Week 6: Sunday Service Announcements
Leave your worries of the world at the door and step into this house, you can put your sorrows aside and let the Lord replenish your soul.
If I had a church home here in Oakland, I would have taken my behind to church this morning. The state of the world and the tension between people is discomforting.
As we are reminded each year during elections that our ancestor’s fight was much more brutal and disheartening, I speak for us all when I say we don’t see how they did it. While I won’t take up this Sunday Service to speak on politics, the church is where revolutionary plans were made and executed within the community.
I think about James Baldwin and how he is a reflection of me, a writer and activist. He is a reflection for many of you too.
My message today is to keep writing. As your emotions are running high, write. Let the words flow through you like water and explore deep within the depths of your soul. Church is within, it’s time to go to church!
Church was a place where Black people could speak their pain or their rage, free of the endless and violent scrutiny of whiteness. It was a place we could be ourselves; a place to be joyful and a place to mourn. 1
Before the pastor gets in the pulpit on Sunday morning to preach the sermon, the word is studied, and the sermon is written. Before Martin Luther King, Jr. gave any speech it had to be written. After a meditation, we journal.
By denying ourselves the freedom to pour our words onto the wet ink-filled pages we are silencing ourselves and our ancestors. Fellowship with us next Sunday after Service for our second Writers Circle on Zoom. The last one moved us and shifted something massive within our community so this next one is even more intentional. Our sis
will pour libations for our ancestors, and we will then follow into a writing exercise that will ignite empowerment and resilience within us as we allow our words to flow with ease.As we prepare for this week’s guest writers we are going to have the praise team come up while the ushers pass the collection plate around, please place both envelopes in the collection plate for tithes/offerings and the building fund. 2
I’ve always communicated with God through writing…
One of the ways that I’ve always communicated with God was through writing Him letters. On week 4 of Sunday Service,
shared a letter with us where she questioned if she was doing this whole prayer thing right and I’ve felt so inspired ever since because SAME. I have always wondered if my letters to God, my daily thoughts to Him, or my changed behaviors, held any weight in His court. I always wondered if it was enough and now I’m at a point where I can confidently say:I’ve always felt this way but never stood on business, if you know what I mean. Shoutout to
for being so vulnerable with us, it was much needed. Thank you! Shoutout to Jacquie for cultivating this space of healing by making black people feel so seen and so safe!
A letter/prayer to God on the state of our nation
Dear God,
I come before you humbly and completely open to your presence. Thank you for bringing all of these beautiful black voices together in this space. For me personally, I’ve always struggled with feeling invisible, so this space here on BlackStack and Substack in general, has begun to heal those parts of me! I have You to thank for that. Thank you for speaking to Jacquie’s heart of gold. Thank you for all of the signs and messages. Thank you for all of the storms you’ve delivered us through as a community and as individuals. Thank you for all of the storms you will continue to deliver us through. And lastly, but certainly not least, thank you for the inner peace and unwavering love.
Unwavering love. Something this nation knows nothing about, it feels like. Our nation doesn’t seem to know you, they don’t know love, they don’t understand it. They don’t understand you God. This election season, coupled with another senseless act of fatal violence against yet another black woman named, Sonya Massey, has begun to highlight our lack of love and emotional intelligence yet again. These next few months and the next four years to come are about to be grueling, to say the least.
I’m asking you to cover this nation in more love. Speak to the hearts of those who are scared and anxious. Let them feel your grace and know faith. I’m asking that you speak to hearts of our radicals who are gearing up for the fight. Speak to the hearts of our elected officials. Speak to the hearts of our liberals, conservatives and moderates. We all have different views and beliefs, but the foundation of it all should be the same; love. From what I’m seeing and feeling down here, it’s not. Love is nonexistent in the conversations.
God, you’ve brought me so much inner peace that I’m not all the way ready to share with others yet. I’m trying to slowly but surely as we continue to build our relationship. In the meantime, can I ask you to descend upon our nation, help them to know peace and love.
Prune the nation, burn the branches, and then deliver us forward. Forward and upwards with everlasting momentum.
