The Lazarus Effect

Recently, Michael Santiago Render, better known by his stage name Killer Mike, had a huge effect on me. A little over a month ago, he swept the rap category at the Grammys. He dropped his moniker, invested 500,000 dollars of his own money, and simply put out an honest album that he describes as introducing people to Michael. This year, Easter marked 3 years of me uprooting my family from a ministry that we had been a part of for 25+ years in pursuit of purpose, but his story genuinely inspired me. It has taken me the last 3 years to process and accept this next phase of my journey, only to realize how much I had to unlearn, forgive, and grow from. Realizing the person I truly am, has been a frightening experience because for years I saw myself as one thing, only to realize that once I changed my environment, it wasn’t me at all. Dying to self is extremely hard. And being your true self sometimes can be even harder. I’ve heard many people say that they are afraid to die. And I can understand that when you have things that you have not accomplished yet, or you might feel like there is still something for you to do in your lifetime. I get it, but it can also be looked at as selfishness. Either way, there comes a time in our life when we must accept it. Whether it’s a loved one who has lived a long life as a family patriarch, we personally can’t let them go even if they have come to grips with it. It could be death to a friendship or relationship that is bad for us, or maybe a habit, addiction, or even how we see ourselves may be causing us to die slowly. To slowly pass away is what I would consider suffering. Death is inevitable, but we can drag death along and turn it into misery and anguish.

I really wanted to prove my love to God. But I also realized that I did a lot more by saying that I loved rather than showing that I loved. I also started to understand that during this process I saw that it was hard for me to receive love or trust. In certain parts of my life, it didn’t register or make sense. I was confused or I didn’t recognize love to a certain degree. I was being reprogrammed. All the whoopings and childhood chastisement were brought back to my remembrance, attached with the lesson that I learned from it.Sometimes we go through pain and are allowed to experience it for the sake of the love shown. Tough love is something that I learned and filtered through later in life. Heartbreak is something that eventually helped me grow. But both instances helped me and made me better through the discomfort of undergoing them. It also helps us recognize that sometimes what we want and what God wants for us is different. We can white-knuckle a dream or a self-professed vision that we have for ourselves, only to realize later that it was nothing more than selfish ambition or conditioning.

When a doctor gives you a shot, you only experience pain or discomfort for a short while. I’ve never really been scared of shots, but I have noticed that people who fear needles are usually focused on the pain. I learned that from my children. Trips to the doctor's office were always the worst because the question they would always ask was, “Is it going to hurt?”, even though they knew that it would. When they were younger, I could keep them distracted while the nurse would give them a shot. But as they got older, they would either anticipate the shot, catch on to the game, and no longer fall for the okey doke which would eventually require a mild restraint, or I would give in to promises of candy and toys to go through with it. The funny thing is after the shot, doctors would always give a lollipop to help ease their minds from the overdramatic trauma that the little ones experienced, and they would be back to normal as if nothing happened.

Many times, in my life I’ve witnessed that same similarity in God’s anger. Like those immunization shots, the pain only lasts for a moment, but the benefit of the shot you don’t tend to think about it all being worth it. The good effects of the medicine administered should outweigh the pain that you feel temporarily. I never really thought about it like that. There is nothing permanent about what we face in life. But when the situation arises, we can treat it like it is perpetual. The problem will last only a night, only a season, but can treat them like a binge-worthy rerun marathon in our minds. Like my children, we can focus on the pain and make it so much bigger than it is. We can forget that aside from the momentary hurt, that same instrument is there to help us. We can squirm and become anxious and relive those quick moments of torment every time we have a doctor’s visit, but Psalm 30:5 reads, “for his anger last only a moment, but his favor last a lifetime; weeping may stay for the night, but rejoicing comes in the morning”. No matter how difficult or challenging the problem may appear to be, one thing is certain in this, problems don’t last forever. We have to learn that whatever we go through, every doctor’s visit that we attend, is only a temporary situation. There’s nothing permanent about what we go through.

