Insecure, Rev. Dr. Marshall-Turman

0:03 Oh, come on, Alfred Street. You can do better than that. Give the Lord a hand praise. Come on. You can do better than that. Give God some praise. God woke you up this morning. God, are you on your way?

0:36 The old saints say, Yes. The elder saints say that, they say that my bed could have been my cooling bowl and my sheets my winding cloth. But we give God praise for another day of life. Another day to get it right. Another day to be in the service.

1:36 I give honor to God because God is the head of my life. God is the first and the last. God is the beginning and the end. The Greek New Testament tells us that God is the Alpha Chi Omega. God is the author and the finisher of my faith. To God be the glory, all glory, great things God has done. I give God praise for the under shepherd of this house, the Reverend Dr. Howard John Wesley. Amen. I'm so grateful for his invitation for me to be present with you, that I might worship in spirit and truth with this most distinguished and service-spirited congregation. It is a great privilege and a great honor to stand here at the Alfred Street Baptist Church.

2:39 I, of course, come from the Abyssinian Baptist Church in the city of New York. And as I told in earlier service, there are not many churches in this nation that can beat us out in terms of age. But Alfred Street does the job just fine. 1803, I believe, and Abyssinian is 1808. So this indeed is an old ship of Zion. And I'm glad to be in the service today with each of you. I give God praise for your pastor because just in my short time here, not even, hello, 24 hours in, well, I came into Washington, D.C. I think I'm in Virginia this morning, but I may have stayed over in Maryland. Hmm. So I don't really know where I am.

3:32 But in being here less than 24 hours in the DMV, I said, my Lord, does Pastor Wesley do this revival every weekend? My God, the brother needs a Sabbath. Rest is of the Lord. So we thank God for this season of Sabbath for your pastor. and we pray for him wherever he is right now, that he might be rejuvenated and refilled and revivified in the Lord as he comes back to offer his priestly and prophetic and pastoral service to this wonderful congregation and this great community. I give honor to the Reverend clergy who are present today and who have been so hospitable to me in my very short time here, to the Reverend Dr. Judy Frentress Williams, my Yale sister.

4:30 I have always said, I have said this rather already, but I will say it again because it is just that true that she has the most beautiful pastoral spirit. She is full of grace and humility and kindness. And I'm just so grateful. It's good to be in the presence of good folk. And that has certainly been my experience with her this morning, as well as with Minister Barbara and with Reverend Mark, who is my student, y'all. See, he prayed that prayer because he studied the word. No, I'm joking. I'm joking. I'm joking. But it's good to see, it's always good to see former students who have gone out into the church and the world just walking in the light of God and multiplying the blessings of others. on behalf of the Lord.

5:28 And so it's good to see you, Mark. You look good. You look like you're taking care of yourself. And I'm glad about that. To my dear sister, Reverend Marcia, whose name I pronounced wrongly in an earlier service. I don't know. I was talking fast, y'all. I hope you will charge it to my head and not my heart, but it's good to see you always. And y'all have so many ministers, so many folks serving the Lord. and everybody is just doing such a phenomenal job. God bless you, your service and your sacrifice, and I will continuously remember you in my prayers. To the officers of this house, I was told that there are no deaconesses. Praise the Lord, Alfred Street is ahead of just about every other Baptist church in the nation. But to the offices of the church, the deacons and the trustees, I will also remember you in my prayers, and I bless God for the work that you do for this congregation.

6:28 To this great singing aggregation behind me that has reminded us to be confident in the work of the Lord. I bless God for their ministry. In light of their singing, it would sing that the word has already gone forth, that we might not even need a sermon, but I'm going to try anyhow. To all of the members of this great house, and even to the friends of the body of Christ who are with us this morning, I greet you today, this afternoon, as I would any other in the name of the Creator and in the name of the Christ and in the name of the Holy Ghost. Good afternoon.

7:16 Our scripture is taken from the Old Testament, the Hebrew Bible. I will be reading from... The 139th Psalm, if it is your custom, please stand for the reading and hearing of the word. Our emphasis this morning will be on verses 7 through 14.