Amen.
That’s all I can give for today and I’m trying to remind myself that that’s perfectly okay.
-ciarajd
Black people are storytellers, most Bible stories share similarities with our existing folklore…
Black people are storytellers, people who engrave history on their skin, people who clutch their culture to their chests like precious pearls so as to pass it down to every next generation. I am Igbo, a south eastern tribe in Nigeria West Africa, and the first white people we ever saw were missionaries. They crossed the oceans and brought Christianity and stories of Jesus Christ to us, and our history has shown that one of the major reasons they were well recepted in the Igbo land was because both our stories were common ground, most bible stories had similarities with our already existing folklore, like their story of joseph and his jealous brothers and our story of the orphaned girl and her stepmother where they both found favour in foreign lands.
Now before these missionaries arrived, Igbo folk-tales were the primary source of learning everyday life lessons, children were taught honesty, sacrifice, and diligence through these stories from generation to generation, it is still the same till today, I remember sitting with my cousins some years ago in the evenings trading stories, especially of the tortoise known for his wisdom and cunning, he appeared so much in our folklore often symbolizing the source of the moral lesson, at some point, it was as though the tortoise paid our parents for PR, that till today the tortoise is still a special animal to me if one could tell a good story, they are regarded as wise, and a good orator. These stories represent larger, real-life lessons but are hidden in the folklore of not just the Igbo, but so many African tribes, hardly were there any childhood lesson I learnt that was not taught to me somehow somewhere through a story. These folktales also hold a whole lot of importance because Africans are not known for telling things verbatim, we communicate in riddles and proverbs and sarcasm, a lot of sarcasm. So often after these stories are told, our parents would ask us each what we learnt.
So today, I want to take you back to West Africa, Nigeria, to where I’m from, the Igbo land where our folklore is as important as the language itself, where songs and stories existed as forms of oral literature for centuries and were used to teach our younger generations what to do and what not to do. I want to tell you the story of the tortoise and the elephant and I will leave you to pick from it whatever lesson you want.
Dr Mike Ejagha from his 1983 album “akuko na egwu” meaning stories and songs where he tells the story of the tortoise and the lion.
Long time ago, when the world was still new and animals talked to human beings, there was a great king who had a beautiful daughter. His daughter was so beautiful that both men and animals wanted her hand in marriage, men from beyond the seas would hear tales of her beauty and travel to come see her, they would offer her the palest of silvers and the brightest of gold, the shiniest diamonds and the softest silk yet she refused them all. One day the king called a family meeting to ask his daughter why she had kept refusing suitors, the princess told her father that she wanted an elephant and that whoever could bring her an elephant would be the one to have her hand in marriage. Soon news of the princess’s demand spread to the village, and many of her suitors heard it and were discouraged, the elephant was big and strong and had never been captured, nobody had ever successfully put a leash round its neck, and how exactly were they supposed to convince their fellow animal to submit to being the princess’s pet?
Now the tortoise and the elephant had been good friends for years and the tortoise had always wanted the princess but knew he didn’t stand a chance at winning her heart. So he went to the king and told him that he would bring the elephant in exchange for his daughter’s hand, the king laughed long and hard, but the tortoise told the king that in three days he would be coming for his daughter’s hand and that a feast should be prepared in his name.
Then the tortoise went into the forest to visit his friend, the elephant, he managed to convince the elephant that the king was hosting the ofala feast, the biggest feast in the land in three days and that the king wanted the elephant to be one of the honoured guests, the elephant was happy. The tortoise then begged the elephant to honour him by going with him, which the elephant agreed to. On the D day, the elephant woke up early and dressed up for the feast, then he waited for the tortoise to show up so they could set off together, he waited and waited but the tortoise did not show up, but just before the sun was high up in the sky, the tortoise arrived, apologising for his lateness. The elephant in anger asked him if he intended to make him late after telling him that the king wanted his presence especially, the tortoise apologised again and they set off. Halfway into the journey, the tortoise started lagging behind, the elephant in anger asked him to walk faster but the tortoise said his slow steps were no match for the elephant’s giant strides, but it would save everybody the stress if the elephant carried him on his back so that they could get there faster, the elephant agreed. A little while later the tortoise asked the elephant if he could place a rope round its neck to tighten his grip so that he doesn’t fall, the elephant agreed, and they kept traveling. Just before they were almost at the palace gate the tortoise started singing
“My king, my king! I have caught you the elephant”
“My king, my king! I have caught you the elephant”
The elephant on hearing this song angrily asked:
“Tortoise who do you say you have caught?”
