:10 gives reference to God and the surety of his word and the abundance of his work where it is stated, “he that ministereth seed to the sower both minister bread for your food.”

So often ministers take this phrase “seed to the sower, and bread to the eater” out of context and misuse it to infer that that there are two types of people: one who gives to others (in particularly into the church offering) and those that do not give (implying they consume their finances on their own needs).  Whereas in the scripture, the sower and eater were terms referring to the same person.  The one who was blessed by the rain both ate and sowed because of the overabundance of God’s blessing. 

These ministers further misrepresent God as one who will more abundantly bless the giver over the one who was unable or unwilling to give. Yet scripture reflects a God who disperses broadly.  “He maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.” (Matthew 5:45)

God is not manipulated by our giving, neither moved by our gifts.  For gifts given with unclean hands and an impure heart are unacceptable.  This is why 2 Cor. 9:7 states, “Every man according as he purposeth in his heart, so let him give.”  Because when God judges mankind, He will “make manifest the counsels of the hearts.”(1 Cor. 4:5)

Give: give freely; give bountifully, and give cheerfully as God directs your heart.  “For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure. (Phil 2:13)

Purse Taken

Softly he whispered, “mama” in my ear.
That name put me at ease and stirred in me no fear.
It was a name used by the younger to subdue the older.
I yielded and accepted the tug on my shoulder.

But I soon realized my purse from my shoulder, was ripped.

This time I’d left my purse unzipped.
Perhaps he wondered what treasures lay in its deep folds
And what pleasures he could have if my purse was his to hold.

Perhaps he had found its pink lining enticing,

Exotic, erotic, hypnotic, inviting.
But what was there to gain by his stealing?
The few dollars tucked away in a corner weren't revealing.

Did he want to ramble through my purse’s contents, as if to ramble through my panty drawer?

Or was he really after my address and the keys to my door?
Was he trying to gain an understanding of the things I held so near?
Or did he only want some change to buy himself a beer?

My purse meant so little to him than it meant to me.
My purse carried acknowledgement of my identity
And held within it access cards to my every resource.

Who or what would be there for me as recourse?

Would my purse be returned to me intact?

Did I have any hope to ever get it back?
Oh, the misery that did take hold,
The day I lost my power and my control.

What You See

I am not her, the one you used to know:
And yet your mind does make it so.
Her image lingers.  It's her you see,
Even though you now look at me.

Your vision is distorted by what you've seen in the past.
It's unknown how long this illusion will last.
Now you react to a perception that rests only in your mind.
Whatever you hold, you have; and whatever you seek, you find.

The eye sees what the mind conceives,
Which is based upon what the heart believes.
Where is truth?

Plant the Seed for your Need

I've gone to churches where I see the one taking up the offering say, "Name your seed when you place your offering here."   Either they are ignorant to the principles of sowing and reaping or they are participating in deception, trying to profit off of the needs of the congregation.  You can call a corn seed a watermelon seed all you want, if you plant it you will get corn.  The seed is under commandment by God to reproduce after its kind.

Money becomes the seed of the ground in which it is placed.  If you place your money in the basket of this ministry, it becomes a ministry seed and it will reap ministry.  The ministry in which you placed it will reap a harvest.  Perhaps your own ministry will prosper.  It is a ministry seed!  You can pray for a someone to minister to your loved ones, just realize that a ministry seed only produces ministry.

If you need a car, you need to sow transportation seed.  If you have a car, give someone a ride.  If you ride the bus, pay someone's fare.  If you go through a toll, pay for the car behind you.  That's transportation seed.

If you need a house, shelter others where you are now.  Give to a homeless shelter, participate on a Habitat for Humanity project, take in a stray animal, give to an orphanage or to a home for battered women.  Plant shelter seeds.

If you need a husband, your contributions to a ministry won't help you.  Show yourself friendly.  Manage your budget.  Have self-respect.  Be virtuous.  Plant (good) husband seed.

If you need a promotion on your job, be to work on time.  Have good attendance.  Do your work with excellence.  Offer suggestions for improvement. Show initiative to increase your knowledge.  Be a team player.  Look out for your boss.  That's job promotion seed.

Look at your need, then plant the seed to meet that need.

Your Fruit

As fruit identifies the tree,
So it is for you and me.
The fruit of your womb carry your name.
They can bring you praise or they can bring you shame.

Up Front and In Charge

What does it mean to be upfront? 

By definition it means to be the first in line, the first to receive, or a position of privilege. At a banquet, perhaps you'd be the one sitting at the head table, with the best dinner set and served the best food.  In the not too distant past, white Americans were "upfront."  They sat at the front of the bus, entered through the front door, were given higher paying jobs, and better schools and books.  By definition, someone upfront would be the one in a position of leadership, the one who called the shots and who made the decisions in which all others would follow.  By definition, someone upfront would be the spokesperson.  In a jury, that would be the foreman, the one who spoke for the group.  Politically, it would be your congressman who represents you, his district or state.  By definition, someone up front would be someone in a position of superiority in some shape, form or fashion.  It would be someone considered better, more fir or stronger than others.  That strength may come in the form of physical might, battle strategy, weaponry, or psychological advantage.  Often those who perceive themselves in a position of strength use their strength to take over, control or oppress others.  As the world says, "only the strong survive."

 Yet man's thoughts are not God's thoughts and man's ways are not God's ways.  Man makes his decisions based on the satisfaction of his lusts and carnal desires.  The very imagination of man is evil continuously.  The thoughts and ways of man are opposed to God.  But there was one man who knew the thoughts and ways of God.  This was His Son, Jesus.  He is truly a man up front and in charge. (Eph. 1:18-23)  This man who is up front and in charge was raised from the dead.  God raises dead men.  He casts down prideful men.
While the world says, "only the strong survive," God says the weak survive because the strong lay down his life for the salvation of the weak.  The strong bear the infirmity of the weak.  Christ bore the sin of the world.

So what does it truly mean to be upfront?

To be upfront means to be sent to the frontline of the infantry, to be the frontline of defense, to be sent to face the adversary face to face.  To be upfront means to be expendable, to give or risk your life for another.  It means to put aside your needs, wants, desires, hopes, dreams and aspirations to help another.  To be upfront doesn't make you the spokesperson, it makes you God's messenger, and you speak only what you hear God saying, without adding to and without taking away.  To be upfront doesn't place you as head, it brings you under submission.

Watch yo' Mouth

"Watch yo' mouth!"  There is a God principle at work, which many people disregard or don't realize.  It is true, because God has spoken it, "That whosoever shall say [anything]; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that those things which he saith shall come to pass; he shall have whatsoever he saith."  (Mark 11:23) What you talkin' 'bout?

See

We "see" what we think we saw.  Our vision is translated by our perception.  Our natural vision is full of blind spots. And after we have stared at one thing, we carry the image of it over into our next field of vision (this is called the after image effect).  We can only see a limited frequency of light, leaving much of what is present, invisible.  "Now we see through a glass, darkly." (1 Cor. 13:12)  Therefore, do not react to what you think you saw, but rather respond to what you know God said.

See Why

Suppose you want to strike a pose
And get up on a mic to recite your prose
In hopes to delight and excite my toes
Up to my head.
I'm digging your rhythm and your rhyme.
I'm looking through your prism and moving in your time.
I'm eating your words and drinking your wine,
While lying in my bed.

Now my words begin to flow.
Untie my thoughts and let them go.
Reply to what my soul does know.
See why I choose instead
To sing a song unsung,
To speak an unknown tongue,
To start where none's begun,
To go where I am led.