“NO!”
I almost choked on my sweet potatoes as the defeated person walked away from the table, head down, ashamed. She dared to ask one of my tablemates if she could, in a child-like way, pleeaasse have some of the hot sauce she saw in her pocket.
“NO!”
My heart broke, not because she was told “no,” but because she was told, “NO!,” In such a hateful, don’t-bother-me fashion. I said nothing, couldn’t, for the tears fighting to get out of my eyes and blocking my throat. My heart was way ahead of my head. I swallowed my tears along with the sweet potatoes and put the prison mask firmly back in place.
I was reminded today that not all “Heathen” are kin. It is a hard lesson.
I cry for all the “NO!’s,” I cry for my NO!
This is my voice. I suspect, although I am not certain, pain is from where I write. The building of a resume of voice that speaks to me as I shower alone, and allow the tears to fall, for a brief moment. I cry for what I should have said, could have said. I cry because I did not remind this hateful “No-er!” that she too had asked me for a cup of coffee and I gave her a whole bag of coffee, not just a cup. I cry because this gesture was literally wasted. Not the coffee, or the hot sauce. I cry because when I saw this same person, picking an already consumed cigarette from a butt can, I did not offer her any tobacco, my silent, “NO!”
I cry because of what the prison mask has taken away.
I cry for each and every time I hear defeat, loneliness, fear, and pain in my husband’s voice. I cry for every tear that falls down my daughter’s face when she leaves visitation, because she has asked, “Mommy come home with Rora and Daddy today?,” and I have to say, “Not yet Precious,” because what she hears is, “NO!” I cry for each pain-filled syllable my grandmother utters, asking, “Have you heard anything yet?,” and I have to reply with, “No, Granny, not yet.”
I cry for the sister who has to listen to John Legend’s and Lecrea’s “Drown,” so that she or I don’t drown. I cry for the concubine and virgin in Judges 19, who had to be wondering where God was. I cry because I was reminded this morning that a year ago, as I was reading Luke 22:31-32 NKJV, I asked God why He did not tell Satan “NO!” when he asked to sift Peter and even further back when Satan asked to sift Job.
I cry because if it were my child I would tell him, “NO!,” because DUH! That’s my child. I cry because others do not hear God saying, “NO!,” you can not have, sift or torture My child. I cry because of the discrimination I experience because of my eye color, or her skin color, and I wonder what the hell I’m doing here. Here in this class, on this earth, trying to put a voice to my voice.
In these moments, I really don’t care that I do not know what a subject, predicate, or a damn gerund is, as a gerund sound like a genre of music I may or may not listen to. What I want to know is how knowing the different parts of speech will help me stop, or at the very least, slow down these “NO’s!” that have fractured my soul, and continue to chip away at the pieces left behind.
I thought that my voice was a gentle, whispering, water-over-rocks, healing voice until I heard that “NO!” today, coupled with the heartbreak of a person I spoke with this morning about the abuse of the handicapped and elderly. The abuse coming from the hands of those who have taken an oath to do no harm. I cry because of the frustrated feeling of being powerless, of not being able to do a damn thing. I cry because this person I spoke with does not know that she has God living inside her.
My voice comes out through a pen in cutting, confident, and funny ways. I wonder what will happen when my pen and tongue marry. What will my voice do then? This search for voice, having been told from all directions that I HAVE a voice, and I need to know what it is and use it.
Can you diagram, “Can I pleeaassee have some of your hot sauce?”?
The subject is not the “I,” but the please, the plea. This is why I cry. The object was not the hot sauce, it was the unspoken need that came out in a spoken request. The modifiers were the rest. This is my voice, and I wonder if I “see” it the “right” way, will I have the wrong view? I cry because I am afraid so.
Does it matter? Does it even matter that I can buy this broken person a bottle of hot sauce? What if I couldn’t, would the fact that I am willing to soften that “NO!” she consumed, into a “YES!” matter?
This is why 1 write.
My writing was not born out of desire to be an author. My voice, that comes through my pen, was born out of necessity. I am trying to learn how to turn a lot of “NOs!,” into “YESs!” To be an instrument of change. Not THE instrument, because I know that I can not conduct and perform a symphony by myself.
I will learn how to diagram a sentence, learn the differences of all the different parts of speech, and I will buy this precious human being a bottle of damn hot sauce. I will have it delivered anonymously because in the end, what matters is that she was heard. I will also, at some point, buy this “NO-er!” a bottle of hot sauce to share, it won’t he delivered anonymously. I heard her as well. This is my voice, today. Tomorrow I will write a devotion, and wonder if you can hear me in your heart and feel me in your bones. The devotion will read:
Wise Men From The East-Wise Man From Africa Scripture Reading Matthew 2:1-12 NKJV “Now after Jesus was bom in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the East came to Jerusalem, saying, “Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? For we have seen His star in the East and have come to worship Him.” Matthew 2:1-2 NJKV
Why do we Christians sometimes think we know everything? Adding to that, we also behave as if we are the only ones with the answers. I know the Bible says to have an answer when asked the reason for our hope (1 Peter 3:15); however, I am quite confident that it does not mean that we can not learn from people who are different than we are, nor does it mean we are to act superior in our knowing the peace that transcends understanding.
God’s word says that, from the East, wise men came to Jerusalem, saying, “Where is He who is born King of the Jews?” How did they know? “For we have seen His star in the East and have come to worship.” That certainly does not sound like any Christian theology most “Conservative Christians” would accept today, but it’s in God’s word. Says it right there in black and white.
Who told these men that a baby had been born, much less a King? The stars? Although the stars are magnificent in their splendor, I have never heard the stars talk. Someone told them that a King was born and I will infer my own thoughts here, they felt the desire to worship, not an obligation, this King of a culture they did not know. Pagan, that is what they would be labeled.
Why do we think that God only speaks to a selected group of people? Arrogance perhaps? If that is too strong for you, ignorance? Are you going by what you have been told, or have you asked God Himself these questions?
The most revealing part of this scripture, to me, is what follows. Go ahead and read it, I’m not putting it here in quotation, because it will have more impact when you read what the King of Judea did to his own people. Their own leader. Their own spokesperson. Their own. HIS own.
God chose wise men from the East to worship, reveal, and warn the parents of Jesus to “go another way.”
Who are your “wise men” from the East? What is being learned? What does God say about how you are to treat people different than you?
This devotion is not to tell you what to do. My hope is for my words to prompt you to have a talk with yourself, and with God about how you do things now, and then ask Him where you need to do things differently. It is to plant a seed that God loves everyone. If He does not play favorites with who He gives instruction and directions to, who are we to question His authority?
Prayer: “Lord, thank You for your love. Forgive me for judging others who are different than me or those I know. Help me to see where I need to change, and enable me by my willingness to become more like You. In Jesus Name, Amen and Amen.”
This is part of my voice, and I cry, because someone has told someone different than they are, “NO!,” you can’t join here, you can’t be saved, healed, delivered, liberated, and loved because of this, that, or the other. So I write, today, tomorrow, and the next day, and I cry. I cry because when some read these words, all they will see is I spent money on a bottle of hot sauce for someone who did not “deserve” it. I write because I did not choose this sword, this sword chose me.
Angela Turner #00245633
Birmingham Community Work Center
1216 25th St N
Birmingham, AL 35234