“Tortoise who do you say you have caught?”
The tortoise replied
“I was merely asking the land to protect and guard the elephant, and it seemed like I was saying I had caught the elephant”
The elephant suspected foul play from his friend but said nothing. The tortoise continued singing this song till they got to the palace gates, with the elephant willingly walking into the palace, and the tortoise riding on its back with a leash singing his song. The king couldn’t believe his eyes, but he had already promised the tortoise his daughter. So he arrested the elephant and then allowed the tortoise to marry the princess.
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Is God a superhero? No one talks about when God doesn’t save the day.
Saints and friends, if there is one thing that can throw me off-balance or off-kilter, it’s when life makes me question my faith. So today I want to talk with you about one of my faith struggles that leaves me asking the question is God a superhero?
Now I know I’m not alone in questioning my faith. We’ve been led to believe that we are out of order when we question God. But I came here to tell you that God can handle your questions. Turn to your neighbor and say…
Neighbor, God can handle your questions.
I've often wondered why we as a culture are so fascinated with superheroes? Seems like opening nights for comic movies have become religious experiences.
Now I’m gonna just toss out there so you understand me a little bit better, that I’m not into comics, and in general I’m not big on movies. I can be a tough critic of movies. Seems like I don’t watch movies from the same perspective as others. Most of the time, I’m not all that impressed. I kinda feel insulted when I’ve determined a movie to be bad. I’m like really irritated and it’s a strange feeling because I’m an overall laid back person. But a bad movie triggers such an intense reaction from me. Like I said, it feels like I’ve been insulted. So yeah movies aren’t really my thing, and I’m left wondering why do people gravitate to movies so much, especially comics?
What is this fascination with superheroes? I get the graphics, cinematography, costumes–all of the artistry. But the devotion says to me there is something deeper going on.
Perhaps the whole thing isn’t that deep at all. But what makes me think it is deeper is how we, especially Christians describe God. The savior aspect of Christianity seems to be a prevailing tenet. It’s Christ supernatural ability to resurrect himself from the dead that is core. Without it our faith is futile. That’s what the Apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:17. Accepting Christ means being rescued from hell’s impending doom, at least that’s what we’ve been taught.
But let’s pivot to the here and now. If we survive something terrible, then we say God had our backs. He was looking out for us. He saved the day. Which makes me think about the Kirk Franklin gospel song, Love Theory. Now overall I like the song. It has a tight beat and tight bass line. I love the instrumentation. It’s a head noddin’, rolling along in the car, feel-good song. But I did kinda cringe, when I heard the lyrics, He saves the day; he will come through, he won’t bow that’s not what superheroes do…
Now I’m not hatin’ on Kirk. I love Kirk. He’s a phenomenal musician and I like the other aspects of the song. The song is in my music library. I actually think Kirk is a great defender of the faith. He’s got some depth for sure. What I struggle with, HOWEVER, is the notion of calling God a superhero. But I’m not really trippin’ about the lyrics but the larger idea that many people ascribe to.
The struggle for me is the fact that God doesn’t always come through. He doesn’t always save the day. We aren’t always rescued from suffering and even death just because we prayed for it or had great faith.
One of the common questions that those struggling to even believe in God is, if God were real then why does he let bad things happen? For every testimony of victory, there’s a story of suffering with the same circumstance. I’d argue that the ratio is for every ONE testimony of victory, there are MULTIPLE stories of suffering. I don’t think those people would say God came through for them. They’re probably singing What About Us by Pink.