Happiness is the byproduct of obedience. True obedience. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve looked at situations where it seemed like the end of the world, only to laugh about it later in life. We truly have the ability to take our hardships, times of pain, and sacrifice and use those stolen moments to learn from. We can all sit back now and laugh about those doctor visits when my children were younger and how they reacted. We can even sit down with them and joke about it and all have a good laugh. We have also laughed at this, my wife is a professional nurse, and she administers shots all the time. But in her case, depending on the size of the needle, or the lack of experience perceived by the unlucky managing attendant, she too can become uneasy and reluctant. This means that there are some pains that we go through depending on the size, and we can react differently. She has gone through many hours and years of training, to give, understand, and explain the benefits of medicines, yet even with that knowledge of knowing that it’s going to make her better, it is still uncomfortable for her to a certain degree. When he afflicts us, it is to our advantage that we may be partakers of his love and we have to be able to identify it in our storms. I had to learn how to receive it. His love is not perceived as punishment, but it is proof that he loves us. Sometimes, we find the challenge in life is looking for the easiest way around pain. Don’t get me wrong, life throws us for a loop every now and then, but we must learn to take a brief shot of pain in order to receive the lollipop afterward. Our pain should rally our faith. Our discomfort should resemble his love. Pain petitions us in the PM, but bliss awakens us in the AM. We have to stop being afraid of what could go wrong and start being positive about what could go right.

Everything you want is on the other side of fear.

Moving Mountains

I love the fall season.  I love the colors of the season and the holidays. And it gives me the opportunity to delve into some of my favorite comfort foods that are perfect and ripe this time of year. “Fall” is symbolic of harvest or abundance so to speak but is also a season of things dying.  The leaves are beautiful, yet they fall away from their life source. Change is also beautiful if you allow the process to naturally run its course. The month of November has always served as a visual reminder that I should always not only embrace change but to be optimistic. Autumn usually represents death. And unfortunately, all things have to die. But “Thanksgiving” is also a great reminder to give thanks for all things. I love meeting with family and indulging in the sin of gluttony like most people, however reflecting on the things that I’ve grown from to acknowledging the things that I need to let to let die in my life are hallmarks. And these things to me have served as the proverbial mountains in my life. Traditionally, I’ve always referred to Matthew 17:20,

20 “Because you’re not yet taking God seriously,” said Jesus. “The simple truth is that if you had a mere kernel of faith, a mustard seed, say, you would tell this mountain, ‘Move!’ and it would move. There is nothing you wouldn’t be able to tackle.”

As a scripture that I’ve given a lot of oxygen to, I’ve told, whispered, spoken to, yelled at the top of my lungs at, and even cursed at the mountains that erected before me in my life. I thought I had faith. I was taught that all I had to do is “tell this mountain to move” and it would. And if I could be completely honest, most of the time “it” didn’t. And when “it” didn’t move initially, I made the hasty decision to foolishly attempt to “climb” the mountain, which only resulted in either me losing my grip or footing and slipping down to the bottom of this mountain covered in the rubble that accompanied me on the way down. Thankfully, I learned a huge lesson this year. Recently, I came across a quote from Confucius that said, “The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.”

And while I was surprised that I had never noticed this before, by being in a new environment, I was able to identify with these sentiments quite differently. This quote helped me realize that while faith moves mountains, faith without works is also dead. My approach was all wrong. I consistently struggled with trying to move my mountain by deadlifting it. Or yelling at God and questioning why was this mountain still here, or even better, why hadn’t he made it magically disappear? I condemned myself. I self-sabotaged His love for me. And I completely ignored the grace that I had been given. And I never recognized the simple question of how this mountain got there in the first place. Mountains are formed when the Earth’s crust smashes against each other and buckles up like the hood of a car in a head-on collision. All those years of ignorance, dysfunctional cycles, and bad habits had formed a crust thicker than a Chicago Stuffed pizza, and life just kept smashing up against each other repeatedly without me ever engaging in, addressing the problems, or making a valid effort to face it. But thankfully, this past season of “mountain climbing” taught me that rock bottom will teach you lessons that mountaintops never will. And even though I had faith, what if I had been assigned this mountain to show others that it could be moved? We move mountains, one stone at a time. When we have an issue or want to make a change in our lives, sometimes we can only focus on the mountain. We are often discouraged because it looks too big, and we get anxious or overwhelmed. But every big change starts with one little step. Every Summer season eventually leads to Autumn. So, whatever the “mountain” is in your facing in this season, don’t let it intimidate you.

As a matter of fact, even though you have faith, grab the smallest stone in front of you and make the decision to move that first.