7:47 But I will begin reading at verse 1. Our emphasis is Psalm 139, 7 through 14. For those of you who will study the scriptures throughout the week. But I will begin reading Psalm 139, beginning at verse 1. Today I am reading from the King James Version of the text. Oh Lord, thou hast searched me and known me. Thou knowest my down sitting and mine uprising. Thou understandest my thought afar off. Thou compassest my path and my lying down and art acquainted with all my ways. For there is not a word in my tongue, but lo, O Lord, thou knowest it altogether.

8:45 Thou hast beset me behind and before and laid thine hand upon me. Such knowledge is too wonderful for me. It is high. I cannot attain unto it. Whither shall I go from thy spirit or whither shall I flee from thy presence If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there. If I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there shall thy hand lead me. and thy right hand shall guide me, shall hold me. If I say, surely the darkness shall cover me, even the night shall be light about me.

9:48 Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee, but the night shineth as the day. The darkness and the light are both alike to thee, for thou hast possessed my reign. Thou hast covered me in my mother's womb. I will praise thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are thy works, and that my soul knoweth right well. The word of the Lord is blessed. You may be seated. Shall we pray? Oh, to grace, how great a debtor, daily I'm constrained to be. Let your grace, Lord, like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to thee.

10:59 prone to wander. Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave the God I love. Here's my heart, Lord. Take and seal it. Seal it for thy courts above. Hide me now, O God, behind the cross that in this preaching moment the waiting congregation might not only see the woman of God, that they might see Jesus first and decide to follow him. This is your servant's prayer in Jesus' name. And the people of God said, amen. Amen.

11:41 I will praise thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are thy works. in consideration of your monthly theme Lord teach us how to pray and in light of In light of the sermonic meditation that has come forward this morning, that has gestured toward the idea that God's got me, I'd like to speak with you briefly today on the subject Insecure. Insecure. And it's a sermon, not an HBO series. In this moment, I cannot help but to be reminded of the great black feminist poet Nikki Giovanni, who, upon her poetic reflection on the unrelenting brilliance, the unparalleled beauty, and the incomparable perfection of blackness, penned her masterpiece Ego Trippin. Now the psalmist says it like this, I am fearfully and wonderfully made. But Nikki Giovanni in her ebony erudition says it like this, I was born in the Congo. I walked to the fertile crescent and I built the Sphinx. Giovanni says, my oldest daughter is Nefertiti and the tears from my birth pains created the Nile. The psalmist says it like this, I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

13:50 But Giovanni in her sable sagacity says it like this, my bowels deliver uranium and the filings from my fingernails are semi-precious jewels. The psalmist says, I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Marvelous are thy works. But Giovanni in her obsidian virtuosity says it like this. I blew my nose and gave oil to the Arab world. My hair thinned and gold was laid across three continents. I'm bad. Giovanni is ego tripping indeed and and and yet Giovanni's alluring prose and black feminist swagger even in concert with the words of the psalmist these are the most high God notwithstanding the truth is that most of us are just stumbling around plain old insecure Insecure.

14:53 And the fact of the matter is we have every reason to be. Black people, especially black women and their children, are counted among the poorest of the poor in the world. And although it is gospel that the poor will always be with us, I find myself wondering why black folks and black children especially are its disproportionate representatives. I wonder sometimes why little black girls, by the time they reach the first grade, are well acquainted with the politics of race, such that through the polyrhythms of youthful hand clapping, they already know that if you're white, you're all right. If you're yellow, you're just mellow. If you're brown, stick around. But if you're black, get back. Before they reach double digits, Black girls are acquainted with schoolyard pigmentocracy that teaches them to bury their magic and to hate themselves based on the color of their skin and the kink of their hair.

16:00 We sing, there is a balm in Gilead, but I find myself, sisters and brothers, wondering from time to time, why black people disproportionately die from treatable and or preventable diseases, heart disease and cancer, stroke and diabetes. We say absence from the body is presence with the Lord. The elders would sing it like this, there's a leak in this old building and my soul has got to move. Apostle Paul reminds us that when the earthly house of this tabernacle be dissolved, we've got a building, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. But I can't help wonder why, but wonder why black women and men are forced to prematurely and disproportionately bury their children. I'm talking this morning about Trayvon and Freddie, about Michael and Tamir, about Ayanna and Renisha, about Stefan and Jordan and both of Shem Jean.

