Episode 10: Who Are The People In Your Neighborhood
Chopping Board
I am not imagining the weather I see.
Some people see clouds and know rain is coming.
Others smell the air.
And others can feel joint pains.
I can use the information I gather in the world to prepare for the weather to come.
The information I gather can inspire me to take action.
Fish Sandwich
Amos 8 NRSV
1 This is what the Lord God showed me—a basket of summer fruit. 2 [The Lord] said, “Amos, what do you see?” And I said, “A basket of summer fruit.” Then the Lord said to me,
“The end has come upon my people Israel;
I will never again pass them by.
3 The songs of the temple shall become wailings in that day,”
says the Lord God;
“the dead bodies shall be many,
cast out in every place. Be silent!”
4 Hear this, you that trample on the needy,
and bring to ruin the poor of the land,
5 saying, “When will the new moon be over
so that we may sell grain;
and the sabbath,
so that we may offer wheat for sale?
We will make the ephah small and the shekel great,
and practice deceit with false balances,
6 buying the poor for silver
and the needy for a pair of sandals,
and selling the sweepings of the wheat.”
7 The Lord has sworn by the pride of Jacob:
Surely I will never forget any of their deeds.
8 Shall not the land tremble on this account,
and everyone mourn who lives in it,
and all of it rise like the Nile,
and be tossed about and sink again, like the Nile of Egypt?
9 On that day, says the Lord God,
I will make the sun go down at noon,
and darken the earth in broad daylight.
10 I will turn your feasts into mourning,
and all your songs into lamentation;
I will bring sackcloth on all loins,
and baldness on every head;
I will make it like the mourning for an only son,
and the end of it like a bitter day.
11 The time is surely coming, says the Lord God,
when I will send a famine on the land;
not a famine of bread, or a thirst for water,
but of hearing the words of the Lord.
12 They shall wander from sea to sea,
and from north to east;
they shall run to and fro, seeking the word of the Lord,
but they shall not find it.
Who Are the People in Your Neighborhood?
I weep for the children in the future who will never know a world with Sesame Street on public television. Sesame Street was an educational program that premiered in 1969 (over 50 years ago) featured Black actors, wildly imaginative puppets and children of varying abilities. But there’s a more profound story behind its inception.
In 1968, a new group called the Black Psychiatrists of America formed to address the psychological trauma that Black people were facing. It was 1968, right after the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr., and the racists were telling on themselves, yet again. So this group came together to push the country to think through an anti-racist movement.
This was the question: What vehicle could we use to influence a generation of compassionate thinkers? Well, in 1968, almost everybody had a television. The group decided to use the same vehicle that had been traumatizing and spreading racist images to combat those images. Intentionally, this show featured multicultural actors and puppets who lived peaceably among one another.
And one of the most iconic songs of this show was “Who Are the People In your Neighborhood.”This was a recurring song in the show, performed several times. We met teachers, grocers, librarians, mail delivery workers. And each time, the neighbors introduced themselves as people who made the community better.
What I want us to think through today is that in addition to teachers, grocers, librarians, mail delivery workers… We have prophets among us. And sometimes the prophets are grocers, teachers, librarians, mail delivery workers.
What does a prophet sound like?
What makes a prophet has nothing to do with clever phrases. I know people use this phrase “blue-check” in a pejorative kind of way, and i want to be really precise here. Sometimes you accidentally stumble into being recognized by the powers, and it’s up to you to discern how you will manage and steward that responsibility. But i also want to say… Prophets don’t go SEARCHING for blue-check validation. I saw a comrade, and ironically i can't remember who, say something to the effect of “anonymity is an advantage.”
A prophet doesn’t just get rounds of applause or thousands of likes or invites to speak at big keynotes. In fact, most prophets live on the fringes of society and are not well-respected by the community while they’re alive. I don’t say that to glamorize that kind of life; I’m saying that because we have to acknowledge that there’s often a sanitizing process that happens when people die. Cuz once Dr. King died, for example, all these liberals (black AND white and OF EVERY STRIPE) swore they marched with him. Baby, stop lying. You know you said “you aint like how he was blocking the traffic.”
Amos was a prophet. He was a farmer and herder who was often angry at the inordinate amount of wealth, elitism, opulence, power-hoarding, inequality that surrounded him. He was tired of the same people who cause the problem spitting pennies back at the problem in charity. He was tired of the same people who hoard wealth pretending to care at Thanksgiving when they shared turkeys… with the same folks they displaced out of their own neighborhoods. He was tired of the military parades and the poor stewardship of tax dollars. Amos was tired. And throughout the book of Amos, the writer wags a finger at the people who are responsible for this.
