A Champion’s anointing

 

At the beginning of every New Year, our professional and collegiate sports seek to crown new champions in their perspective sports. In the month of January, the NCAA College Football have their final four teams compete against one another. The winners from those two games leave the final two teams facing one another in the National Championship game. In the month of February, the National Football League concludes their playoffs to get down to the final two teams who then face one another in the Super Bowl. In the month of March, the NCAA College Men’s Basketball has their March Madness tournament. Over sixty-eight teams compete against one another to determine the final four teams who compete for the championship in the month of April. Each of these games has stadiums and arenas packed with fans cheering for their professional and college teams. The fans who cannot make the games packed their local sports bars and their living rooms with friends watching championship sports on their giant flat-screen televisions.

Men at Work

 

Over a year ago my company located in a new area which forced me to have to take public transportation to work. Every morning I would take the Long Island Railroad train from Wyandanch to Hicksville, New York which is about a fifteen-minute ride. When I get off my stop, my job is right across from the train station and it allows me to walk to my job. The train that I travel on from east to west is called the Ronkonkoma train line. If a train breakdown on that line or gets into an accident with a vehicle or pedestrian, the incident can cause major delays for hours until the problem is fixed.

My Journey of Faith

 

Over twenty-five years ago, I made the decision to leave my hometown in Detroit Michigan. When I considered leaving back then, I was faced with the decision to either move to the west or east coast of the country. During 1992 what a young black male mostly heard from the media, the streets and others was that the average black male would not live past the age of twenty-five. Some young men were involved with a life of drugs, a life of crime or could possibly be killed by black on black crime. My mindset was that if I am going to possibly die before age twenty-five, I wanted to find out what I was good at before it happens. I first considered moving to Los Angeles, California, but because of the clothes that I wore, I had concerns that my life would be at risk. The types of clothes that I wore were Oakland Raiders jerseys similar to the rap group NWA. It was important to me that I did not present the wrong image about who I was and find myself constantly harassed by the police. I listened to rap music and I had even made a rap record called Running in Fear. On the other hand, if I moved to the east coast of New York, there were the issues of racism, homelessness, and poverty in the Big Apple. However, after much prayer, I made my decision to begin my journey of faith by purchasing a one-way bus ticket to New York.