17:13 We've heard of bright mansions above. But our brothers and fathers and uncles and sons and black women and girls, Hmong women, are disproportionately subject to rotting in earthly dungeons. bright mansions above, but we are subject to a rotting in the earthly dungeons of the plantation economics of the prison industrial complex that locks us up for driving while black, swimming while black, going to school while black, being at home while black, minding our own business in Starbucks while black. Black women now. Black women are disproportionately subject to all manner of violence. Physical violence, sexual violence, emotional violence, psychological violence, structural violence, and theological violence.

18:18 Theological violence that links the curse of Ham, Genesis 9 and 25, that links the curse of Ham and its illogical denigration of black flesh. Cursed, it says, be Canaan, a slave of slaves shall he be to his brethren. That links the curse of Ham with biblical misogyny and text of terror that subordinate women's flesh. perpetually maintaining that the head every woman is a man that women are to remain silent in the churches my bad God that women are created only for man that a woman shall have no authority over a man and that women shall bring forth their children in sorrow bully pulpit patriarchy and misogynoiristic proclamation ejaculates all over daytime television throughout the entire nation such that a black woman who demanded nothing less than R-E-S-P-E-C-T, God bless you Aretha, could not even die and be buried beyond the gaze of male superiority and white supremacy in black church face, and when the highest office in the church is riddled with abuse and deceit in the name of the father and the son, and when the highest office in the land is occupied by a poster boy for racism and sexism and misogyny and ableism and narcissism and greed and ruthlessness and self-centeredness and name-calling and punitive retaliated mechanisms and braggadocious self-supremacist motifs and outright lies. It can be hard to believe in your own worth, in your own value, when you have every reason in the

20:26 world to be insecure. Maybe. Maybe you don't know anything about sexism or disease, white supremacy or anti-black state sanctioned violence. I would recommend taking a walk outside. But you know... Maybe you don't know anything about those things, but you do know all too well what it feels like to be financially insecure or job insecure or housing insecure. It's all structural violence.

21:20 I heard a preacher say one time that our God is rich in houses and land. He holds the whole world in the palm of his hand. Yes, we believe that God has called us. God has justified us. God has sanctified us. But the rent and the mortgage is still past due. Holiness is yet right, but the light will still get cut off. You're serving two or three ministries, but you still have to rob Peter to pay Paul every month. And then Sally Mae had the nerve to change her name to Navient like we wouldn't know that she the same old monkey on our back. Maybe.

22:13 She got some nerve. Maybe. Maybe you went to the best schools. You went to Howard or Hamilton. You went to Spelman or Bennett. You went to Fisk or FAMU. You've got a great job. Your bank account is in order. your current on your tithes and your offerings. Your credit score is 800 plus, but your relationship is insecure.

23:03 He called you ugly. She called your mama out her name. They told you that no one else would ever want you. Some of us are emotionally and psychologically insecure. The grief and depression, the anxiety and the panic attacks, the bipolar and delusions, the eating disorders, the impulse control. That's the drinking and the compulsive gambling, the paranoia, the post-traumatic stress. It all threatens to overwhelm us even though we go to the doctor and we take our meds. For it is gospeled that the sick are in need of a physician. Amidst these types of personal and structural insecurities, it's hard to believe, sisters and brothers, that we are fearfully and wonderfully made.

24:02 And this is precisely where we find the psalmist today in the 139th division of the Psalter. This is a psalm of the Ketuvim. It is a psalm of deliverance.

24:23 And while we have been told for centuries that this is a psalm of David, recent biblical scholarship suggests that this psalm, along with others, could in fact have been written by a woman, which should not come as a surprise for us given the ways that we know women are so often looted, invisibilized, and written out of our best scripts. But the gift of the psalm is not so much that it may have been written by a woman. We know that women have been worshipers, that black women have been praisers, praisers, that black women have been religious community builders for millennia. We know that black women know how to worship, that we sing and we praise and we holy dance. We know about the Easter rock and the ring shout, but on the mother continent, before the so-called awakenings of this Western world, we would worship the Most High God, calling on the Orisha and the Egun while we danced the lamban and the macosa and the sabar.

25:39 The gift of this psalm is not that it was written by a woman who worships, but that this worshiping woman liberates all of us from the denial of our own insecurities. In other words, through her, we see that we don't have to pretend that it ain't what it is. the tenor of the psalm reveals that the psalmist herself is insecure she has been nurtured in the crucible of vulnerability she is so overwhelmed and distracted by her vulnerabilities that she cries out in a loud voice, oh, that you would kill the wicked, oh God, that the bloodthirsty would depart from me. The psalmist has been through so much. She is so incensed. She is so undone.