While many may have gained a different perspective from their suffering or arrived at a place of acceptance and peace, we need to acknowledge that their earnest pleas were not necessarily honored. They were not rescued from their situation and I mean on this side of heaven, that’s usually what we are praying for as David said in Psalm 27:13, to see God’s goodness in the land of the living.
Even the perspective of God being eternal, outside of time and space, and not confined to our timetables…quite frankly I don’t know how that encourages anyone. We might be able to glean some faith and encouragement when examining history and the privilege of hindsight. But in the thick of it all in real-time, I’m just saying it’s not helpful to me to know that several generations from now, what we wrestle with now, will finally be solved.
Can I get a witness?
As I start to close, I need to be clear that I do believe God is real. God exists but as a superhero? Nah, I don’t believe that and I don’t understand the origin story behind it. It bothers me because this narrative probably causes immeasurable heartbreak and shattered faith for those who were not rescued. And only God knows what all people have externally turned to or internally shut down to cope.
So if I don’t believe God is a superhero, then what do I believe?
When things are great or things work out, I believe gratitude is in order. I can’t fault anyone for expressing that gratitude however they see fit. AT THE SAME TIME, the mentality associated with this superhero narrative can set ourselves up down the line for disappointment when things don’t pan out well.
When it comes to dealing with trauma and devastation, I believe God is in the recovery process. I believe God is in the healing process, the process of becoming whole. And for me, that revelation has put me more at ease when dealing with unfavorable circumstances. And I’ll take that ease over the frustration and confusion caused by wondering why God didn’t come through like I though superheroes should, like I thought he would; like I hoped he would, like I prayed he would.
Amen?
Amen.
Onward to re-balancing our faith and Harmonious Balance, my friends!
Johanna
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Let’s bring the praise team up one more time with ‘Dispatches from The Queens of R&B Tour’
On legacy and relevancy
I stay connected to my inner child by revisiting the things that brought me joy when I was younger. One of the most sustaining aspects of my youth that allows me to disassociate in a healthy way is listening to music from the era when I was a child. I also have an obsession with docuseries and reality television that follow the lives of the artists who shaped the musical landscape of that time. Unsung, R&B Divas, BET Presents The Encore, and Queens of R&B: SWV Xscape is my favorite brand of what some may call trash TV. How else would I have known that Xscape had the audacity to suggest they headline a concert over SWV? Don't get me wrong, I love both groups, but when we're talking catalog, influence, and impact, SWV was THE '90s R&B girl group for me. I have vivid memories of seeing the cover of their sophomore album, New Beginning, in my mother's CD collection. Lelee, Coko, and Taj became aunties in my head, along with Mary J. Blige, whose discography my mother also burned a hole through.
What bothered me so much about Xscape's assertion that they are somehow superior to SWV was this conflation that Kandi and Tiny having Instagram follower counts exceeding each member of SWV's followers combined was reason enough to place them further up the hierarchy than SWV. It reflects the general reality of living in this last-capitalist, hyper-consumerist dystopian mess where the value of our contributions to the world is only measured numerically. It's another way people discredit and disregard the intangible and unquantifiable impact of creating a sound that defines an era and colors the memories of the people who lived through it. The algorithm clocked my watch history, and I scrolled past an advertisement for The Queens of R&B Tour featuring SWV, Xscape, Mya, Total, and 702. I took the clickbait and bought tickets, and the money was well-spent. I was excited to see these women perform on a major stage after being sequestered to the corner of the music industry where women past the age of 30 are forgotten.
702 had me choking up a little when they came on stage without Irish Grinstead, who passed away at the age of 43 last Fall. After watching LeMisha and Irish struggle to get back into their craft on BET Presents The Encore, it was really special to see LeMisha getting back into her bag with Kameelah and honor her sister's legacy. I can tell that she was overwhelmed with emotion during her performance, but joy emanated from her movement as she danced sang, and gave us all the personality on the stage. Kameelah looked and sounded as incredible as ever. Seeing her made me long for the days when Black beauty and deep brown skin tones were the norm on TV.