I think it’s important, as we’ve been exploring the ways Christian Supremacy can endanger our Jewish comrades, that we remain steadfast in exactly WHAT the problem is here. You and I both know that in every society that is guided by the spirit of Empire and Colonization, there are people who exploit the poor. Amos talks about
“We will make the ephah small and the shekel great,
and practice deceit with false balances,
buying the poor for silver
and the needy for a pair of sandals,
and selling the sweepings of the wheat.”
And as a Christian, i think sometimes we hear these words and think that there’s something specifically and inherently wrong with an entire cohort of people. When in reality, what’s happening is a socio political phenomenon called EMPIRE. And Empire looks like, this:
The stock market is manipulated by some people on reddit, exposing the illusion of the science of stocks and investing. People being evicted from homes while the 1% go on trips and live life with virtually zero interruption. Communities near bus depots suffering from increased levels of cancer, asthma and other due to carcinogens in the atmosphere, and when people come to doctors for treatment, doctors say things like “well you should lose weight.”
It’s regular people being held accountable for things that actually aren’t their responsibility, while the powerful get zero consequences or deterrents for causing actual havoc.
Which, by the way, is not an endorsement of the prison system, I'll have you know. Consequence is not necessarily jail time. I don’t know why I, me, a black queer woman, why EYE would justify the apparatus of the state, knowing good and well it’s only made to fight ME.
Someone like Amos would be laughed at. Ignored. Perhaps every time Amos tried to go to the family BBQ, people would say, “here goes Amos on his soapbox.” And this is what happens for whistleblowers.
Because most people are excited to have their fun now, and they cannot stand people spoiling it. Amos was an outsider. And he had a big mouth. His prophecies weren’t exactly diplomatic, nor did they give room for “all sides to come to the table.” He had no interest in reaching across the aisle. It was not morally righteous for him to call for unity.Most of his prophecies poked holes into the very ancient traditions that were sacred to his audience, as my old testament professor David Carr would say. And while the people may have thought that they could get away from the consequences of their actions, Amos told them they weren't all that. Amos basically said, “I’m tired of this church, I’m tired of this government, I’m tired of this society, I’m tired of your mama and I’m tired of you!”
But prophets come in all sizes, shapes, ages, genders, sexualities, accents.
What do they look like in real life?
On a very practical level, there are prophets among us. You don’t believe me? Talk to the women who sit on the stoop. They might look like harmless little ladies, but I bet you they know who’s moving in, who got kicked out, and about how long we got before a Starbucks pops up on Marcy avenue. They can tell you when it’s going to rain and if you should have brought a jacket, too.
The time is surely coming...
“The time is surely coming, says the Lord God, when I will send a famine on the land; not a famine of bread, or a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord. They shall wander from sea to sea, and from north to east, they shall run to and fro, seeking the word of the Lord, but they shall not find it.”
The time is surely coming.
The time is surely coming.
And still, it took time for people to take him seriously. After all, it takes a while for a message to get from a shepherd to the town square. It takes a while for a message to get from us to the White House, no matter who actually sits in the hot seat. But while people in power live lavish oblivious to the rest of our struggles, there are prophets among us.
Another prophet, Ezekiel says “I sat where the people sat.” You can’t just poke your head in when you feel like it. You gotta live that thing. Tell that to some of these folks who want to teach our children for two years because they want to help… but they won’t humble themselves to ask no questions.
The time is surely coming.
I will send a famine, not of bread or a thirst for water, but of hearing the words of the Lord.
Have you ever been in a place where you have not and could not hear from God? Maybe you’re in a workplace transition, and you’re waiting for that sign. Or a romantic transition, and you really need to know if it’s time for your Megan thee Stallion inspired hot girl summer. Maybe you’re trying to figure out how to deal with a family milestone. And you’re waiting for that sign, you’re waiting for that reminder, you’re waiting for that James Earl Jones voice from the great beyond speaking life over you.
And you just can’t hear it. There’s nothing worse than finally coming to admit that you need help, but the help cannot be seen.
God, where are you? What say you?
“they shall run to and fro, seeking the word of the Lord, but they shall not find it.”
Maybe we can’t hear from God. Maybe we won’t get that booming voice. I sometimes, and perhaps this may get me in trouble with some of you… I sometimes do not know if God is still in this Universe. Like, I believe on some level that God created this world through multiple phenomena like the Big Bang and Evolution and other forces. But I also sometimes feel like God is not around. Like God moved to another galaxy. Like She gets her mail somewhere else. Like she dont live here no more. Out of range. Roaming. There are many times when I feel like God is absent, or at best, uninterested. I have a lot of reasons to feel this way.
But even when God feels absent, people are near. And that’s when, strangely, I feel God.
