The Truth And Nothing But The Truth As Witnessed By A Believer.

I once heard a sermon about the word of God and when God speaks to us (no, it wasn’t my dad this time!). In the sermon the priest exclaimed that, “seeing is not believing, we see and hear God’s Word every day but we can’t hear it and can’t see it, therefore we cannot comprehend what God is saying to us.” He continued to say, “If you believe then you can hear and see the Word of God, it’s then that you can understand what He is saying to us.” To me it was such a poignant revelation and twist to what I have thought I already understood but it made all the good sense in the world. So we see and hear the Voice of God each day but because we don’t believe we don’t comprehend what we hear and see. We have to realize when God speaks to us, if we don’t we are lost. A good example when Rodney King spoke on the violence that ensued after the terrible beating he got from the Los Angeles police when he exclaimed, “can we all get along, can we stop making it horrible for the older people and the kids. It’s not right; it’s not going to change anything. I love people, we’ve got to quit. To keep going along like this, to see a security guard shot on the ground, they will never see his family again, it’s not right, it’s just not right, we can get along, we all can get along, let’s try to work it out.” To those of us who believe, we heard God’s Voice crying out to us through Rodney King. Others made jokes about it all. We all remember the “can’t we all just get along” jokes. We heard them at work; we heard them in school and on the streets. To those of us who believe it was almost blasphemy to laugh at Rodney because we knew it was truly God who was speaking. When believers first heard Obama and his message of hope and change we immediately heard the same message of Jesus, “hope and change.” Let me declare to all right now that I’m not saying Obama is Jesus or even comparing Obama to Jesus but what I am saying is that his message is the same. There’s no question that God had His Hand in this whole political process. I won’t say that God is mixing politics with religion but when you look this whole thing in the eye you come to realize that there’s no way a Black man in America could have survived this all, win the democratic nomination and then win the presidency of America, the most prestigious job in the world by himself. Now if you don’t believe, you won’t agree. There were so many people all ages, all colors, all faiths, all over the world that were hanging on every moment, every second throughout the primary and presidential election process. At Obama’s stump speeches and rallies we saw our Black Grandmothers and Grandfathers crying, holding their heads in their hands overcome with the understanding that our validity as human beings had finally arrived. After soooo many years in the cotton fields, after soooo many lashings, after those dark days when they saw their brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers and children hanging from trees. Hope and change is what we clung to throughout not only these last couple of years but for the last 400 years. Hope realized is when we heard people shouting out in the air of despair saying, “Obama is the next president elect, he will be our 44th President.” Tears poured through the eyes of our souls. We saw young Black men in the North Philadelphia streets 2 am in the morning driving in cars blowing the horns and shouting out for all to hear, “Obama, Obama, Obama.” They were dancing in the streets with Obama signs and banners. People were praising God for the election of Barak Obama. I suddenly realized that they are the same young men who hang out on the corners all day long with nothing to do, the same ones who sell drugs; the same ones who do drugs, the same ones who robbed the candy store; the same ones who killed another brother on the corner. We saw young women crying tears of relief because Christ had finally crushed the anguish of hopelessness. “Change can’t be far away, it just can’t be” they said, finally things are going to be better. They were the same young ladies that have to sell their bodies in the streets just to feed their babies, the same ones that have to work two jobs just to make ends almost meet. Our grandchildren, some as young as 5 and 6 years old knew something wonderful was happening, they too cried out, Obama, Obama, Obama.” They saw something in their parent’s eyes that they had never seen before and they gloried in it even though they knew not what it was. It’s amazing what just a glimmer of hope can do! Those of us who believe know that God is pleased when we thank Him for all that He has done for us. He is pleased when we give Him praise, He is pleased when we look upwards and exclaim, “thank you Jesus.” We can safely say that in no other time in history in any one given period have so many people thanked God in sacred unison for a single blessing that we have received from Him. God must have been greatly pleased. There was dancing, singing and tears of joy around the world when it was announced that Obama had won the presidential election!!! In Africa, in Japan, in Russia, in the Netherlands, in Australia, in France, in Paris, in the third world countries people had that same feeling that hope has sprung eternal, “everything is going to be all right, we are finally on our way to becoming a sane and compassionate world.” The angels must have been filled with joy, Gabriel’s horn was blowing for the believers to hear. The flowers in heaven by the streets He has paved in gold had to have been swaying side to side with joyful praise. The birds in heaven surely were chirping, “Praises to You Almighty God.” If we were dancing in the streets here on earth, I know Emit Tills, Martin, Malcolm, Gandhi, John, my Dad; those who hung from trees, those who were burned at stake, the abolitionists who fought for our freedom and everyone else in heaven had to be dancing in those pearly streets paved by God. This was such a spiritual experience never before witnessed by so many. One that I will never forget, one I will always treasure. I thank God I was able to witness it and thankful to be able to see just what was transpiring right before my eyes. Once again God chose the weak to confound the mighty. The Black man was at the bottom of the totem pole on this earth, the scourge of the earth but God lifted him on high for all to see. We who believe witnessed God in action and we watched every moment of it all. It was so great to see Him at work. No matter what the opposition did, it never made any difference. We heard all the attacks and negative comments and ads. In some cases it had the opposite reaction that they wanted. People began to say, we’re tired of the negativity, we’re tired of the same old politics. We want something new, we want hope, we want fairness, we want to talk first instead of bomb first, we want change. Those fiery darts they threw at Obama were all intercepted by the Angels of protection God put around him. If they could have seen all the protection God put around Obama they would have run into the hills, but they didn’t believe so they couldn’t see. God increased Obama’s greatness and comforted him on every side. I pray that God continues to protect Obama until his work predestined by God is done. We ourselves have to support Obama; we have to help him out in our homes, in our schools, on our jobs, in the streets and everyday in our lives. Now that change is finally here, now that we finally see hope we can’t let it die. Those young men and women who celebrated in the streets and around the world have to be able to hold onto that feeling, if they don’t the streets of despair will get worse. Their children need to see the delight of hope in their mothers and fathers eyes every day. We have to put a new sign in the entrance to our cities and around the world. Tear down the sign that reads as in Dante’s inferno, “Abandon all hope all ye that enter this place.” The new sign must read, “Hope lives here and change is coming.” Thank you Mr. President elect for allowing yourself to be an instrument of God. Please continue to lead and inspire us all to become the people, the citizens, the America and the world that God wants us to be. The residue of God’s Glory is still in the air and still in our hearts. Let us not waste this opportunity that God had provided us, it’s time to pick up the cross and march onward to Zion with Jesus at our side and with God up on high.
Kemah C. Washington

Father Paul Washington Community Committee
fatherpaulwashington.com