Tag Archives: Jesus Christ

Right that Strong Black Woman Book

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As promised on Friday, today I begin posting excerpts from a draft of my book on the strong black woman. If you look over the course of my life, this book has been in the making since I was about 5. I began writing it, however, about 10 years ago. Over the decade there has been a host of articles, talk shows, lectures and books on this topic. Most recently, Sheri Parks published Fierce Angels: The Strong Black Woman in American Life and Culture and Hasani Pettiford published Why We Hate Black Women. While these books deal with stereotypes surrounding strong black women and even delve into areas of spirituality, neither offers a Christian worldview. My work does. If you have been following this blog, you know that I believe Jesus Christ is the author and finisher of my faith. So any conclusions that I come to about who I am have to be words based on what Jesus says. So from my book with the working title Destroying the Myth of the Strong Black Woman, I present to you a portion of the foreword:

    “Their strength is to sit still. Now go, write it before them in a table, and note it in a book, that it may be for the time to come forever and ever. . .” Isaiah 30:7b-8.

When God tells you to do something, you better do it, even if the task is harsh; you think people won’t like you, that people will attack you. Such was the case with completing Destroying the Myth of the Strong Black Woman. I didn’t feel this way in the beginning. I first thought, “God gave me this book to help set black women free. This is going to be good. I and so many women I know have these issues. People need this book.” And hundreds of women and men I talked to and interviewed supported my thinking. So did one mainstream publisher whose only apprehension was backlash from the black community. A white editor wanted to know what the black community would feel about some of its dirty laundry being aired. This sentiment kept them from publishing my book. But now here I am, because when God tells you to do something, you better do it, even if the task is harsh, you think people won’t like you, that people will attack you.

So, this is a forewarning. You may think what I have written is harsh; you may not like me; you may even attack me. I can deal with that. What I can’t deal with is the repercussions of God showing me something so clearly, telling me to write it, and disobeying Him for fear of man. This book is my debt to my God who entrusted my limbs to deliver a message, one that is hard-hitting but redeeming for me. When I examined the history of my independence and pride in being a strong black woman I recognized little of my walk had been with God. . . .

More of my story from the book next time

Copyright 2006-2010 by Rhonda J. Smith

The USA: An Unrequited Love

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I simply love “My Country ’Tis of Thee,” the patriotic song I had to learn in kindergarten. This song by Samuel F. Smith (1831) speaks of beautiful people and bountiful land, and the music gives me goose bumps every time I hear it. This is America, the way it was meant to be. But in too many ways and for too many people, the United States of America never became Smith’s “My Country ’Tis of Thee.” Proverbs 14:34 tells us why: “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a disgrace to any people.” Lack of morality, particularly acknowledging that God-given ability to discern between right and wrong, has brought disgrace among us. Our history and the continuance of racial and gender discrimination, monetary greed and unrestrained sexual appetites cause those of us who see these as problematic core issues to seek change. This is why an abolitionist in 1843 rewrote “My Country ’Tis of Thee” and why Henry Dumas couldn’t bring himself to call the United States his country in the poem ’Tis of Thee, his tale of unrequited love. And this is why I seek for people to give their lives to Jesus Christ, making Him their Savior and Lord. Jesus is righteousness and having Him not only as Savior but Lord (master) of their lives can bring about the change we need so that our nation can be exalted the way it needs to be.

Copyright 2010 by Rhonda J. Smith

My Country, ’Tis of Thee
By Samuel F. Smith, 1831

My country, ’tis of thee,
Sweet land of liberty,
Of thee I sing;
Land where my fathers died,
Land of the pilgrims’ pride,
From every mountainside
Let freedom ring!

My native country, thee,
Land of the noble free,
Thy name I love;
I love thy rocks and rills,
Thy woods and templed hills;
My heart with rapture thrills,
Like that above.

Let music swell the breeze,
And ring from all the trees
Sweet freedom’s song;
Let mortal tongues awake;
Let all that breathe partake;
Let rocks their silence break,
The sound prolong.

Our fathers’ God to Thee,
Author of liberty,
To Thee we sing.
Long may our land be bright,
With freedom’s holy light,
Protect us by Thy might,
Great God our King.

Additional Abolitionist Lyrics
By AG Duncan, 1843

My country,’ tis of thee,
Stronghold of slavery, of thee I sing;
Land where my fathers died,
Where men man’s rights deride,
From every mountainside thy deeds shall ring!

My native country, thee,
Where all men are born free, if white’s their skin;
I love thy hills and dales,
Thy mounts and pleasant vales;
But hate thy negro sales, as foulest sin.

Let wailing swell the breeze,
And ring from all the trees the black man’s wrong;
Let every tongue awake;
Let bond and free partake;
Let rocks their silence break, the sound prolong.

Our father’s God! to thee,
Author of Liberty, to thee we sing;
Soon may our land be bright,
With holy freedom’s right,
Protect us by thy might, Great God, our King.

It comes, the joyful day,
When tyranny’s proud sway, stern as the grave,
Shall to the ground be hurl’d,
And freedom’s flag, unfurl’d,
Shall wave throughout the world, O’er every slave.

Trump of glad jubilee!
Echo o’er land and sea freedom for all.
Let the glad tidings fly,
And every tribe reply,
“Glory to God on high,” at Slavery’s fall.

'Tis of Thee

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From my tirade about how my countrymen are treating President Obama you can probably tell I have been thinking about the United States a lot lately. And though this is the land of opportunity and I’m so glad to have been born here, I realize that the country’s foundation is uneven. For instance, on one slab the United States was built on Judeo-Christian values and on another slab it was built upon the backs of enslaved Africans. That’s an uneven foundation because Jesus Christ does not approve of the type of slavery that our ancestors experienced. Certainly there are other events that have contributed to our country’s foundation being uneven, but the promotion of Christian ideals while promoting something opposite of a Christian ideal is a standout contradiction for me. Anyway, when your foundation is unstable, there’s going to be a lot of quaking going on, literally and figuratively, both of which we now see happening in the United States. To call more attention to this uneven foundation and the quaking it’s causing, I want you to let my literary love speak to you through his poem “’Tis of Thee”:

You are oversized, you are overrated, you are overblown,
fat and filled with hardened rocks.
You are sick and stumbling like an old man without
a stick in the mud.
You make me sick to my stomach, and I am sad
that I have to look at you.
You have eaten too much garlic
And drunk too much beer,
And built too many empty churches.
You are fat with starch and lies.

Your steeled cities range like malignant cancers across
The belly of your land.
Your sons race death in metal machines that
defecate poison into the air.
Your ideas are machine made,
your values operated by machines
your truths nourished by machines,
your history written by machines,
your language sounds like millions of coins jingling
into an empty barrel.
Your heroes are dead.
Your wars are massacres.
You are an overkiller,
oversexed, overripe, overrotten.

You are a sinful old man who has no repentance
in his heart,
a lecherous old winebelly vomiting blood.
You are a murderer of your sons
and a raper of your daughters.
You are cold and filled with death.
Few flowers grow from your gardens
and the snow and the ice shall be your grave.

You are a despiser of black and misunderstander of white.
You are a mystery of yourself and a hater of that.
You once were a star that blazed,
but now you are overcivilized, oversterilized, oversated.
If you were a barren tree in my garden
I would come and cut you down.

By Henry Dumas
From Knees of a Natural Man
Copyright 1989 by Loretta Dumas and Eugene B. Redmond
Published by Thunder’s Mouth Press

The Necessity of Forgiveness

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Many said it was hard. Others admitted they didn’t want to do it. Some didn’t think they could do it. But most knew that they had no choice but to forgive. These were the women in my workshops on forgiveness last weekend. They challenged my ‘no exceptions’ message by saying surely murderers and pedophiles didn’t apply. After I reiterated that no sin we could do to each other was greater than our sin against a perfect God who died so our sins wouldn’t be charged to us—thus offering us forgiveness, they understood that even murderers and pedophiles must be forgiven (Mark 3:28).

