Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her hard service has been completed, that her sin has been paid for, that she has received from the LORD’s hand double for all her sins. Isaiah 40: 1-2

So I’m walking in the mall yesterday strolling along, when V Cape the Legend calls. Ironically, I had missed church that morning but V Cape was calling me to tell me about his experience at church. Now this doesn’t happen too often so he had me all ears because I feel it is a necessity that as men we continue to grow each other. So V Cape was excited about what he had heard in Church; he said the Pastor spoke about the 5 C’s or five types of people who are beneficial to our growth. They are the Challenger, Confronter, Counselor, Comforter and Celebrator. He began to tell me about the sermon and it sounded amazing. I told him I would weave in some way shape or form these 5 C’s into the pardon me this week. I felt good when I got off the phone with him because even though I had failed to go to worship earlier in the day we both gained something from his experience.

Well when I went looking for a scripture this morning I was led to Isaiah chapter 40 which is the chapter that speaks of the comfort for God’s people. So comfort is the theme of today. That person who comforts you in your time of need, or weakness. When I think of comfort, I think of it being synonymous with faith, the person who comforts us holds our trust. We believe in their words because they will not steer us wrong. As God was comforting his people in the above scripture he is letting them know that their struggling is over, there time has come and they will receive the Lord’s grace. Comfort is like the warm blanket that rests upon your shoulders as you look out the window into the storm that is ravaging your neighborhood. The blanket comforts you because it keeps you warm, that warmth lets you know that this storm will be over but until then here is your comfort. You shall not be cold, for you are being protected. We must be thankful for not only the comforting person that is in our lives but we must pay homage to our Almighty Creator who always comforts us. Peace and Grace be unto you!

Unless you call out, who will open the door.

For God did not appoint us to suffer wrath but to receive salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ. He died for us so that, whether we are awake or asleep, we may live together with him. Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing. 1 Thessalonians 5: 9-11

First I want to send a special happy bornday shout out to my brother from another Darian Mark Joel Roopnarine, may God bless your day brother and I thank him for keeping us meshed like two trains that collide and the metal melts into each other. (Pause) That was vivid, lol, but the month of June is the birth month to my closest brothers so I just want to acknowledge the iron that sharpens me, shout out to to Mo Freezy. Now that I am done with my intro (lol), I chose this particular scripture today because the last line spoke to me. It says we should encourage one another and build each other up. How real is that, I mean how genuine of a word to tell us that we need not be so worried about ourselves but look to encourage our brothers and sisters and build them up.

This morning while building with Darian we spoke about how there is a saying that the sun don’t shine forever but that is simply not true. The sun shines while we are asleep, while we are awake and it wasn’t until right now that I realize that our son is our Lord and Savior. When it seems that times are dark, the sun still exists, it is just preparing us. Preparing us for more battles that we have to fight, more greatness that we have yet to achieve. So I put the scripture together and it is clear that God has lit us with his light not only to light our dark paths but to light those around us. You might hear a good word, some words of wisdom and selfishly think that it does not apply to you. Does it not apply to your friend who is struggling, the man on the corner asking for change. Many have given their lives so that we can be where we are today, Jesus was crucified so that we could put forth good works in the name of God and our sins would be cleansed. Let us continue to build each other up, for without you there is no me. Peace and Grace be unto you!

People have it confused; if you and your man do a crime and you get caught and he doesn’t and you tell. THAT’S SNITCHING! You chose that lifestyle, you are only telling because you got caught. However if a little girl gets shot in the street and you say you’re not going to “snitch”, a. that’s not snitching, b. you’re a punk and you’ll end up dead soon enough. See because you chose not to snitch you bring death to your own front doorstep! 1

START SNITCHING

We see it glorified in old mob flicks, rap records hail it as the sin of all sins; the number one code of the streets; “don’t snitch”. LOYALTY, I understand the concept very well, but when does it border stupidity and become a cause in fact of the violence and destruction of our neighborhoods. The “Stop Snitching Campaign” was subliminally etched into our minds long before the celebrated t-shirts with stop signs and the word snitching embedded within. Well please forgive me, for I am about to break the ultimate code of honor, I’m about to become the rat of all rats, because my charge for us as a community is to… “START SNITCHING”.

There, I said it, START SNITCHING, start snitching if you want your children to live to see past their elementary school graduation. Start Snitching if you want to stop living in fear as you walk to the corner store. This is heavy, because as a people we have a strong distrust for law enforcement. I mean, why wouldn’t we, after seeing many of our leaders crippled by this system of American Justice. We vividly remember news clips of the Civil Rights Era, watching police officers brutally attack people of color with water hoses and K-9 dogs? Many of us can attest to the “random” car stops, the harassment and brutality that our people face on a daily basis from those who are supposed to protect and serve. Yet I still say START SNITCHING, far too many of our children are becoming victims in the crossfire of drug wars, domestic disputes and other various forms of crime that begat violence.