26:39 We can almost hear the psalmist murmuring through the words of Miss Sophia, I kill him. I kill him dead. except that she, the psalmist, the one who sings of the beauty of holiness, the certainty of deliverance, the song of ascent, this insecure psalmist, this insecure psalmist dares to ask God to do her dirty work for her. God, that you would kill the wicked. Talk about the real church, ladies, of the Hebrew Bible. And this is just how it is. Have you ever been so mad, so out of sorts, that you ask God to do your dirty work for you?

27:35 Lord, strike them down. Take them out. Cut them off. Imprecatory prayer. Sometimes it makes us feel better. It's cathartic. But our stuff, this is the point, can be so messy that our prayer becomes warped. In the middle of the psalm, we see what our insecurities have the capacity to do to us. They can turn us into haters. The psalm says, I hate them with perfect hatred. They can compel us to return evil for evil. I count them as my enemies. And before we start pointing fingers and profiling the insecure among us, she's so insecure, we ought to know that insecurity is no respecter of person.

28:34 I know you got fashions. You have it all together. You drive a Lex Coupe Beamer and a Benz. Someone's got a degree from Yale or Harvard or Union or Princeton hanging on the wall, I know so well that everything that glitters ain't gold.

28:55 I can hear the murmurings in the church now who she thinks she is. He always talking smack. He always trying to pimp the ministry. She always up in somebody's business. I know like the psalmist that we count others too often as our enemies and we hate others too often with perfect hatred, but we really don't know what they've been through or what they're going through or what they're carrying. But even here, the psalm is instructive because as quickly as the psalmist dissolves into her own insecurities, which are reasonable given the fact that this world ain't loyal, we find the psalmist resurrected by the transformation of her prayer. You see, sometimes we have to stop asking God to do our dirty work and clean the mess up for ourselves.

29:56 The Psalter is a book of prayers. And in the ancient world, these prayers were sung as hymns in worship. And I know something about this work of singing prayer via hymns because when the words of prayer elude me, when I have no words of my own, I'll pray a hymn every time. Sometimes I'll say, here I raise mine Ebenezer. Hither by thy help I'm come. And I hope by thy good pleasure safely to arrive at home. Sometimes I'll say, sweet hour of prayer, sweet hour of prayer. May I thy consolation share. Till from Mount Pisgah's lofty height I view my home and take my flight.

30:53 through it all the psalmist changes her prayer the text is telling us that even at our worst when all seems lost an antidote to our insecurities is wrapped up in the quality of our prayers but the fact of the matter is that although most of us love good preaching most of us don't know the first thing about praying Beyond what happens on Sunday morning, most of us don't know anything about talking with God. And sometimes it's what we did 25 years ago that prevents us from praying, that has us paralyzed in fear. God won't hear my prayer. God does not care about my prayer. God does not see me. God doesn't want to hear anything from me.

31:48 And here I am reminded of William's exegetical treatment of the African slave woman who, in the midst of her own drama, named God for herself, El-Ra'i, the God who sees. In the text, amidst the bloodthirsty insecurities of life that threaten to derail and distract her, we find the psalmist calling out to the same God. Lord, you have searched me and known me. You know when I sit down and rise up. You search out my path and my lying down. Before a whir is on my tongue, you know it completely. And notice the pattern that emerges in her desperate prayer. Lord, you have searched me. Lord, you know when I sit down. Lord, you discern my thoughts. You search out my path.

32:42 You are acquainted with all my ways. In other words, the text is telling us that the antidote to insecurity is not I amma fix my life. It's not super soul Sunday on own. It's not even yoga, sis. but it begins with prayer that reminds us that no matter what is going on in our lives, we are intimately connected to the life of God. No matter how disconnected you may feel, we are intimately connected to the life of God. John the evangelist says it like this, the word became flesh and dwelt among us full of grace and truth. Matthew the evangelist said it like this, she will give birth to a son and call him God with us. Paul says it like this, he made himself of no reputation and took on the form of a slave.

