IT TAKES LOVE

 One of my favorite movies of all time is a little movie called Lethal Weapon. If you don’t know, this movie was one of the original “buddy cop” movies. Roger Murtaugh was a family man, 50 years old, and a police officer for many years. He got told that he was going to get a partner by the name of Martin Riggs. Riggs was perceived as crazy. He was perceived as psychotic. He was suffering from mental health issues. He lost his wife which turned his world upside down. Meaning night after night he would hold a gun to his mouth ready to end it with tears in his eyes, but right before he pulled the trigger, he would uncock the gun and express how much he misses his now late wife. So holding all that emotion in while trying to be a police officer at the same time would probably make anybody a little off, right? I bring up this movie, because it was the love of Murtaugh and his family that lifted Riggs out of his mental condition. He didn’t talk to a therapist which he likely needed to, it was the love of his new partner and family. Maybe what’s keeping some people from losing their minds is love. The love of God. The love from family and friends. I believe the writer was right when they said, “What the world needs now is love sweet love.”

The church I attend now had 3 prior pastors, one of which was my Dad. Dad would sometimes get up for his sermon and just read from hymn 425 in the COGIC Hymnal.

“I was sinking deep in sin, far from the peaceful shore, Very deeply stained within, sinking to rise no more; but the Master of the sea heard my despairing cry, from the waters lifted me—Now safe am I. All my heart to Him I give, ever to Him I’ll cling, in his blessed presence live, ever His praises sing. Love so mighty and so true merits in my soul’s best songs; faithful, loving service too to Him belongs. Souls in danger, look above, Jesus completely saves, He will lift you by his love out of the angry waves. He’s the Master of the sea, billows his will obey; He your Savior wants to be—be saved today. Love lifted me, love lifted me, when nothing else could help, love lifted me; love lifted me, love lifted me, when nothing else could help, love lifted me.”

I will admit now that I realize that some may be reading this that do not believe in God. I’m not here to argue with anybody about the existence of God. That’s your prerogative. I will say that you must talk to somebody if you’re dealing with some type of anxiety or suicidal thoughts, God or not. Keeping that kind of stuff in is not healthy. Find an ear you can vent to that would use their mouth to spread your business or their fingers to spread your business on social media. To those that don’t believe in God, I will say you can vent to God and don’t have to worry about him spreading your business. I’m just saying.

As I write this, we as wrestling fans are worried about the well being of a wrestler that recently went on Instagram and contemplated suicide. Apparently, this wrestler had a gun and read out their last will and testament. In the last month this is the second wrestler I’ve seen make a video with the subject of ending it all. The spirit of suicide is not a game. I understand that wrestling is a work, but the people behind the characters we love or despise have real life issues. I understand the feeling of wanting to end it all. I never would have the guts to make a video about it. I have cried myself to sleep night after night due to mental anxiety. Why did I never do it? Because of the love of my family and church family. I’ve mentioned this before and it’s still holds true, I have to learn how to love Daniel. You must learn how to love you. Find something good about yourself and build on that.

Now if you know somebody that is dealing with said issues, don’t just say love you got to show love. Fred Hammond said, “When you say how are you doin'/ Do you really wanna know/ And are you concerned, yeah/ And if you had the solution/ But it took some of your time or some cash or whatever/ Are you willing.” The chorus goes like this.

“Not just what you say {It's mostly what you do}
Not a game that you play {To keep the winning hand with you}
Not just wasting time {With empty words that don't mean much}
Not just how you feel {When others need your tender touch}
So can you take out some time {To help somebody else in need}
And when this is done {The love of God is truly seen}
Then above all {We need to cover and forgive}
Then we can act like we know what love is”

With people hurting with a pain that doesn’t seem to be going away this is not the time to play with people emotions. The wrestlers I talked about before are just two examples of people dealing with mental health, and many other people that are dealing with the same issues but unlike some people, they have a platform. September is suicide prevention month. There’s a hotline you can call 1-800-273-TALK (8255). You can call on God. My inbox is open. There are people that are willing to listen and love on you. Not everybody Is out here preying on you, some are praying for you.

That’s all I have for this post. I thank you for reading it. I thank those who keep encouraging me to keep writing. I do ask that you please share this post around if you feel led. This is a subject matter that really hits home to me. I know I talk about mental health a lot lately because I see a lot of it on my timeline on the daily. Me myself, I’m still dealing with it. So, here we go. Me writing is my therapy. And if you talk to somebody, one time is not enough. There’s a reason why the Bible says, “…men ought to always pray and not faint.” The old song says, “Don’t stop praying! The Lord is nigh; Don’t stop praying! He’ll hear your cry; For the Lord has promised, and His Word is true; Don’t stop praying; He’ll answer you.”

Ok now I’m done.

Stay Saved,

Daniel Richerson

DO YOU REALLY LOVE? DON'T YOU REALLY CARE?

For Hana Kimura. 22 year old professional wrestler. Death by suicide. 22 years old. Adult life never really got started. I never watched her perform, but that doesn't matter. What hurts is that she was so young and thought that life wasn't worth it. What also hurts is that what about those that are not being reported that's happening right around your block or dare I say right in your church. What about them? What are we doing as a body of believers to show that we care? What are we doing as a body to show that there's hope? Why are we continuing to sing to each other that "My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus blood and righteousness" and not singing that to people that need to hear it? How long will we say that we need to get out the four walls of the church and...get out the four walls? Shouts out to the people and the ministries doing the work.

Mark 2:16-17 "And the scribes of the Pharisees, when they saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, said to his disciples, “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?” And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, “Those who are w'ell have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners."

Paul said in 1 Timothy 1:15-16 "This is a true saying, to be completely accepted and believed: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. I am the worst of them, but God was merciful to me in order that Christ Jesus might show his full patience in dealing with me, the worst of sinners, as an example for all those who would later believe in him and receive eternal life."

I once led a song by Dewayne Woods called God is that said, "God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever." Based off Psalm 73:26 that says, "My flesh and my heart faileth:  but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion forever."

If we're going to present that God is love and we don't show love, then what's the point? Salvation is an action. To live is an action. We got to learn how to love each other. I think one of the problems may be as to why we don't show the love of Jesus to the "world" is that we don't show it to each other. How can we tell people that they need Jesus and we can't even show the love of Jesus to each other? We don't even care about the mental health of people in the sanctuary.

I understand that you can't go to everyone to vent because some people just don't care. They'll say anything to end the conversation because they don't want to dig in to what the real issue may be. There's some people that really care. Some people need an ear not a mouth. That'll preach. Sometimes in prayer you need to be more of an ear and less of a mouth. Moving on.

How many more suicides do we need to see before we start to care? How many more leaders have to commit suicide before we pray for our leaders? The Clark Sisters put out a song "Pray for the USA." Are we? Am I? I know this is random. New Edition's first hit, "Candy Girl." There's a part of the song that repeats in my head. "Do you really love me? Don't you really care?"

Thanks for reading. Please, if you need an ear, there's someone willing to listen. There's someone that cares. I'm going to end it like this. "Souls in danger. Look above. For Jesus completely saves. He will lift you by His love out of the angry waves. He's the master of the sea. Billows His will obeys. He your savior wants to be, be saved today." I know I repeat myself in some of these posts, and that's not my goal. My goal is to spread hope through this hopeless time.

Stay Saved,

Daniel Richerson

LET GOD BE GOD

Let’s go head and get it out the way in the beginning. Follow me on Twitter @Big_Dusty. Get at me on Facebook.com/BigDusty. Alright?

I want to grow. I want to grow mentally as well as spiritually. To be honest with you though, lately I feel that I’ve been on hold. I’m not being stupid and putting the blame on God, but I feel like somehow or another I’ve put myself on hold. I see God moving in my family and amongst my friends, yet when the camera zooms in on me, it’s like I’m walking slowly backwards while everyone else is moving past me going 100 mph. If you look at my face, I’m smiling thinking I’m moving forward blind to the fact that everything around me is going on in the name of the Lord, and I’m going backwards and sinking at the same time. Song writer says, “I was sinking deep in sin far from the peaceful shore. Very deeply stained within sinking to rise no more. But the master of the sea heard my despairing cry, and from the waters he lifted me. Now safe am I.” That’s from one of my favorite hymns, Love Lifted Me. Search for it on youtube. My suggestion is a BeBe Winans and Donnie McClurkin version that was done like back in ’93. Anyway, let’s get to the part where it says, “…the master of the sea heard my despairing cry..” What is despairing? Looking it up in the dictionary, it simply means to be without hope or hopeless. So the writer here was at the point of no hope. He had nowhere to go, so he cried out to God. I would go on to say that he was crying out to anything or anybody that was willing to help. When you’re hopeless, you’re desperate for just about anything. If you’ve ever been desperate for anything, you know that you sometimes get to the point where you’ll take help from just about anything or anyone. Why? Because You’re past the point of what Kurt Carr said, “I almost let go.” You did let go, and once you do let go, you lose focus. Once you’re lose focus, you get to the point of desperation. That’s where the danger comes in.

“…the master of the sea heard my despairing cry, and from the waters he lifted me…” What that says to me is when you cry out to God, he will not only save you but he will lift you out of the sin you’re indulged in. That means it doesn’t matter what you’re struggling with, the master of the sea, God, can lift you out of sin no matter how deep. So that tells me also that there’s no sin too deep that God can’t lift you out of. Now here comes the question. Why do we put a limit on what God can do? I said, we because I will admit that I do it. I put a limit on God. All my life growing up I heard the old saints say, “There’s no limit to what God can do.” Yet, here and now, I’m struggling in a rut of habitual sin. Why? It’s not God’s fault. His hand is there to lift me up, but I’m not reaching up. We’re not reaching up. I remember the old saints used to sing, “God’s got a blessing for you. If you want it, reach up and grab it. God’s got a blessing for you.” Seems too simple, right? You’re telling me that all I have to do is reach up to God, and I will blessed? Psshhh, please, right? It can’t be that simple, can it? Why do we put limits on God? Why do we make elementary math hard like calculus? We’ve gotten so educated and technology savvy, that when something as simple as just reaching up to God for help, we can’t comprehend it. When a baby wants to be picked up, what does it do? It reaches up or out to you. Crying out to you until you pick it up. Interesting concept. Crying out to someone bigger than you that can pick you up and make your world seem better. Interesting…

“…the master of the sea heard my despairing cry, and from the waters he lifted me. Now safe am I.” Safety. Protection. Not only safety and protection from the sin, but protection from yourself, right? So here’s what I got to do better with. Here’s what we all got to do better with. We got to let God be God. Again, it seems too simple, but obviously what we’re doing now ain’t working. I know what I ‘m doing now ain’t working for me. I used to lead a song talking about God is…well I got to let him be….God. The video of me leading a song that says, “For the rest of my life, I’m going to praise You.” I listened to that last night, and I had goose bumps. We are not living what we’re singing about. Let’s keep it real. We got to do better. We got to let God  be God. Bottom line. Once we do that, the stress we put on ourselves will be lifted before we know it. I’ll end this with another old song that says, “Take your burdens to the Lord and leave it there.” Simple.

Stay Saved,

 Daniel Richerson aka Big Dusty