Saturday, May 28, 2011

SHABBAT SHALOM

"Remember the Sabbath day by keeping it holy. Six days you shall labor and do all your work, but the seventh day is a sabbath to the LORD your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns. For in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, but he rested on the seventh day. Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy."-Exodus 20:8-11

Of all of the ten commandments, the passage on the sabbath is by far the longest and most detailed in explanation. So why is it the one that we revere the least?

Culturally, because of the way we structure our "work week", we casually recognize Monday as the first day of the week. Because we live in a capitalistic society, everything we do is centered around capital and earnings, as with how we structure our week. And even before the United States of America existed as the nation it is today, there was a historical shift which caused Saturday to become socially replaced as the sabbath. Around 200 A.D., Roman Catholics suggested that Sunday be kept to honor the resurrection. So until about 300 A.D., believers kept both Saturday sabbath and Sunday simultaneously. Because Sunday was also a day of sun worship among the pagan Romans (hence the name Sun Day), and was highly regarded throughout the city, Roman Christians began to favor the united front of worship on Sunday. By the 4th century, Sunday was the standard day for worship among Western believers, which eventually permeated the rituals of the traditional Eastern worshippers .

This information isn't hidden, it's quite obvious and readily available actually. Check your local library, or a variety or credible internet sources. Neither is it foreign to us that Sunday is the first day of the week. Look at any calendar and you'll notice that Sunday is the first day of the week listed. When we, as children (and even our children today) learned the days of the week in kindergarten it was even taught in song and rhyme with Sunday always as the first day. Here's a popular example:



Because our rest and worship is embedded in a state of sin in that we are being disobedient to the specific commands of YHWH, we are not benefitting from the power of the holy day. I'm not saying that the Most High does not show up in the midst of Sunday worship, for we know that the Word says, "where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them (Matthew 18:22)", but in gathering on the chosen holy day, we activate power and blessings that can be released only on that day. I know I want the full promise, don't you?

Many try to justify by saying that as long as they keep "a" sabbath, they believe that YHWH is pleased, so they keep a Sunday sabbath because that's what everyone else does, or they keep an "off-day" sabbath, meaning they consider the day they are off from work as their sabbath. But the YHWH wants me to remind you that your obedience is more valued than your sacrifice (1 Samuel 15:22). Others say that because it was under the old testament law, then it is dead since Jesus came to fulfill the law. It's important to note that there was not just a single old testament law, rather three different types of laws: moral, ceremonial, and civil.

Yashua (Jesus) came to remove the ceremonial and sacrificial laws that brought about curses (often death) upon those who didn't honor them. He is the lamb sacrifice who shed blood that we might no longer perform those types of rituals. However, because he came to redeem us from the "curse of the law", does not excuse us from the moral portion of the law (Galatians 3:13). The Mosiac law given to show us a moral standard applies today, just as much as it did then, only we tend to negate the laws that have been culturally omitted. Because we are no longer under a particular law, does not mean we are without law. But above all, as believers have been sternly warned against allowing the world to dictate our behavior. Can you imagine how choosing to be obedient to this the same way we we are to killing, stealing and tithing might change the face of our nation and ultimately the Christian face of the world?

The LORD wants you to know the value in the sabbath for your own benefit. We treat it as a handicap and even sometimes a curse, but it's a gift to us so that we not only have a day where we share in focused relationship with the Creator, but a day for us to focus on our own health and wellness so that we don't become stressed, overwhelmed, and run-down with life. This does not mean that we cannot worship or rest on other days, but it must be in addition to what we were commanded. I rest and worship on Saturday, but also worship on Sunday. Sunday is my own personal sacrificial way of giving back to YHWH my first-fruits, since it is the first day of the week. But I had to come out from under the spell of the Sunday worship cultural standard and become obedient to the sabbath commandment before I could add that additionally.

We say we follow (Yahshua) Jesus, and there are numerous scriptures that identify him as having kept the sabbath holy. Yes, he was questioned by the Pharisees about his lack of strict regiment in that he did service work on the sabbath, but he kept it nonetheless. When we serve on the sabbath as opposed to working, we are within the boundaries that the Messiah set for us. It's only if we are not keeping the sabbath at all that we are being disobedient to both what the Lord modeled, as well as what YHWH commanded.