God's Plans Are Better Than My Dreams

Dreams. I heard this word throughout my life, but I could never quite put my finger on the sentiment until recently. From what I’ve read, the definition is; dreams are understood to be recent autobiographical episodes that become woven with past memories to create a new memory that can be referenced later, but nightmares are simply dreams that cause a strong but unpleasant emotional response. Dreams are things that I’ve spoken of and with several people in my life in different seasons, some living and some that are no longer here, but we all had an idea of at least what our individual dreams were. We’ve all chimed in about what our dreams are, but only a select few from within my 6 degrees of separation have I witnessed them manifest.  Motivational speaker Les Brown said, “The graveyard is the richest place on earth because it is here that you will find all the hopes and dreams that were never fulfilled, the books that were never written, the songs that were never sung, the inventions that were never shared, the cures that were never discovered, all because someone was too afraid to take that first step, keep with the problem, or determined to carry out their dream.” He also stated that, “too many of us are not living our dreams because we are living our fears.” Now fear is something that I am all too familiar with. For over half my life, anxiety, doubt, and worry held me captive on a short leash. Fear can kill more dreams than failure ever will. And I know a few dreams that are lying dormant in the cemetery now from those whom I’ve known personally that have passed on. I was having a discussion with a friend over coffee the other morning, and I was sharing how as a Christian in organized religion, I was programmed to see everything through the lens of faith. Meaning that it was drilled in me, or should I say that I was willingly force-fed the ideology of faith-intensive messages subconsciously molding me to believe more in what I couldn’t see, than what I could. Now don’t get me wrong, I strongly believe in faith, but I feel like I was conditioned to be more inclined to the narrative of trusting God to do it behind the curtains, rather than me physically watching the stagehands and production crew build the set. I staunchly trust in the system of FAITH, but as an avid DIYer, there have been a few things that if it wasn’t for YouTube and lack of funds, I never would have challenged myself to accomplish. To some of us, seeing IS actually believing, and while it doesn’t work in all segments of life, it rings true to many. I read once that, “the man who moves a mountain begins by carrying small stones.” And I’ve also been in the confines of congregations or communities on many a Sunday morning hearing echoes of faith moving mountains and such. I, without a shadow of a doubt, have the faith of a mustard seed, and I’ve planted that seed in a few grassy knolls only to be consumed by weeds. You’ll never hear me confess to having a green thumb, but you can ask my wife about a few projects that I’ve typed in my google browser that turned out to be “a dream come true scenario.” I’ve made a mess out of a lot of things as I’ve chased my dreams over the years. I’ve attempted to climb a few mountains myself, only to lose my footing and fall face-first into a pile of failure. Why should I keep stepping out on faith when there are no visible steps? Because you have to face your fears to live your dreams. Sometimes you have to risk it all for a dream only you can see. Sometimes life is about risking everything for a dream no one can see but you. Every time I chased my dreams and fell, over time I learned that I needed to “chase” my dream differently. For a long time, I struggled internally because like Moe (Moses) in the Good Book, I would rebuttal with God about not knowing what to do with what I was given. I watched all the YouTube videos on faith, and I still didn’t get it.

Recently, I was vibing in the studio with my recording engineer and we were discussing the mental strain of being older and still attempting to make music in hip-hop and how difficult it can be. We laughed about how we approach our dreams differently the older we get. Studio time and writing songs happen inversely now rather than when I was in my twenties, without a wife and children, and my priorities were simply a car note, a cell phone bill, and a steady supply of weed. In this stage of my life, I’m beginning to understand that your dreams shouldn’t change just because your priorities do. Dreams aren’t plastic, they’re elastic – and as a Christian who participated in the business of church, I was programmed to rely on everything by faith. But in the process of chasing my dreams, I began to appreciate that while knowing I’m in God’s hands, to a certain degree, your life is in your hands, and you have to stop waiting for further instructions. I had to stop asking blind people to proofread my vision. I had to stop asking people who have not been where I was going for directions. After moonlighting for a while as a mountain climber, I, unfortunately, got the hang of falling, and I learned that rock bottom will teach you lessons that mountaintops never will.Rock bottom became the solid foundation on which I rebuilt my dream. And I’m learning how to build that dream with the same stones that were thrown at me. When you have to prove people wrong about your dreams, stopping isn’t an option. Dream chasing led me to the foot of the mountain, and in times past, I either prayed for God to remove the mountain or I put my faith in

Matthew 17:20-21 where Jesus replied, “Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, 'Move from here to there,' and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

But while I believe in both, as of recent, I feel like I’ve been assigned this mountain to show others that it CAN be moved. Last year, Dave Chappelle honored Jay-Z at the 36th Annual Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony, and as I witnessed history as part fan/part hip-hop enthusiast, he said these words that summed it up for me, “Oh don’t get it twisted, American pie is not made out of apples, it’s made out of whatever you can get your @#$%* hands on. And I felt that. But so are our dreams. For me it boils down to this, you better get to climbing because those dreams hit different when you remember what you went through to fulfill them.

They call me a dreamer but I’m the one that doesn’t sleep.