Understand this: Just because you forgive—no longer being angry and criticizing—doesn’t mean you validate the offender’s sin. Forgiveness doesn’t necessarily cancel the consequences for the sin either (i.e., pedophiles must register as sex offenders and not be allowed to interact with children though they may “deserve” death). Forgiveness is a set of actions toward the offender to help her turn from her ferocious or violent behavior (Luke 6:27-37 & 17:3*). Christians are deliverance agents sent on a mission from God to reconcile people to Him. Forgiveness is but one method that God uses.

Forgiveness is not only used to heal the offender but also the offended (the ones directly affected and those offended by what was done to others). Until we forgive, our soul (mind, will and emotions) will be tormented (Matthew 18:15, 34-35). There will be no peace, even though we may have moments of happiness based on circumstances in our life, things that happen outside of us. Our inside, where stability comes from, will still be a wreck if we withhold forgiveness. We may not have daily manifestations of anger and pain, but unforgiveness works in concert with anger and pain, leading us to bitterness and an eventual outburst that will damage others (Hebrews 12:15). We must also forgive others so that God forgives us (Matthew 6:14-15).

The women in my workshops began to understand that unforgiveness creates fractured relationships and fractured souls. As Christians, we are called to be in fellowship with God and one another. We are also called to minister the love, grace and healing of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ so that others’ might have a personal relationship with Him and be whole. Forgiveness calls for us to take our eyes off the offense and focus on loving the hell out of the offender. Each act of love serves to push the offense from the forefront of our minds. The more acts of love we offer the farther away the offense becomes. Again, forgiveness is not easy, but it is necessary for the welfare of all and for the kingdom of God.

So those of you who are withholding forgiveness, I continue to challenge you: Rewrite The Making of Unforgiving (also see Activate Forgiveness) to help you face your offender and the offense, not to relive the moment but to begin the process toward forgiveness.

Copyright 2010 by Rhonda J. Smith

*Greek definition of rebuke

Divinely Poetic

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Poetry—the measured language of emotion; the art of rhythmical composition, written or spoken, for exciting pleasure by beautiful, imaginative, or elevated thoughts—Dictionary.com

April is National Poetry Month, celebrating all things poetry. This is what I plan to do this month, beginning today, Good Friday, the day that Christians recognize Jesus’ suffering and crucifixion for the sins of humanity. I recognize Jesus Christ as God, the savior, my savior, but today I also recognize Him as the ultimate poet, the one who personified delivering “the measured language of emotion,” his whole life being “the art of rhythmical composition,” displaying love to the fullest.

From before the beginning of time God had plans for me (Ephesians 1:4-6). These plans included living forever in concert with Him then people interrupted this plan, messed it up for all women and men, when they ate that forbidden fruit. They had to depart from His presence, separating all of us from Him, but God never dismissed us from His ultimate plan of life with Him. The people broke the connection and only He could make the connection again.

A bull couldn’t do it. A goat or bird wouldn’t do. Not a lamb or an ordinary man. Only Jesus, perfect God and perfect man when He came to dwell on the earth solely to redeem humanity back to Him (John 1:1, 14). Only he could devise a plan, set it in motion and see it through to its fulfillment. His virgin birth, His sinless life, his death on the cross, paid the price for humanity’s sins that we may live at peace with Him again and forever. “For God so love the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life” (John 3:16). Christ’s sacrifice—a plan from elevated thoughts (of God Himself)—is the measured language of emotion, a rhythmical composition that gives me pleasure. That is pure poetry.

I am happy today because of the poetry of Jesus. He simply could have said, “Come back to me” and we would have been redeemed. But the price was blood, His very own shed because of His great love for us. That’s some beautiful poetry.

Copyright 2010 by Rhonda J. Smith