I don't want to come across preachy, because I am not a preacher, but the Most High ordered me to deliver this teaching word to you today, so out of obedience, I must oblige. Don't get mad; and if you don't agree, exercise the freewill to do what you believe is right for you. Above all, pray about the matter so that you may hear from YHWH directly.

I hate to fuss, so this doesn't make me happy to step on the toes of so many people that I truly love and respect. Fact is though, because I love you, I must tell you not what you want to hear, rather what you need to hear. Trust, this is a word for me just as much as for you.

*FOR A MORE IN-DEPTH AFRICAN-RELATED STUDY ON THE TEN COMMANDMENTS, RESEARCH THE 42 PRINCIPLES OF MA'AT

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Sunday, May 8, 2011

MORE & MOOR POETRY



For Mother's Day, I was granted the opportunity to do one of the only things I love almost as much as parenting, and that's being artistic. I was asked to perform, "A Negro Mother" by Langston Hughes and jumped at the chance. Even though I prefer to perform my own material, I can see where I am being humbled by reciting others' work, taking the emphasis off of me & teaching me to focus more on The Most High & how I'm being used for divine purpose. I am walking in my season & accepting all that comes my way, continuing to sharpen my tools for even greater works. For those of you who have asked for the lyrics to the poem, here goes:


The Negro Mother
by Langston Hughes


Children, I come back today
To tell you a story of the long dark way
That I had to climb, that I had to know
In order that the race might live and grow.
Look at my face - dark as the night -
Yet shining like the sun with love's true light.
I am the dark girl who crossed the red sea
Carrying in my body the seed of the free.
I am the woman who worked in the field
Bringing the cotton and the corn to yield.
I am the one who labored as a slave,
Beaten and mistreated for the work that I gave -
Children sold away from me, I'm husband sold, too.
No safety , no love, no respect was I due.

Three hundred years in the deepest South:
But God put a song and a prayer in my mouth .
God put a dream like steel in my soul.
Now, through my children, I'm reaching the goal.

Now, through my children, young and free,
I realized the blessing deed to me.
I couldn't read then. I couldn't write.
I had nothing, back there in the night.
Sometimes, the valley was filled with tears,
But I kept trudging on through the lonely years.
Sometimes, the road was hot with the sun,
But I had to keep on till my work was done:
I had to keep on! No stopping for me -
I was the seed of the coming Free.
I nourished the dream that nothing could smother
Deep in my breast - the Negro mother.
I had only hope then , but now through you,
Dark ones of today, my dreams must come true:
All you dark children in the world out there,
Remember my sweat, my pain, my despair.
Remember my years, heavy with sorrow -
And make of those years a torch for tomorrow.
Make of my pass a road to the light
Out of the darkness, the ignorance, the night.
Lift high my banner out of the dust.
Stand like free men supporting my trust.
Believe in the right, let none push you back.
Remember the whip and the slaver's track.
Remember how the strong in struggle and strife
Still bar you the way, and deny you life -
But march ever forward, breaking down bars.
Look ever upward at the sun and the stars.
Oh, my dark children, may my dreams and my prayers
Impel you forever up the great stairs -
For I will be with you till no white brother
Dares keep down the children of the Negro Mother.

Here's a summary as taken from enotes.com:
“The Negro Mother” is the title poem in the collection of poetry that Hughes wrote to reach the masses of black people. The twenty-page book and the poem were such an instant success that Hughes told his friend Carl Van Vechten that in Birmingham, Alabama, the book “sold like reefers on 131st Street.”

The voice in the poem is that of the black mothers through the ages. In the opening line, the narrator addresses her children. In the narrative that follows, “the Negro mother” depicts the capture and hardship of black slaves and speaks of the will to endure that kept them going. The voice of the Negro mother urges the children to transform the future so that they may live in dignity and freedom from white oppression.

The poem, often referred to as a heritage poem, is highly lyrical, employing both a regular rhyme scheme (couplets) and meter. It was Hughes's intention, he said, that the poems be pleasant to recite and easy to remember. “The Negro Mother” and the success of the volume show how keenly in tune Hughes was with his audience."