Читать книгу There Is No Comparison - E.L. Brown - Страница 2

Before I entered the Kingdom of God, I had no idea that up to that point in my life, everything I did was meaningless. All of my accomplishments meant nothing; all of the cars I had, all the fancy clothes I wore, all the expensive jewelry I wore, all the girls I dated, all the people I knew and all the respect I was given was worthless. My life had no purpose or meaning and it was filled with disappointments. I was just living the way I was taught and following the world’s way of doing things, like the majority of people I knew.

The World had me trapped in a system that taught me how to think and what to value. It was almost as if I was brainwashed to go along with everything everybody else said and did. My dreams had become their dreams: to go to the NBA, to sell drugs and to become a rapper. My hopes had become their hopes: to get rich fast, become famous and be a big player. My thoughts had become their thoughts: self-driven, cunning and wicked. I was in over my head and the World had me just where they wanted me, trapped.

I had been tricked, fooled, misled, cheated, lied to, abused, taken advantage of and stripped of my own identity. I had become the World and the World was me. We were all one big unhappy family, doomed for everlasting hell fire and Satan (the prince of this world) was our father. It’s one thing to know that your life is going in the wrong direction. However, it is a sad thing to know it and not be able to change and go in the right direction (Proverbs 3:5). Although I knew that my life was not right and that I wasn’t who I pretended to be, I wasn’t sure if I even wanted to change and go into the right direction. I just knew deep down inside that I was not the person I made known to everyone else.

Looking back, all I can say is what was I thinking or was I even thinking at all. Now it seems foolish for me to have followed people who were in a place in their life that they didn’t want to be: always complaining, bitter, lacking peace, broke, stubborn, jealous, full of pride, disobedient, lacking their own identity and driven by twisted desires. There was no way that I could see. I had to be blind. Not to mention, I was living in the so-called lime light which could have been blinding me!

In the World’s eyes, I was living the life! From my childhood on up, I never lacked much. I had the girls, the cars, the popularity, the game on and off the basketball court, the looks and the gear. I was cool! The girls loved me, the guys respected me and my old neighborhood was counting on me to be one of the first ones to make it out of the hood into a rich neighborhood. I really liked who I thought I was and the life I thought I was living.

As a kid, I played baseball, football and basketball, but basketball was my favorite; I loved to play some ball. If it snowed, I would shovel the snow up. If it rained, I would put on a rain coat and if it was hot, I would take my shirt off to play basketball. No matter how the weather was, I was determined to play basketball. I played basketball in elementary school, middle school and high school. I played basketball more than I did almost anything else growing up, which kept me out of a lot of trouble.

I never considered myself as a thug in my younger years. Although when I got older, I hung around some people who actually took people’s lives and were involved with some big time drug dealers at one point. Sometimes I drove in cars with AK’s in the trunk and pistols under the seat. But for the neighborhood I grew up in, this was nothing bad at all; it was normal for us. Drive-by shootings, selling drugs and people getting robbed was not out of the ordinary at all.

It was what I saw and what I heard growing up that made me the person I became. In the streets, at school and on TV, I saw the guy that everybody else looked up to, everybody admired, all the girls wanted and all the guys followed, and I wanted to be that guy. I was hearing that to be successful, you needed a lot of money, being a player was cool, to get high and drunk was what’s up and to do what you wanted to do was it. I began to believe in what I saw and what I heard and that made me the way I was. I did whatever was necessary for me to do to become that guy. I bought the best clothes I could afford, best shoes, the hottest chains, the coolest watches, the sweetest rides. I had the nicest cut from my barber, James, in order to get the attention, the popularity, the girls, the fame and that name. Therefore, I did stuff just to be seen, just to be doing it and to be known. In high school, I was making scenes and acting wild everywhere I went so that I would be recognized so that people would be talking about me. Even on the basketball court, I would show off and try to make people fall and score thirty points on people. I would embarrass people and talk junk all through the game to let them know that they didn’t have a chance at beating me or my team. So that when we got back home all my boys, D-Man, Tone, Rob & Larry would be telling everybody, “man Eric’s cold; did you see how he made Marlowe fall on his face today?” What I wanted to be was not who I was; it was somebody else; an image the World made up for young men to follow in order to influence young men to be something other than who they really are.

When I was growing up around thirteen years old, I remember talking to my uncle Butch as he was sitting on my grandmother’s porch. I was walking the basketball up and down the street dribbling between my legs. We were talking about girls and I remember him saying, “boy, you’re still wet behind your ears, you haven’t had none yet.” I replied, “man whatever,” wanting to be grown and pretending like I had already started having sex. But it was not much longer after that when I was around sixteen years old that I first had sex. The people I grew up around made sex seem like you had to have it or you would die. Now isn’t that something, because you can have sex and catch a disease and die for real.

The truth is that it is better to wait ‘til after you are married to have sex.

