April showers bring May flowers. After the storm and the rain comes the sun and the growth of new life. But can you weather the storm and the rain? Can you maintain faith and keep hope alive during the hard times, during the rains of injustice and a seemingly impenetrable system of racism/white supremacy, designed to quell our progress as a nation, and in particular, people of color?

The historical reality is that we have been through many rainstorms and have still survived as a people. We’ve fought against the odds and have found a way to keep the faith, from generation to generation.

We’ve survived the middle passage, the Black Codes, and the industrial prison system. We’ve survived broken promises of 40 acres of land and inclusion in the Constitution, Jim Crow segregation, decades of lynchings, violent terrorists’ attacks on our homes, churches, and communities.

We’ve witnessed our children being killed in the streets by those who took an oath to serve and protect. We’ve been victimized by water hoses and police dogs, and teachers who planted seeds of doubt in our youthful minds that we could achieve our dreams. We’ve seen the murders of our people walk free and celebrate one less Black face in America, the beautiful when it wasn’t so beautiful for us.   

We have a very different American experience than our “white” counterparts and therefore cannot be expected to logically hold the same sentiments.

But the question remains: Can you stand the rain?

The Rev. Jessie Jackson, one of our great civil rights leaders, recently transitioned from this earth but left us a legacy and a resounding message of “Keep hope Alive.”

When it seems there is no reason to maintain, when all around us seems to be pointed against us, keep hope alive. When it seems that for every step forward, we are pushed two steps backwards, keep hope alive. When we face an uphill battle and feel too tired to keep on keeping on, keep hope alive. When we get sick and tired of being sick and tired, keep hope alive.

It has been our relentless hope and faith in an unchanging, all-powerful God that has provided our strength and been a light to our path in the midst of darkness.  

We’ve held the 23^rd Psalm close to our hearts: “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

And even though we are up against another dark storm just when it seemed the sunlight was about to break, we must not lose hope, but instead take a lesson from Peter’s walk on the water when he asked Jesus to bid him to come to Him.

As long as he kept his eyes on the Christ, he was able to do the miraculous. It was only when he took his eyes off the Savior and refocused them on the storm raging around him that he began to sink.

We cannot afford to take our eyes off the Christ, the God of the universe, manifest in physical form, manifest in the Holy Spirit that dwells within us who are believers.

When we join together with others of like mind to fight against those who mock God and ignore the commands of the Holy One to love our neighbors as ourselves and to show compassion to the least of these, we can stand tall in the spirit of speaking truth to power. We can indeed stand the rain, and the storm, and anything else the enemy throws our way, as no weapon formed against us will prosper.   

We must be able to identify the people of God, versus those who simply claim to be, while violating the principles of God. The Bible teaches us that many will come in His name, but we will be able to identify them by their fruit. You cannot love God whom you have not seen and hate your brother whom you have seen.

Yes, we are stronger together, but we must not be unequally yoked to those who pretend to be Christians, all the while doing all they can to otherize their neighbors, to justify and rationalize their ill-treatment.

There are those of other faiths and even non-believers with whom we may have more in common. While agreeing to disagree on our spiritual beliefs, we can unite in a battle that, at the end of the day, affects all of us.

As Rev. Jackson stated during one of his speeches as he ran for President of the United States, “We may have come here on different ships, but we’re all in the same boat now.”