33:43 Prayer reminds us that we are intimately connected to a God who sees us, to a God who knows us, to a God who searches us, to a God who discerns us. Where, she says, can I go from your spirit? And where, she says, can I flee from your presence? If I ascend unto the heavens, you are there. And if I make my bed in hell, behold, you are there. Prayer reminds us that even at our worst in the pit of Sheol, God, is right there with us. It's like my grandmother who, amidst the insecurities of domestic violence and alcoholism and poverty and mental illness, would sit at the front of the church in the first seat of the pew. She'd rock back and forth and hum to herself, have a little talk with Jesus. Tell him all about our troubles. He'll hear our faintest cry and answer by and by.

34:53 Prayer reminds us, saints, that nothing, Paul said, neither death nor life, that nothing, neither angels nor principalities, that nothing, neither powers nor things to come, Nothing, neither heights nor depth or any other creature shall separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. Such that even in our insecurities in prayer, we are reminded that we are secure. In our insecurities, prayer reminds us that we are secure. Now, in the Theological Academy, we call this idea of being secure the doctrine of eternal security.

35:59 In the Baptist church, we call this the perseverance of the saints. The Sunday school teacher might explain it like this. He's got the whole world in his hands. That reminds us, prayer reminds us in our insecurity that we are in fact secure. He's got the whole world in his hands. But long before there was a Baptist church, long before there was an AME church or a Zion church or a CME church or a UCC church or a Disciples of Christ church or a non-denominational church or a church of God in Christ. In fact, before there was a church, the psalmist explained our security amidst the insecurities of life like this.

37:02 She said, if I take the wings of mourning or if I dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, that means no matter how high I go or how low I go, come on, Michelle Obama, the psalmist says, thy right hand shall hold me. And what do we know about the right hand of God? Oh, there is one seated there at the right hand of God. From which the Bible says he will come to judge the quick and the dead. What do we know about the right hand of God? Well, it is written that from now on, you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of God. What do we know about the right hand of God?

37:56 Luke the physician said, behold, I see heaven open and the Son of Man at the right hand of God. What do we know about the right hand of God? Paul said that Jesus, you may have heard him called the root of Jesse or the lion of Judah or the rose of Sharon. Paul said that Jesus, you may have heard him called the son of David or the sure foundation or the wisdom of God, the only begotten, the chief cornerstone, the lamb of God, the head of the body, the first fruits of them that slept, the captain of our salvation, the resurrection and the life, the lily of the valley, the bright and morning star, the Alpha Chi Omega, the beginning and the end.

38:53 What do we know about the right hand of God but that Jesus is seated there, interceding on our behalf? Let me say it like this and I'll be through. I grew up around boys. The only girl of three boys in a neighborhood full of boys. And I remember watching my brothers and their friends riding their bikes up and down the street. They would pop wheelies and stand on their handlebars. Those boys were bad. For real. And I remember thinking, hmm, I can do that. So I asked my mother for a bike, and she got me one.

39:54 But I couldn't ride it. It was a purple, like a lilac dirt bike. But I couldn't ride it because it didn't have any training wheels. And every time I'd try to make my way to ride with my brothers, I'd fall down on hard ground. And I fell down so much that I became afraid to ride the bike. But my mother said, all the money I spent on this bike, you're going to ride. Just like that. Just like that. She might have put her hand on the hip and leaned to the side. All the money I spent on this bike, you're going to ride. So one day, mother took me outside. And mother told me to get on the bike. And I protested because I was afraid that I would fall down on hard ground. But my mother said, I'm going to hold the back of your seat with my right hand.

40:52 Oh, you all are not with me today. My mother said, get on the bike. I'm going to hold the back of your seat with my right hand. And though you may feel a little unstable, although you may feel a little insecure, a mother said, I promise you, daughter, that you will not fall. And she held the back of my seat with her right hand. And before I knew it, I was riding with the boys. I wasn't only riding with the boys, but I was leading the pack. They couldn't keep up. So I stopped by to tell somebody who might not know anything about ego-tripping, somebody who's been stumbling around insecure for some time now. I stopped by to tell you about a God who, like a good black mother, is holding you in the security of his right hand.

42:00 I know you feel unstable. I know you feel insecure. But keep on praying. Keep on pedaling. Keep on pressing and ride this thing called life until the wheels fall off. But now, saints, now, saints, now, saints, unto the one who is able to keep you from falling, now unto the one who is able to keep you from falling, now unto the one who is able to keep us from falling, be all glory. and all honor and all dominion and all power through Jesus Christ our Lord.