What do you tell a mother who just lost her 6-year-old child to gun violence and you know what happened? What do we put on your grave when you’re no longer here, “here lies a good man cause he wasn’t no snitch”. No, more like here lies a coward who was too afraid to take ownership of his community and protect the lives around him. Now you’re thinking, “I‘m not snitching because then they are going to come and get me”. I agree, and sadly once again law enforcement does an awful job at protecting those who come forward with the truth. There is power in numbers, if we take a stand as a people we can combat these atrocities. We can put pressure on the legislators to create better programs for those who come forward, put pressure on city hall to allocate sufficient funds to the police department for such programs. Once we become aware of our power we won’t have to live in fear, we will begin to think for the system and have our thoughts implemented, as they should be in the first place. We elect, key word “elect” public officials, they are in their positions to serve us. So if we don’t feel safe it is our duty to get that message across to those who we have elected to make us feel protected. We can employ “effective snitching” by going to city council meetings, arranging town hall meetings and charging elected officials with doing their job and implementing programs that will make our streets safer. Our taxes are what pay the salaries of these elected officials and law enforcement personnel, so essentially they work for us, its time that we remind these people who write their checks and demand that produce results!

I’m talking about taking a stand for the well-being of the children we are raising. We know exactly what goes on around the way from violence to drug dealing and we even know what times it is more probable that these crimes occur. Effective snitching means as a community going to these elected officials and providing them with this information, demanding that they not only look at the information but that they create a plan of action to address it. Jail time is supposed to serve as a deterrent for crimes committed, meaning if you do the crime you do the time. By not snitching and taking a blind eye to the crimes within our neighborhoods, we are sending our people the message that what they’re doing is right and will be tolerated. We’re saying there’s no reason to think before you act because no one is going to tell so you don’t have to worry about prison time. No wonder the murder rates are so high, we have sent a message that people can be killed and we will protect the killers by keeping silent. START SNITCHING, effective snitching, lets be a catalyst for the change that we wish to see in our communities. Let’s Make It Happen!

Cedric D. Shine

Today I was watching the video below of a young girl who is using youtube to rile people up to help her. The video is really sad and it reminds me of a piece I wrote about how the court systems treat women like prostitutes and are not helpful to rape victims. The piece is below as well!

Sadly this young woman is looking for justice after dealing with this terrible ordeal and when the courts hear her they may not give her the justice she deserves. It’s a sad system!

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfg3w11_A_E&hl=en]

Treat Her Like A Prostitute
Think of North Philadelphia, think of the abandoned row homes; already I can see the drug addicts standing around outside waiting for their daily fix. The cops aren’t paying much attention to this block; this is a typical block in the heart of North Philly where abandoned homes stand in desolate neighborhoods; a criminal’s safe haven. Inside this fateful house a young woman is being RAPED, she is being forced to have sex with four men at gunpoint. On this lonely block I can see this young woman fearing for her life. While in this house these men are beating her and taking her womanhood from her forcefully. Wait……. This story is biased, did I mention our victim is a prostitute! Does that matter? Or, because she is a prostitute is this merely an occupational hazard? Let’s take away our moral judgment and rely solely on the law, which is meant to protect the citizens of this country. Well according to Judge Teresa Carr Deni in Philadelphia, a woman who was raped in late September in North Philadelphia experienced such an occupational hazard. Things that make you go hmmmmmmmmmm…

So what type of message are we sending, I remember hearing NO MEANS NO! Rape victims are already not supported by the criminal justice system, which is why so many sexual assaults go unreported every year. Moreover, essentially what the courts are saying is that if you are a prostitute then you are not a credible citizen and your rights can be violated because you put yourself in that situation.

I am not here to defend prostitution as a viable means of income but I am concerned with how people are treated in this country. Now to give the whole story without any bias I will give you the information as provided to me by the local newspaper, The Philadelphia Daily News. As the story goes, the woman was working as a prostitute, she charged two men $200 to have sex with them. They refused to pay her, and here is where this story gets ugly. A gun then comes out and two more men rape the woman at gunpoint. The 5th man saw the woman crying and decided to help her get dressed so that she could leave the house without further harassment from the other individuals. Unfortunately, the judge said that she would not waste her time on such a case because there are real rape victims out there. Again I ask does No not mean No? I mean, I’m just curious, or are we letting our moral judgments affect who the law will protect and whom it will dismiss as this poor young woman was dismissed in Philadelphia?

