A Taste of Heaven While Living in Hell – How God Sustains His Children
by Sabrina Dawkins
It had been around three weeks since my garden last tasted rain water. In the 90-degree heat, I’d been trying to wait it out with measured amounts of the treated city water, but my crops don’t grow as well with it. I’d left my house to feed the crops every other day and had to endure colorful cars moving too slowly down the street as their speakers shouted obscenities at me, “nigga,” “hoe,” “bitch,” fired in rapid succession over a simplistic, trite bassline; porch-sitters who sat outside looking at the invisible air (I hope they were looking at the air) as if it were entertaining, their mouths occasionally opening as they casually talked with passerby and parroted the same filthy words screamed by their favorite rap “artists” through car stereos, with their kids playing well within earshot; neighbors returning from fast-food restaurants. But rain had been in the forecast, and I’d looked forward to it for days.
The first rain earlier in the day was just an appetizer. It rained for a little while in the evening while it was still hot. In fact, parts of the street had already completely dried only two hours after that sprinkle. So I went out to do a tad bit of watering during the night, unsure whether or not God would provide any more rain. After three weeks and temperatures in the 90s, I was happy for the rain I did receive. As usual, a lot of cars were neatly parked on the lot next to mine: gamblers coming for their weekly gambling session. I saw the silhouettes of questionable people going into the house across the street, heard the demonic rap lyrics oozing out of shiny cars that stopped in front of the house for a few minutes. It was pitch-black, but their party was just beginning. I heard adults arguing playfully and loudly as they walked out of the house about gambling money they were owed.
I thought about the joy I feel whenever I feed my crops and they produce food for me to eat. But I saw that their joy was in partying, gambling, smoking, drinking, cursing, and entertainment. Spiritually and mentally, they occupy a different reality, but we are currently here in the same place physically: hell. I went inside, feeling alone, like I was the only one around interested in working to achieve something positive and not looking for the evil shortcuts, such as gambling, getting high, and consuming entertainment. They’d clearly chosen their favorite gangster rapper, athlete, or entertainer, and a blind roll of the dice over actual work for a worthy cause.
Suddenly it was as if someone emptied a water tower on my roof. It was pouring in the middle of the night during high humidity, which guaranteed that the water would linger longer and soak deep down into the soil. And at that moment my worries faded away. Yes, I am in hell, where people willingly consume the poison that kills them, even with glee, and the demonic smoke from an active spiritual fire raging within their walking corpses enters my nostrils when I go outside to sustain life in my garden and harvest healthy food. But even in the midst of hell, I thought to myself, God sustains me with tastes of heaven: a much-needed rain shower to feed my crops with that good untreated water. And with that, he reminded me again that he is in control.
Today was cloudy and humid, the water still hiding in the ground—I could tell by the shine at the bottom of my reel mower as I mowed the by now dry grass above. As fall approaches, the temperature creeps down into the 80s; and as a result, I didn’t notice the heat at all as I mowed. It was a good workout. And at the end, as I was on the home stretch, as the sun went down, I saw a fully grown dark green cucumber reaching through my hex garden fence on a vine. It was almost like a green arm reaching out of my fence, hidden by the weeds below. But it reached high to hand me a healthy snack at the end of my hour-long workout. It was the perfect ending, a pleasant surprise, as the heavy rain following the light rain had been yesterday. The deep penetration of nutritious rain into soil and the reaching of a long, thin, green arm above the weeds below to hand me a healthy treat as I completed my work are like God’s hand reaching into this hell to sustain his children. And no matter what obstacles appear on earth’s surface in their lives, the soul and soil are deeply fed.
It becomes increasingly difficult to occupy spaces with those who have no respect at all. I’ve lived in areas with many different races of people and unfortunately the people that look like you can be the worse. I assumed that people would be grateful to have a peaceable neighbor, but unfortunately people don’t want good or peace. It’s like being a descent human being puts a target on your back. It’s like you alone are left to keep the peace which includes overlooking everything that they do. Most don’t care how they treat others or how their behaviors affect others. Two men that were full grown reverenced the Hispanic woman and turn down their filthy lyrics when she passed, but my passing was one that was not as important. I hate to say that the black community is a self hating wasteland. It’s truly sad to see us not look within ourselves and see that mostly we’re the problem. The black women in my family often complain about wanting good black men, but support their feminization. Black men in large have fashioned themselves as leaders and have lead the people to believe that somehow they alongside their vote matters in a system that has proven to them just how much they matter. The Father remains pressed under his people. Despite the affliction, curses, and laughingstock that we’ve become; the Father remains pressed under us. These are the days we need him the most, yet our need to continuously be like the other nations keep us far from our resting place. I often think that if most of us were accepted by these nations then we’d have our paradise. My spirit is in anguish in this place and I do hate it. It’s a nightmare that I wake up to daily, but there’s comfort in knowing that it won’t last always. Your work here is a taste of heaven while here in hell. Thank you as always, Tarayvia.
They think being accepted by other nations will be their paradise. But they will find that Jeremiah 4:30 is true: