The Naked Truth: From Minister's Wife to Mainstream Activist.

The entry has been trapped somewhere---somewhere raw and open within the byways and the highways of my humanity wrapped in skin. The expedition like a movie trailer: quick, fast & furious.

How do you make long stories short?

Since my teen years, I had be involved in the Christian Church; whatever that means. From the worship team to youth group to leadership, I dipped my toes in it. Fast forward in time that is lightening speed---I marry a pastor's kid, a man deeply involved and committed to a life of ministry. He was and still is a renegade, a different breed of ministers cut from a completely different cloth---perhaps cascading along the lines of the protesting spirit of Jesus, and the radical and brilliant nature of the Apostle Paul. Who really even knows, as we are constantly evolving and changing our faith clothes.

I have lost track with regards to how many ministries, Churches, programs, launches, relaunches, and cease and desists I've partaken in. I married a pastor, so I followed into the unknown terrain of ministry building, leadership developing, & program-perfecting spiritual practices for the better part of my adult life.

Each season, sometimes with a new group of individuals was a collision of love, grace, pain, work, and surprises. It was a charcuterie board of experiences that are too lofty to mention.

Yet, it was there where my gifts, my assets, my contributions to this world were born. It was in the Church, like most gospel artists and musicians, where I got my chops.

Many often ask me after I speak, "Where did you get all that magic and style of communication from?" The answer sometimes is too complicated for me to answer, so I typically say I've been doing it for years--lots of practice and dedication to the craft.

Yet, on the record it was in the Church where I gained the ability to speak and communicate with charisma, power, anointing, and creative exploration. It was between the pews and before the altar that the activista heart within me was born. I engaged some groundbreaking mission work on a global level I’m hella proud of. Of which, I'm eternally grateful and tip my fedora hat to the stain glassed windows and rugged cross.

As of late, our faith collective has re-routed---paused. This is but another chapter in the book of my spiritual pilgrimage. It has initiated a new tension in my life's work, my faith-lens, and desire to congregate.

What's more, I feel more and more and more and more that I'm being pushed out into the "marketplace" of society to delve deeper into my life of education activism, equity, and advocacy work. Mirroring the heroine acts of Jesus who in my eyes remains the greatest social activist and revolutionary of His time, I now argue this is my ministry and spiritual act of service. Put more honest, I feel accepted more in these circles of collective struggle, la lucha, and civic action. It's like they see me, all of me, and draw me into community. This, I still crave.

Going deeper, as a former pastor's wife who led ministries and planted Churches, it's hard for me to reconcile the fact that this type of service was even sustainable. Caught in the webs of performance traps, comparisons, people-pleasing, superficial relationships based on how long one builds ministry with you, and a constant battle to reflect what the first century Church admonished us to organically do...it became a bag of minutia and an exhausting journey into nowhere. I digress. There were sacred moments, but where are they now? Like vapor mist or burning sparks from an open flame, first you see them and then they spring up and dissipate into the evening dusk.

I know I'm not alone, dear pilgrim. I know this mystery of how to engage a life of spirituality and service, I'm not the only one grappling with.

I’ve allowed this special angst to be my professor. I’m sitting in its lecture hall, I’m not cancelling class anymore—-are you?

Perhaps I am a shepherd of some sorts still. I know I'm still preaching the Gospel of truth, of justice, of defense of the underdog. I am she, you are them.

Obedience! I shall remain obedient to the role call of heaven. I know I got favor, drip, the goods. I'm responsible as my civic and social responsibility to continue on in my distribution of them like the few fish and loaves of bread from my basket(referring to the story in the Gospels where Jesus turns a few bread and fish from a boy's lunch into a buffet that fed 1,000's)---I better keep passing em out. I have a lot of passion and good energy so I have to put it somewhere. I have to keep pouring or I die.

All I know is I'm far from those wooden doors and metal clasps. I'm pretty distant from the chorus of worshipers as they ascend to the bridge from the chorus as the beat drops. There's a gap between me and the fellowship hall, and the annoucements they pass out. I'm just far. Yet, my heart is still close, my best practices to seek, knock, and find are still on point. I'm still led by the North Star shining over the City of David. I still rock the verses that tell me to love Justice, do Mercy, and walk Humbly. So should you. If this be you. I'm here with you.

In closing..here I sit in mainstream activism---conference halls, podcasts, ongoing nonprofit work with my beloved Project 214, national fellowships, and break out sessions my new podium on the altar of my ministry. Planes, trains, Ubers, hotel stays...my new version of Church, and guess what, I'm flipping here for it. I’d rather be boots on the ground, in the trenches, among the people, addressing suffering up close.

I ebb. I flow. I go. I distribute. I grow and I glow. I'll figure this out with the One who made me, and in whose Name I come. Until then, I go with what's in front of me and within me. I know, I just know I'm onto something---and I'm too far gone to return to the places and spaces I once dwelled. So follow me forward as I lean into the light...