But here’s what God does. God places prophets around us who can help us plan for the future.They help us plan for future because they’re so plugged in and aware and sensitive to what’s happening now that it appears as though they’re clairvoyant. They’re not.
Last summer, Octavia Butler’s book “Parable of the Sower” finally made it to the bestseller list. She had been hoping for that her whole life. And people were so amazed at the way this book seemed to predict the hellscape of 2020. That book feels like a prophetic text.
I want to bring us back to something we talked about last week. I think sometimes we do a lot of sloganeering and it’s superficial. But when we say Believe Black women, what are we signaling? Which Black women? Why do we say Believe Black women?
I don’t want to put a cape on Octavia Butler, even though she is my favorite author. But instead, I want to highlight, she had a process that made it possible to plan for the future. Both she, and her character Lauren Olamina, could prepare for the future because they were tuned into the present.
The sexy thing to believe is that there are people who are sitting around crystal balls who are able to give us the lottery numbers. And I say that WITH DEEP respect for people who practice Hoodoo, Vodoun, Ifa, and other African diasporic religions. In fact, it’s because I have respect that I know they don’t just stumble into prophecy. Shout outs to my sis who reads for me.
It is my cousins who are not Christian, who are in tune with other manifestations of African Diasporic spiritualities, that helped me understand that prophecy is not about predicting things. It’s about reading things. Because the people be talking, honey. And they be loud.
Here is the misfortunate truth:
Prophets don’t get the red carpet rolled out for them. They depend on the rest of us to heed the warning. The prophets need the people. We have to commit to listening to the people who are most affected by the trouble that is “surely coming.” If we listen, we can collectively anticipate the trouble, meet it, and fix it.
The good news is this friends. Prophets can predict famine, but prophets can also predict when we win. Solutions can only be seen and drafted by those who are directly impacted.
Thus far, Amos has gotten a bad rap because he’s predicting famine and baldness and a season of mourning. He’s not exactly a fun guy. But Amos also predicts justice and joy. Amos says elsewhere “let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.” You know what would be scary? If Amos could only see the death and destruction.
Some of us, all we can do is see the negative. We’re so stuck in our diagnosing of the problem that we can’t get to solutions. We always got a conspiracy theory. Always got a story. Always wanna say how somebody got you messed up and how everyone else is at fault… But it is also the prophet’s job to see the solution. And many may disagree with that, but we need people who can help us chart a way out of the mess.
In his prophetic imagination, he sees justice rolling down like waters. The prophet does not just predict doom and gloom. The prophet predicts the wins. I believe that we will win.
Let justice roll down like waters.
Can’t you see it?
What do the prophets see? What do the people in YOUR neighborhood see?
What do the teachers see?
What do the grocers see?
What do the librarians see? What do the people in your neighborhood see? What do the elders see? What do the children see?
You might be anxious about tomorrow. It might be a personal anxiety or you’re worried about family. It might be a worry about your own health. It might be a worry about the future. It might be a worry about a list of societal issues that seem to be compounding and adding interest to each other. It’s okay to be anxious. You’re a human being. But guess what?
There are prophets among us. God gives us people who can help us plan for the danger. AND When you get anxious, or scared, or sad, you can tap into the things YOU know better than anybody else. God gives each one of us the gift of our own dreams.
Yall’s president is talking about not banning fracking.
Another group that has been politically placed is coal miners. Coal miners have incredibly dangerous jobs. When you get so far deep into a mine, you can get exposed to toxic gas. So miners found a way to protect themselves, even before complex technology and gas meters. Canaries. Canaries have delicate lungs. So if the canary fell ill or even died, the miners knew that it was time to get out of there quickly. You may think that the shout is that prophets are like canaries, whose death shows the rest of us how to run out of the mine. You might think that the assassinations of people like Dr. King and Marielle Franco and others is the warning.
But the shout is this-- what if we didn’t have to put people in vulnerable positions just so that the rest of us could learn in the first place?
What if there were no more dangerous coal mines and we found other ways to get energy?
The canary’s LIFE is worthwhile, not the death.
The prophet’s LIFE is Worthwhile, not the death.
God does not require any more human sacrifices just to help us to get it. God does not require any more blood just so that the rest of us can get it. We just have to listen.
What if we listened to the people in our neighborhood about what they need and want, instead of waiting for disaster to show it?
What if we really believed that justice would roll down like waters?
Who are the prophets in your neighborhood?
They’re the people that you meet, when you’re walking down the street, They’re the people that you meet each day.
To Go Bag:
Who are the people in your neighborhood? Take a minute to think about someone who is essential in your neighborhood. Research what that person may experience. How early does a grocery worker have to wake up in the morning? How long does it take for a teacher to become certified? How do mail delivery workers get trained? Take the time to develop a curiosity, and empathy, for the people you see every day.