It's Offering Time!

So, I'm one of those people who absolutely loves church. There is something about being in the house of the Lord that just lifts my heart, and I always find something humorous when I go.

A couple of Sundays ago I went to Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem, which is on Lenox Ave and Adam Clayton Powell, if I recall. I heard it was sort of a tourist-y church. This may be true, as evidenced by the white people in the balcony in jeans, T-shirts and things. Only God can judge you, yes Tupac is right, but that's NOT how we go to church. "Come as you are" is a different argument and one that we can have later...but I'm talking about this day.

I'm not going to talk about the man in the front row in the white suit with pants so high you saw ALL of his mid-calf length dress socks. I won't even mention how my friend Tanda pointed at this one particular dark-skinned old lady with a big white hat (with the top cut out and her bun sticking out the top) and asked if she was Cicely Tyson. No mention of how I was expecting a rocking Baptist choir and this lady stood up singing a song out of a book like an operatic mezzo soprano.

I wanna talk about the offering. The fact that two plates came around just heightened my shame at the fact that i did not have any change to give. But then I realized why I did not have any change. The day before I was in a hurry to get to the MAC store and buy some lip gloss when this young-looking man stopped me on the street with some long-winded tale of how he had been walking all night and was hungry. He may have said something about having to leave his home or whatever, I was just so impatient (People who talk slow frustrate me) I cut him off and asked if he wanted directions or what he was trynna say. He said, "It's hard for me to express myself like this, I only stopped two people because I was scared to say this but I'm hungry and I just wanted to know if you could help me." So I reached in my pocket and my wallet and gave him all the singles I had. I felt bad passing the offering plate down empty, but I remembered what I gave to that man and realized I had already given my offering:

"And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me." -Matthew 25:40