Total was interesting to watch. They started their show using an intro track from their song "Trippin'" where Diddy says, "Total, Kima, Keisha, Pam," except "Pam" was cut off because Pam wasn't there. Hearing Diddy's voice gave me the creeps, and cutting off “Pam” felt disjointed, so I'm not sure how necessary that was. However, they looked and sounded great and had amazing stage presence. The last I heard about Pam was that she was on a journey. I hope she is in good spirits.
I was super excited to see Mya because she is one of the few people of that era whose new music I enjoy. Many people don't even know she was nominated for a Grammy in 2016 for best R&B album for her project Smoove Jones. I was curious to see if she would perform some new material, but she didn't, which I understand because it's a nostalgia tour. I was happy to see her play a new track at the end of her set called "Anytime," which I instantly added to my Spotify playlist. She has evolved so much as a vocalist and blew my wig off when she surprised us by bringing out Sisqo for "All About Me" (he's still blonde and sings his ass off, by the way). Mya's legacy has always puzzled me because I felt like she was on par to be as respected as Aaliyah, Beyoncé, and other artists she came up with in that era, not to mention she is aging incredibly, which normally affords women the privilege of maintaining relevance longer. From what I know about how Mya moves, she doesn't seem interested in the Hollywood rah-rah. She's an independent artist who writes and produces her music and has put out countless singles and EPs despite not having the major label support she had in the late 90s and early 2000s. These traits in Mya remind me a lot of Tinashe, whose "Nasty" music video, feels like (but may not be) a direct reference to Mya's "Case of The Ex" music video. Similarly, Victoria Monet, whose baby blue jersey dress in her "On My Mama" video, was definitely inspired by the one Mya popularized in the "Best of Me Remix" music video. Both "Nasty" and "On My Mama" boosted the careers of 30-something singer-songwriter-performers who were overlooked similarly to Mya. Yet, what separates Mya from the new generation of women she influences is the difference between coming up in a time when teen stars reigned supreme and no longer being in your 20s immediately turned you into a relic. If Mya had the space to break out or begin again in her 30s, like Tinashe and Victoria, I wonder how fans would regard her now.
After Mya's set was the co-headlined Xscape and SWV set. Both groups came out to "Run The World" by Beyoncé. In fact, there were a lot of Beyoncé references in their set, from stage design to an interpolation of “Party” by Beyoncé with “You’re The One” by SWV. It was interesting to see these acts who essentially paved the way for Destiny’s Child, paying homage to B. There are Queens of R&B, and then there is THE Queen. The intro felt a little weird because they all came out of the stage and turned right back around. I suppose this was their way of not fighting over who gets to start the show.
The set was an oscillation between SWV and Xscape. I commend SWV for putting their egos aside for the betterment of the groups. If only LaTocha from Xscape could've done the same. In my assessment of LaTocha's character (which is solely based on reality TV, which I can acknowledge lacks context), she seems egotistical, manipulative, and dishonest. While I enjoyed Xscape's set, seeing LaTocha up there would have been amazing because her voice shaped the group's sound. However, seeing Tamika sang her sister LaTocha's parts may have been the karmic retribution LaTocha had coming if the allegations are true. As much as I enjoyed Xscape, breaking up SWV's set to perform some moderately memorable Xscape b-sides that were nowhere near the level of bops SWV delivered felt very much like a child yelling, "Look at me! I made classic R&B songs music too!". On the Queens of R&B reality show, there was a disagreement amongst the groups about whether the show should end with “Weak” or “Understanding.” I think most 90s R&B heads would say “Weak” is the one, but SWV conceded and let Xscape have their moment. I was satisfied to see they finally saw the light of day because SWV closed the show I went to with “Weak” followed by “Anything” and a surprise appearance from Method Man.
