Making It Plain

Tony Orlando and Dawn was a singing group back in the 70's. Tony Orlando was singing well before then though. During that time, the hit, Tie a Yellow Ribbon was on the rise, and so was his weight. By the mid to late 70's, everyone noticed how he started to slim down. It looked effortless. He was on a talk show when the subject came up in an interview. Mr. Orlando explained that as a child and well into his adult years, he would always have a particular snack of a well known brand of chocolate cookie and milk. It seemed innocent enough when growing into his teen years and really wasn't noticing the weight gain until an adult. He didn't change much of his diet, he just stopped the seemingly innocent snack of milk and cookies. This is how the concept of trust has been used, something as simple as a childhood snack. When reading about relationships or studying about marriage and counseling couples, this concept is paramount in all aspects of the dynamic. Having the support...

  Attending a Christian College to obtain a graduate degree, I was eager to begin the new semester. There were assignments, as usual, but my favorite part of any class was the essays. The essay we were to compose had to do with the subject matter of trust and where we learned this valuable lesson using scripture to substantiate the point of view. I don’t recall the content of the paper but I do remember some of the comments the professor had in the margins. He thought that the essay I wrote was funny. Still, at the end, he disagreed with my point of view and wrote, “ you have to trust someone .”  His comment perplexed me for several reasons. One, it’s a Christian institution and I assumed those teaching are Christian as well. The other thing was that I used scripture to make my point valid and it didn’t matter to him. Finally, I wondered why I was allowing this man to teach me anything if he was going to oppose the basics of trust? The remainder of that semester became difficu...

Currently, my career has led me to a mental health facility where the job of Social Work is constant. The services provided are not only to the poor and homeless but also to those with higher levels of education and socio-economic status. It is an aspect of this field I had no interest to be a part of, but God. As I became more acclimated to the position, I have found a common thread in many of the mental health issues. For instance, if you’ve ever seen the television show, Hoarders, you realize that as the episode continues and delves into that particular hoarder, he/she has had some trauma in their life some sort of way and many of them have another common thread using thrift stores (estate, yard, or garage sales) as a means of escape. The facility where I am employed the common thread is the absolving trust within relationships. These relationships can be immediate family or long termed friendship or marriage. It takes therapy sessions before the patient can come to terms with trust...

Sometimes after church services, a group of us single women would find something to do. On that particular Sunday, we went open house browsing in affluent neighborhoods. The homes were so palatial. Far more spacious than what any of us were able to afford at the time, but God ( we said ). From one house to another we ooh and awed before noticing that it was getting dark. For us, that meant the blinds or curtains were going to close for privacy. These owners had no window dressing to use. It was the only thing we found odd, until leaving and saw how dark it was in the entire neighborhood...to the point that if it weren't for the owner leaving that light on in the house, we wouldn't have been able to see backing out of the driveway. There were no streetlights, no personal yard light, no porch lights - nothing. It was explained that the wiring was underground to minimize blackouts during storm season. Oh, we said in unison with a question mark. So they would prefer car accidents i...

  Jenifer Lewis, a well known actress for many years and co-starred in the popular (yet cancelled) sit-com, Black-ish , made an interesting statement that assisted with the misunderstood notion written in these next few sentences. Aside from the "colorful" language and mannerisms that makes her the actress she is, she said something like, "look at yourself in a mirror. Who do you see? Once you get passed the tears, you have to love who you are." The misunderstood notion: you should never be a lover of yourself. Now, the task Ms. Lewis mentions would seem pretty elemental (look at yourself in the mirror). The question she says is pretty obvious (who do you see?). The direction though had me scratching my head wondering, if this would be necessary in these days and times (you have to love who you are). Aren't we past this point and ready to get our teeth into the meat and potatoes of a relationship already? And the answer is sadly, no. Why? In talking about datin...

When I was in grade school, there was this guy. He didn't belong in our home room and he was driving his own teacher nuts, but he would come to my home room because he liked our teacher and the teacher liked him. His name was Danny. He was just hysterically funny. When class was about to start, our teacher seemed to hate to send Danny on his way, but he had to so work could get done. Danny liked to play and would have the entire class rolling in laughter. His home room teacher was very strict and didn't tolerate Danny's antics. In high school, there was a guy who liked to play around and joke too, only he waited when we had extracurricular activities like bowling or the school newspaper before he would start on his tirade of mischief. He was funny too and everyone around him seemed to always have a good time. There was this other guy from the church I used to attend, every now and again, he would come to visit my family and I. His name was Leon. My Mom would invite him ...

Do you remember when you first believed and the Holy Spirit came to visit? That all consuming peace and love made every situation seem menial. There is a measure of confidence that comes in with Him along with wisdom and answers to questions you thought you'd never get the answers to. That feeling of motivation to do what you are called to do. It's what keeps you quiet when you want to speak your mind and it's what makes you speak up when it's not the popular thing ( Acts 2:1-4 AMP ). I loved that feeling so much. I wanted it with me always; believing that going to church services would strengthen it causing me to always do the right thing. And then, seemingly all of a sudden I noticed it seeping away when justifying looking at television programs that weren't edifying ( Luke 21:34 AMP ). I noticed it seeping away when getting angry and saying the wrong thing ( Ephesians 4:29 AMP ). I noticed it seeping away thinking of matters from the past longer than I should h...