My mother was not home often because she worked long hours at an insurance company when I was growing up. So after school, I would normally go over to my grandmother’s house to play with my cousins and wait until my mother would get off work. Then I would go home which was one house down from my grandmother’s house. This is where my mother stayed with me and my little sister and brother, Carnita and Andre. Growing up was fun; however, I always desired to have a home where both of my parents were married and we all stayed together. My mother spoiled me so much that I was convinced growing up that there was nothing that I could not have. When I went to look for my first car, I was really upset because my mother would not buy me a brand new dodge Durango. I was in the 10^th grade and I was literally talking back to my moms, cursing out loud and just out of control because I was so used to getting my way. I didn’t know how to act when I didn’t get my way. I was a momma’s boy. My mother, Elsie, told me that she didn’t remember me ever crawling because she would always have me in her arms. The next thing she knew, I was “on the floor running, not walking but running.” I don’t recall any time that my mother hit me, but I know she had to when I was younger at least once, but I don’t remember it. However, I remember getting a whipping once by my grandmother, Emma, when my cousin Jamar convinced me to steal some G. I. Joe toys from the store with him. We both were caught, and when we made it home, my grandmother took out a belt and beat both of us. That was the first and last time I recall taking anything from a store growing up.

The one thing I wanted growing up and I did not have was a father figure that I could talk to. There were no older male figures in my life that I could look to and see or hear something other than what I had always seen and heard. There were no Apostle Coleman, Elder Sheards, Elder Brown, Elder Hughes or Elder Radolph (my Pastor and elders from my church) that I could turn to in order to see and hear something that wasn’t said in the World or to encourage me in my journey of life. The men in my life growing up were scarce. I do not recall any of them really taking me by the hand to show me that there is more to life than what I had been living. I needed that, a father figure in my life to show me that he cared about the decisions I made, to encourage me and to speak blessings into my life. A father figure would have caused me to be a better person and that would have pushed me to give my best in life in everything I did. I know my mother cared and my family cared, but I really needed a father figure with a loving and humble spirit to show me something other than what I had saw and heard, both by his example and by speaking good things about me. I remember playing basketball for Denby High School, and I wanted my Dad to come and see me play, but I don’t ever recall him coming to any of my games. It means the world for a young man to see his father sitting and watching him play ball in the stands. It means a lot to hear him cheering and saying, “number 15, that’s my son.” I never had that. I needed that and I believe every young man needs that. It is important for someone to show him that they are interested in his life and that he cares about the decisions that he makes, someone to encourage him and not put him down, someone to open up to them and love them for who they are. I never really talk much about my childhood because much of it, I don’t remember, and it is mainly because that part of my life was missing. That man to be there for me when I needed him, that man that I knew cared, and that man that encouraged me and I knew loved me for me.

Two weeks before high school graduation, my daddy died. We didn’t have the closest relationship, although he did come around on my birthdays and on Christmas to bring me gifts and to see my family. For some reason, I would act really good when he came around and I showed him a lot of respect, even more than my mother. I used to think that it was cool to talk back to my mom and to curse and swear in front of her, I don’t ever recall cursing at my mother but I had a bad habit of talking back to her and cursing in front of her. While I was at my father’s funeral, tears begin to flow vigorously down my face, not because of my feelings for him although he was my dad, but because in my mind, all I could think of was this question, Who Is Going To Be My Father Now? I desired something I never thought I really had and I felt that a father would be needed in my life for me to take the next step to become a man.

To think back, it’s amazing, my earthly father told everybody I was not his son and even took my mother to court when I was younger, but my heavenly Father took me to court when I got older. Dropped all the accusations I had brought up against Him growing up by neglecting His words and being a disobedient son. Then He waited patiently for me to ask the question, “who is going to be my father now?” He was the first one to stand in heaven and say, “Son, I will be your Father, for I have always been your Father even when you had not been a son.” That’s the picture I see when I think about how he saved me.

Now after graduating from high school, I went down south to play basketball for Alabama State University, but I never ended up playing. I was more interested at this point in chasing young pretty women. I spent three whole years down there before dropping out and didn’t accomplish anything except meeting some really good people who I try to keep in contact with even today.

I left Alabama State and came back home and hooked up with some of my cousin’s friends who were known as the Brick Boys in the nineties, some of Detroit’s biggest drug dealers. Three months after we connected, we went to Vegas on a business trip that involved some drug trafficking, money laundering and I couldn’t tell you what else. I was connected because somebody at all times needed to be with the two top dealers. They allowed me to be a part since I could be trusted, I was smart and I knew the streets. This was different from what I was used to; they really were connected and lived almost all of their life in the game.

Almost everything that I didn’t see in the World while I was growing up in the hood and in school, I saw with them. From unloading semi- trucks of weed and cocaine in warehouses to driving the most expensive cars and even living in a mansion for short period of time in Vegas, I did it.

We were living the so-called life, I was twenty-two and I felt like Scar Face, “The World is all mine!” I would come home from Vegas to Detroit and drive downtown in an all white 500 Benz with 20 inch Lorenzo rims on it with a twenty thousand dollar kit, with cream leather interior, and looking better than a scrumptious box of chocolate, with a fresh hair cut, red gold chain around my neck and with diamonds in my techno watch. There wasn’t too much anyone could tell me at this point. I was where I always wanted to be; ON TOP.

