GOD is in the Grassroots

Gullah/Geechee Nation ♦ July 26, 2020 ♦ 2 Comments

by Queen Quet, Chieftess of the Gullah/Geechee Nation (www.QueenQuet.com)

I went to sleep at approximately 3 am as I often do after working through the night. I just knew I would do what others call “sleep in” the next morning since my first activity would be in the afternoon. However, GOD quickened me and had me rise feeling fully rested at 6:30 am. I often emerge from what I call the “rejuvenation chamber” or “recharging station” within short periods of time like this when GOD has something major for me to do and a message that I must hear.

I laid still and proceeded to pray and meditate on what the message was this time. I kept seeing my field. I dreaded seeing it at the moment because since our tiller broke and the heatwave of 90-100 degree days hit, the grass has grown between the vegetable rows like a savannah in the Motherland. My mother can’t take seeing a snake, so she refuses to go in there, but I step right on in to reap the harvest late in the evenings just as the blazing sun is setting. She recently called me out of there when she felt it was already dark, but I could see what I was getting and was determined not to stop until I had it.

This morning, I was determined not to release GOD until I had the overstanding that I was seeking. There was a reason for 6:30 and there was a reason to head into the field at this time. So, I rose and got dressed and headed out the door at 7 am. I put my feet in my boots that I keep at the door and walked out with my water and grabbed the field hoe and kept walking. I gave thanks for what seemed like a slight breeze. I felt like it was GOD breathing life and energy into me.

I chopped and chopped and pulled and pulled this knot grass and crab grass that seemed to behave just like crabs from the creek when you try to get them-it was fighting back. The grass would tie up and be a large ball like mound as I would pull it from the alley over to a row that is all grass now. I will let the tractor plow that part. I simply needed to stop this grass from stunting the growth of my okra.

I glanced at one of my okra plants on the next row and was shocked to see that one of the beautiful flowers was wilted and dead. I had never seen that happen before. I shook my head with a bit of sadness and then in my spirit I heard “to everything there is a season.” I nodded my head in agreement and perked back up to keep chopping.

I bent down to pull some of the weeds from right next to the okra and saw what I always saw-how weeds try to always grow close to that which will actually nourish you. They hope that you don’t notice them as they take all the nutrients and vibrancy from that which you want to grow. I pulled the grass up by the root and GOD said to me “I am in the grassroots.”

I stood back and looked down the row at all that was now cleared and could see the richness and beauty of the soil. I recalled how earlier in the season my okra plants weren’t bearing yet and then they started bearing slowly, but when I pulled grass from around them they started bearing abundantly. I said to myself, “Yes. GOD is in the grassroots.”

As an organizer of grassroots activism, I have witnessed how a grassroots movement gets something going and how those that do not want to do the hard work, sit safely away from the issue, but once they think that this issue is now one of financial benefit or media attention, they position themselves to walk in for the harvest. GOD repeated to me, “I am in the grassroots.”

I kept chopping and pulling and felt my ancestors along side me and heard GOD say to me “What did they do?” I pictured them working by hand and carrying out backbreaking hard labor in the same field that I was working in. I saw them bringing in abundant harvest at the end of all their hard work.

I keep chopping and I kept pulling. I now saw how men developed machines so that they could rush things and not spend this much time and energy. However, I then pictured what these different devices do-cut off the tops, but not deal with the roots. GOD is in the grassroots.

It came to mind how a person that decides to sit idle or the one that decides to rush to try to think he or she is going to get things will be sadly disappointed at how short lived what they have schemed up is. Just then I saw another weed tucked neatly side by side with the okra and I reached over and pulled it up by the root. I started chopping around that plant and realized that there are families and communities that are filled with weeds, but amongst them, there is that one fruitful child that simply needs someone to come and get them from amongst the weeds so that they can grow. I saw the rose that came up through the concrete and I saw how that was the urban version of what happens. In both cases, this has to be rooted out if we want growth for our Black communities in the future.

I started chopping faster as the sweat drained down from all over my body because the sun was steady rising and I was steady working. I was determined to finish this row and I was determined to finish this lesson. I wasn’t up at 6:30 drylongso.

I couldn’t finish fast enough to get inside to do a quick study and to share this sermonette that was just spoken into my soul. I got in and only wiped off enough sweat from my brow to stop it from dropping in my eyes so that folks would see that sweat equity is a real thing in spite of the fact that more oft than not, that is the last type of investment that people want to do today. However. GOD is saying that we must put in work to dig down deep into the Spirit of GOD and become rooted so that we can choke out that which we don’t want and then we must uproot the evil that is attempting to rule the earth through man’s mechanisms of manipulation and designs wherein they keep their feet beneath the table and have others out laboring. They then come in to reap the harvest or to choke out or cut the heads off of those that are producing the positive and uplifting fruit.

As I pondered this revelation, The Spirit led me to a question:

1 Peter 1:25 25 but the word of the LORD endures forever .” And this is the word that was preached to you. Isaiah 40:6-8 6 A voice says, “Cry out.” And I said, ” What shall I cry?”

GOD answered me again and said, “I am in the grassroots.” So, I cried out, “GOD is in the grassroots!”

The question that I had was “What does grass mean in the Bible?” and with a quick search, I got the answer from Easton’s Bible Dictionary: “Grass. Grass [N] [T] Heb. hatsir, ripe grass fit for mowing ( 1 Kings 18:5 ; Job 40:15; Psalms 104:14 ). As the herbage rapidly fades under the scorching sun, it is used as an image of the brevity of human life (Isaiah 40:6 Isaiah 40:7 ; Psalms 90:5).”

I had a fleeting thought of all the people dying in this pandemic as I read this, but then again I heard from within my soul “to everything there is a season.” GOD started showing me the crowds of people of GOD gathering and standing close together as thick as the grass was. I saw how they were overcoming the negativity in the world in its myriad of forms that manifest as racism, injustice, inequity, disenfranchisement, and inequality. Rooted together, the people of GOD will choke out those that seek to produce these fruits of the flesh and the roots of GOD’s people will grow deeper and stronger together.

“6 A voice says, “Cry out.” And I said, ” What shall I cry?” “All people are like grass, and all their faithfulness is like the flowers of the field. 7 The grass withers and the flowers fall, because the breath of the LORD blows on them. Surely the people are grass. 8 The grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of our God endures forever .” Psalm 136:1 1 Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good. His love endures forever . Psalm 136:18 18 and killed mighty kings- His love endures forever . Psalm 118:1 1 Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever . Psalm 118:29 29 Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good; his love endures forever .”

Yes, the enduring love that is within the two ultimate commandments upon which hang all laws as stated in Matthew 22:37-40, “Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.“

My love of GOD and the love of my neighbors is what prompted me to get online with sweat dripping down to share the message that GOD had planted in the soil of my soul as I uprooted that which was not fruitful. I wanted everybody else to have a tool to help them not only clear out the things that are choking their progress, but to help them go to the depths where GOD is. GOD is in the grassroots! It is the season that we know this so that we have a positive abundantly fruitful outcome from all that is being uprooted in the world. I give thanks for GOD giving me the truth to cry out. GOD is in the grassroots!

Tune in to hear what Queen Quet, Chieftess of the Gullah/Geechee Nation (www.QueenQuet.com) shared with the Facebook family as she emerged from the field: