Let’s go back, about forty years back, back into time. These are the days in which our grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles, and others were fighting for civil rights for blacks. They were fighting so that their children could one day live in a society in which the greatest opportunity to succeed would be attainable.These are the days of Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, the young Jesse Jackson, and many others including people like Rosa Parks. A group of people who came together as a family to fight against oppression, but most importantly to pray together and ask God for brighter days to come.
Now fast forward into the present. Instead of uniting together to better ourselves, we fight among ourselves. We stab each other in the back when another becomes successful rather than supporting that individual. “Am I my brother’s keeper?” We should be. If we have a sister or brother who is in dire straits, we should care and show love for that person, rather than take the attitude of glad it’s not me. How quickly we have forgotten where God has brought us from as individuals and a race.
Instead of being thankful for where God has brought us, most of us complain about being oppressed and about the situations we are in. Yes, it is true that we as a race still battle racism and oppression. But we can’t blame others for our status. Most of us will never understand why we as a black race can’t seem to grow out of poverty into prosperity. God tells us to “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding; In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths.” (Proverbs 3:5-6) Let’s stop dwelling in the past and start uniting and praying together for brighter days once more.
“But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the surpassing greatness of the power may be of God and not from ourselves; we are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not despairing; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.” (2 Corinthians 4:7-10)
“Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal.” (2 Corinthians 4:16-18)