It’s very interesting how we vilify the media, Hip-Hop, movies and all other proponents of misogyny when it comes to the mis-representation and treatment of women. However, here is our sacred criminal justice system picking and choosing who deserves to be protected under the law and who does not. I just wonder if this is a sign of things to come. A woman has one to many drinks, she’s forced to sleep with several men and the argument goes something like this; “well she’s normally a very promiscuous girl, she had on a short skirt, or the infamous, she wanted it”!

It’s our time to stand up and have our voices heard if only to protect our sisters, cousins and mothers and ourselves in the future. If we are outraged by the way women are treated in the media, we should be equally outraged at how women are being victimized by the criminal justice system. It is not ok for a man or a group of men to maliciously rape a woman no matter what her occupation is. If we continue to allow this type of behavior to persist than we will continue to get the same results that depict women as sexual objects who are not deserving of respect. We have allowed the media to say this for far too long, now it has spilled over into the law of our land. We can not allow our women and their presence to be belittled, lets fight to preserve their image and their constitutional right as human beings that deserve the right to be protected in this country. We can start by sending letters to our Congressmen and the Philadelphia Bar Association to let the powers that be know that we will not take this type of injustice sitting down. Let’s Make It Happen!

Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.
For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened. Matthew 7: 7-8

Some mornings when I wake up thoughts run through my head. Often these thoughts inspire the Pardon me messages. So yesterday I had a talk with a friend, then before I went to sleep I had a talk with God. When I awoke, I was still asking him the same questions; so it makes sense that today’s scripture would be about prayer. Someone told me once, that Christians pray “specifically”, no need to persuade God because he already knows. Just come right out and ask him. So the scripture tells us the same thing, ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find. So what do you when you are asking, seeking, knocking but you feel your knocks and prayers go unanswered.

Of course you continue to believe, you lean on the spiritual people in your life but I have this conversation with myself (yea I talk to myself, been doing it since I was a kid) everyday. So what do I do when my knocks go unanswered, I stop knocking for fear that I’ll continue to be disappointed. The Pastor of a church I go to would now say in his sermon “oh look how yall looking at me” LOL. I continue to pray for others in their time of need, I truly believe in the Lord and I have watched him bless people and myself in such a way it’s amazing. So when I say I stop knocking, I just stop asking for myself, maybe I don’t know what I really need, maybe he sees that things aren’t good for me and is protecting me from it. Only God knows! Prayer, something some of us only use in our time of need, I pray everyday, I ask for guidance. I stopped asking for strength because then God would do things to test my strength, I already felt weak, I wasn’t trying to lift no more. But I pray for guidance, and hopefully through that guidance, through me acknowledging my struggles with the Lord I will be blessed with the wisdom to travel through whatever I need to and find true happiness where he wants me to. Peace and Grace be unto you!

Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The earnest prayer of a righteous person has great power and wonderful results.

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START SNITCHING

We see it glorified in old mob flicks, rap records hail it as the sin of all sins; the number one code of the streets; “don’t snitch”. LOYALTY, I understand the concept very well, but when does it border stupidity and become a cause in fact of the violence and destruction of our neighborhoods. The “Stop Snitching Campaign” was subliminally etched into our minds long before the celebrated t-shirts with stop signs and the word snitching embedded within. Well please forgive me, for I am about to break the ultimate code of honor, I’m about to become the rat of all rats, because my charge for us as a community is to… “START SNITCHING”.

There, I said it, START SNITCHING, start snitching if you want your children to live to see past their elementary school graduation. Start Snitching if you want to stop living in fear as you walk to the corner store. This is heavy, because as a people we have a strong distrust for law enforcement. I mean, why wouldn’t we, after seeing many of our leaders crippled by this system of American Justice. We vividly remember news clips of the Civil Rights Era, watching police officers brutally attack people of color with water hoses and K-9 dogs? Many of us can attest to the “random” car stops, the harassment and brutality that our people face on a daily basis from those who are supposed to protect and serve. Yet I still say START SNITCHING, far too many of our children are becoming victims in the crossfire of drug wars, domestic disputes and other various forms of crime that begat violence.