This all happened within an eight month period; all after I left from college at Alabama State in 2003. I get the impression that God wanted me to see the best this world had to offer me in order to be able to declare and proclaim that the life God has for you is far better, more abundant and it last much longer. I believe He wanted me to see that “There Is No Comparison between The World and His Kingdom.”

I get the impression that God wanted me to see the best this world had to offer me in order to be able to declare and proclaim that the life God has for you is far better, more abundant and it last much longer.

On one hand, I started feeling disappointed with life as I traveled back down south to Alabama. On the other hand, I was excited because I was on my way back down south to shut the whole city down by showing off the new creamy pearl Lexus 430, with 20 inch rims. I’m telling you, it looked like a spaceship and I knew all my boys were going to be stunned and the girls would go crazy when they saw me driving a Lexus.

Somehow, the eleven hour trip from Detroit to Alabama took longer than I expected. I felt something very valuable was missing in my life and without it my life was useless, but I couldn‘t figure out what it was. Can you imagine being in a place in this world where everybody else you know is trying to get and your soul begins to call out for something more. It even begins to scream out on the inside of you that there must be much more to life than this. That’s something else isn’t it; okay let me get back to the story. When I arrived in Alabama, they reacted just like I thought; they went berserk.

I thought they would be happy to see me, but they were happy to see the car, the chain and the watch. When I drove on campus, everybody stopped what they were doing; all the girls in the dorms stuck their heads out of their windows and all eyes were on me. I thought I would love the attention, but on the second day there, it was too much for me to handle. I saw the hatred, jealousy and envy in most of the young men’s eyes. I felt the intentions of the young women trying to find their way to survive. I was fed up with my life and the World.

I left Alabama State and as soon as I got home, I stopped by my cousin’s friend’s house. This was the guy who put me on and connected me with the rest of the crew. I then knew something was wrong; my mother had been calling my cousins a lot because she was really worried about me, seeing that I had not been home for months, and she was wondering where I was. Therefore, I ended up dropping the Lexus off at his apartment and going home for a while to my grandmother’s house.

Now at my grandmother’s house, my mother, my uncle, my brother and my sister all lived there with my grandmother. We all moved in together when I was in the eleventh grade on Bliss Street when my grandmother’s house on Longview caught on fire. Nobody was hurt by the fire although my grandmother was in the house her dog Polo jumped on her bed and woke her up and she made it out of the house with the dog safe. Thank God, I loved my grandmother.

On Bliss, my grandmother, mother, uncle, brother and sister all stayed upstairs and I stayed in the basement. When I came back home from Alabama, I stayed in my old room in the basement. One night, I was in my room and it had to be close to midnight; I picked up a Bible that my mother bought me some years back for Christmas. I begin to read the book of Proverbs. What happened next is the reason my life has never been the same.

God spoke to me. Yes GOD spoke to me. He said, you have been lied to; you have been tricked and everything the world has told you has been a lie. Then I went to sleep, and I woke up in the morning and confessed all of my sins and asked Jesus to come into my heart, and that is exactly what He did. I was completely changed. I told God everything that I did wrong that I could remember. I told Him about all my sins and even sins I planned on committing in the future. He forgave me, and from that day on, I was never the same.

In John 10:4 it reads, And when he (Jesus) brings out his own sheep (His children), he (Jesus) goes before them; and the sheep (His children) follow him, for they (His children) know his voice (Nkjv).

God speaks to His children.

Jesus was sharing with His people that those who He has called, who have received Him as their Lord and Savior, that they hear from Him and they know His voice. When a unbeliever gives his life to Jesus and becomes a believer, Jesus comes to live on the inside of the believer and the believer is able to hear Him speak to him, to feel His presence as he prays to Him and is able to sense and experience His love. Jesus said in Mathew 7:7 Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeeth findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened (Kjv). He was telling believers that as they continue to seek His face, they would eventually hear His voice, experience His presence, and His love.

The Key to hearing God’s voice is to receive Jesus as Lord and continue to pursue God. He wants every believer to know Him personally.

To get back to the story, I went upstairs the next day and my mother looked at me and she said something that I didn’t know exactly how to reply to. She asked me, “Who Are You?” She had seen the change that happen in me and saw that her prayers had finally been answered. I know now the answer to that question that my mother blurted out at me. I am a son of God. My Father sent Jesus to bring forth many sons, and now I am one of them.

Hebrews 2:10

For it became him (Jesus), for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings (Kjv).

From that day on, I never had sex again, I never went back to hanging with the big time drug dealers and I was finally free from the power of darkness and transformed into the Kingdom of God’s dear Son. What is so amazing is that at the time, I did not have a job; I was no longer in school; I didn’t know what to do next, but nothing mattered because the void that was in my heart had finally been filled with God’s love. I had Jesus and He became my Lord and the Holy Spirit my guide. There was nothing in the world that I would trade for knowing Him, talking to Him, Him talking to me, embracing His love, and bringing people to Him.

John 3:16

For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life (Kjv).