Category: Humanitarian

Taboo Tuesdays: Do You Give To Panhandlers?

For years I have always given to street beggars because I felt blessed.  As a single mom I knew I needed to pay parts of my wages forward as a gift of gratitude.   I was thankful I had a job.  I was grateful I could scrape by and take care of me and my children without the aid of others.  Sure times were hard.  I could have used the money to do an activity with my kids.  However, the image of people standing in the frigged cold of Colorado begging always haunted me.  So, when I found extra (in reality there were no extras) I always shared with no strings attached.

But in this day and time panhandling has been kicked-up-a-notch!

I don’t give to panhandlers like the days of old but I do continue to give.  Normally my financial gifts are given to aid sick children or women fighting breast cancer.  But when I give to a panhandler I give to the person that has the most creative sign.  Because if I’m going to give a very small fraction of my hard-earned taxed dollars to a panhandler I need something in return!  Meaning, the person that gets my money, that it now non-taxed to him/her, they need to work for it in some-type of humane capacity.

And what took me down memory lane of giving to panhandlers is the video below of a man who is upset because he got scammed:

Inspirational Fridays: Liang Yaoyi and The Courage to Face Death

No Life Should be Lived in Vain

Liang YaoyiAs I ponder for meaning to the end of a young life I searched for meaning to my existence.  The world has lost a key-player.  His name is Liang Yaoyi.  He was only 11 years old when he died a heroic death of a man.  He lost his life fearlessly to brain cancer.  Which means he did not leave the earth as a beaten spectator.  He was in the game of life!  And he was indeed a key-player that world will miss because . . .

Had he lived he would have became a doctor with purpose.  He would have been a trail blazer to the world of medical science.  He would have set the world on fire with new medical ideas.  His ideas would have taken medicine to greater heights as his love for life became contagious.

His unselfish dying decree surrender him as a leader that understood he had came to the end of his journey.  And what is so amazing about his death is:  Liang Yaoyi passed the torch of life by donating his liver and kidneys as he bravely recognized he own life was ending.

And I do hope you realize I am writing about the bravery of an 11 year old boy.  Fate gave him choices that have spiritually flatten adults; but, he fought to the end of his life with a gallant spirit of a victorious man.  RIP Liang Yaoyi for your young life was not lived in vain.  [tears]

Prayers of Black Women: Amazing Grace by John Newton

John Newton

John Newton is the author of this spiritually enlightenment hymn.  At the age of eleven he became a seaman and later was imprisoned.  After escaping from those that held him captive he found work on a slave-trading ship.  It was then God began to work on his conscience about the cruelties of slavery.  And it was then when he wrote this beautiful hymn as a testament to his transformation from being a slave-ship captain to becoming a Christian.

Most often God takes our wrong to right the wrong of man’s inhumanity to man.  We’re His wonderful creation with the flaw of cruelty attached to our characters.  It is only by God’s amazing grace that saves us from always extending the hand of destruction to our brothers and sisters.

– Prayer –

I pray this day for God’s peace in your life.  I ask God to give you His grace.  For the Bible says, His grace is enough for you and His power is perfect in your weakness as His grace is new every morning.  Have a wonderful day!

Amazing Grace

Amazing grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.

‘Twas grace that taught my heart to fear,
And grace my fears relieved;
How precious did that grace appear
The hour I first believed!

Through many dangers, toils, and snares,
I have already come;
‘Tis grace has brought me safe thus far,
And grace will lead me home.

The Lord has promised good to me,
His word my hope secures;
He will my shield and portion be
As long as life endures.

When we’ve been there ten thousand years,
Bright shining as the sun,
We’ve no less dys to sing God’s praise
Than when we’d first begun.

The Prayers of Black Women: Please Bless Us With Common Sense

Artist: Henry Lee Battle
Artist: Henry Lee Battle

Lord, I have read and heard a lot this week.  Many of those stories made me feel like I was traveling through a portal of stupidity.  Often I found myself asking the following questions:  Lord, is my thinking off track?  Or are people now enjoying conflict?  And why are they enjoying being hoodwinked?  What is making them so gullible?  And why can’t they see they are being invalidated?

Lord, as I sat in bewilderment over the troubles of the world, I asked, yet, another question, “Where is common sense?”  Has it left the world?  Has it found a hiding place?  Is it sad because humankind no longer has a need for it?  Lord, where is common sense?  Because as I see things, who would enjoy heartaches, trials and tribulations?

Nothing I read or heard this week made any sense at all except for:  “Something that sounds correct could be incorrect.” 

— Prayer —

Lord, please bless the world with common sense.  For without it mankind will become void in all their ways.  So, again, please Lord bless the world with common sense.  Amen