SWV really was the moment. Lelee always seems to have a permanent smile on her face, and I love her uptown attitude. Taj is fun and energetic and loves to cut up on the choreography. Coko's voice is still incredible, and hearing it live makes it easy to see why she sang lead on so many hits. Her voice has a youthful and soulful quality that makes uptempo hip-hop tracks exciting and R&B ballads alluring. They dug deep into their catalog and truthfully could've gone even deeper if they weren't sharing so much set time with Xscape, which makes me resent them a little. SWV is one of the only groups from their time with their original line, which makes them a rare gem, and they should be respected as such. Xscape acts as if they are a brand new girl group that is poppin' on social media because of their music. Never mind that most Xscape fans are probably also SWV fans and that a large portion of the fanbase of both groups may not even be on social media. The majority of the people in the audience were over 50. It was definitely an auntie night, which is my favorite kind of night because I, too, am an auntie. Seeing these three beautiful Black women in their 50s joyfully performing and maintaining a true sisterhood decades after they began was so beautiful to witness.
I left this concert thinking about the experience of living in an era 30+ years removed from the time these artists were beginning their careers. It doesn't even feel like we live in the same world as we were then. I reflected on how women can overcome so much when we work together. I thought of how the life cycle of most artists' careers is to start with a small dedicated audience, gain a broader mainstream audience, and then go back to your small dedicated audience who still sees you, roots for you, and feels connected to what you've put into the world. As someone in their mid-30s, I often feel like the sound of a ticking time bomb gets louder and louder each day. I have to proactively ward off the fear that I will be too old to be considered worthy of taking up space when I finally feel like I've made an impact as an artist. Watching all of these women who have gone through so many ups and downs continue showing up for their craft and do so with grace, passion, and mastery was deeply inspiring. It reminded me how important it is to appreciate the people who support me in this current stage where, to most people, I am a nobody, but they still see something in me that they resonate with or are interested enough to keep following me on this journey. The most valuable lesson I took away from this concert, though, is understanding the key difference between legacy and relevancy. Relevancy is fleeting and fickle. It can make you underestimate how quickly people can forget about you, especially in an age where our attention spans are truncated by technology. Legacy will sustain you when relevancy wanes, imprinting people in ways that cannot be measured with analytics. Creating work that has the power to transport someone to a space of catharsis and resonance in a time when both are so desperately needed is only possible when your spirit has imprinted someone else's. And there is no amount of follows, likes, or social media validation that will ever be more impactful than that.
Prayer Hotline
Now let us pray. (In our dearly loved and missed brother DMX’s voice.)
Dear Heavenly Father,
We are gathered here today…to say…thank YOU for another day!
As we join hands with each other and lift Your name in prayer, we ask for your love and protection to come over us during this time of need, Lord.
We are tired.
For long enough we have been your strongest soldiers and we don’t have much fight left in us anymore, Lord.
I prayed for you.
You prayed for me.
I love you.
I need you to survive.
I won’t harm you with words from my mouth.
I love you.
I pray that this week you survive.
I pray this week you are not mentally, emotionally, or physically affected by the news of the world.
I pray you find home within yourself this week.
I pray you love your Brown skin just a little bit more this week.
I pray you find beauty in the reflection you see in the mirror.
I pray you experience peace, inside and out.
I pray you experience unconditional love for the rest of your days.
I pray that you prioritize your joy.
I pray you discover something new about yourself that brings back your spark.
I pray you wake up to an unexpected deposit this week.
I pray you rest.
I pray for your peace of mind because I love you.
Reads you might have missed this week:
Black Reads: Issue 003
Reporting to you LIVE from BlackStack we have all the fresh, hottest, and recent reads curated in this beautiful collection of Black storytimes to take your mind away from THE NEWS flooding your timelines even here on Substack.
F.U.B.U. - Black Hair Stories pt. 1
Black hair is one of the most admirable things about Black culture.
This is the last week that the paid subscriptions will be offered with the 20% off lifetime discount. August the paid subscriptions for annual subs will increase but monthly and founding members will remain the same. Paid subs will have a guaranteed section in SSA each month, along with personalized content to achieve your Substack goals through the BlackStack community.
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I thank you all for these prayers and blessings. Just what my soul needs on this Sunday afternoon.
Beautiful service as always🙌🏽🙌🏽🙌🏽
@Ciara - 🥹💜🫶🏽