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And the God of all grace, who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, after you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. To him be the power for ever and ever. Amen.  1 Peter 5: 10-11

After you have suffered a little while, will himself restore you and make you strong, firm and steadfast. I pray that this little while of suffering is not life and then I will be happy in the after life. I have heard scriptures be interpreted that way, I pray that is not the case. I think the Lord is saying I have given my all for you, I have been caused pain too by the sins of this world. Yet I have given my only son so that you can be strong, so that you may find a way to eternal happiness through the principles of love and peace that he taught. This temporary suffering is just that; temporary, and after you have suffered I will not only restore your original happiness, but I will make you strong, steadfast and firm.

We need opposition, we need tough times, we need them like we need those great moments in our life. We need tears, just like we need a beautiful smile. Common said “I guess knowing I’m weak is when I’m really being strong, some how through the dusk I could see the dawn”. It is at our moments when we feel our weakest, when we feel that the world is crashing down on us that we are exemplifying our beautiful strength that God has bestowed upon us. Why? Because we are still pushing, we are still hoping, despite whatever circumstances may be weighing us down we still have the ability to fight and push past these obstacles. Don’t be a slave to your vocabulary; suffering comes in many forms. It is not just physical pain or extreme heart break, no suffering is feeling inadequate about something, suffering is the mental anguish we deal with when things aren’t going the way we planned. But through faith in God and belief in oneself we can see the dawn. STILL WE RISE. Peace and Grace be unto you!

Many spiritual teachers - in Buddhism, in Islam - have talked about first-hand experience of the world as an important part of the path to wisdom, to enlightenment.

Hmmm, have you ever been in a situation and you are unsure of which way to turn? We all have, but it is during this time that we must seek help. Help from our Lord and Savior, help from our family and friends, just help in any form that help can come in. Well if we need help, why is it that we reject it? Many of us close up when times get hard and attempt to hold everything together on our own. While watching The Passion the other night there was a scene where the devil says no man can hold this burden alone. Never thought I would be quoting the devil but he was wrong because Jesus did hold that burden, in fact he carried the burden of all our sins so that we would not have to carry such a heavy load. How noble of a man to do such a thing, its like saying “here fam, give me all your bricks and I will carry them for you, all I ask is that now that you have a lighter load you act in a more noble way towards other people and you respect our Creator”.

That’s an amazing gift, a gift that has been bestowed upon all of us. So I look to this scripture and it says that we should not look to our own interests, rather the interests of others. You know what it feels like when you are struggling with something, so when you see your fellow human struggling do them a favor and take a brick or two. Don’t do it hoping that you will gain something worldly from it, if anything do it because it has and will continue to be done for you. So do not only ask for help, give help, give help wherever you can. A friend of mine will read this and say, “well Cedric, you don’t ask for help”. My reply is, I know and I am trying, we are all trying to become more perfect beings in our imperfect state. We are a community of brothers and sisters, united under many different shades, let us continue to Help one another for it has already been done for us. Peace and Grace be unto you.

An idea that is developed and put into action is more important than an idea that exists only as an idea.

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John 3:16

I went to bed with a lot on my mind Saturday night so of course I woke up with the a lot on my mind Sunday morning. I was consumed with mental anguish about different things and asking God where was he with respect to different situations in my life. However, with it being Sunday morning I was quickly reminded of the Resurrection of Jesus and I wondered who was I to have these thoughts. All of this reminded me of a story I heard Shirley Caesar tell on one of her albums. The story was of a Minister who had a son who was fighting in Vietnam. The Pastor and family would pray every night that the Lord would bring this young man home, unfortunately the young man was killed on the front line. This death shocked the Minister and caused him to stay away from the church because he was angry that the Lord had failed him. The Minister asked where was God when he was praying all those nights; a close Deacon friend said the Lord was right where he was when gave his only begotten son right there at Calvary.

The Pastor realized that life is a battlefield and by him leaving the spiritual battlefield of a pastor people in the church were spiritually dying. I use this story because despite the pains and troubles that we endure in our lives we must remain faithful to the Lord. A God who would give up his only son for the sins of the world; so that we could get to him through the ways of Jesus Christ. Principles of nobility, a kind heart, and doing unto others as you would like them to do unto you. So today’s scripture is a reminder to me that I serve a God who too has been pierced by the sinful ways of man when they killed his only son. But through his son, in believing in his son, in believing in the great powers of the Lord I can fight whatever internal or external battle I may have. That no weapon formed against me shall prosper because my soul is connected to the Creator. So despite troubled times, think to the troubles our own God has faced and find hope in that through our connection to him we can ACHIEVE whatever greatness we allow our beautiful minds to conjure up. Peace and Grace be unto you!

All that we are is the result of what we have thought. If a man speaks or acts with an evil thought, pain follows him. If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him, like a shadow that never leaves him.