Hannah did the unthinkable.  She was so despised, so humiliated, and felt so un-woman-like that she petitioned God constantly for a child.  While we celebrate Motherhood, Hannah is not your typical candidate as a celebrant of this significant honoring of mothers.
No matter how Elkanah tried to appease her, she was relentless in her request to God, not for motherhood, BUT for womanhood.  In Jewish society, to be barren was almost to not be a woman.  Reproduction was more important than recreation.  No one really cared too much for the activity of sexual intimacy.  What really mattered was the fruit, the outcome- pregnancy.  That proved womanhood more than anything else.
To be barren was to be considered as cursed.  Hannah wanted to proof, evidence that she was a woman.  That would come only through childbearing.   So she pursued Divine aid through bitter tears.   Eventually she bargained with God.  So to God she bantered- “If you would give me a son ( evidence of womanhood),  I would give it to You (sacrifice of motherhood).”
God heard her.  She conceived.  She was a woman- WHEW! ! !  FINALLY! ! !.  Now she will keep her word, her end of the bargain.  She waited until Samuel was weaned, then she shipped him of (motherhood rescinded) to the House of the Lord to be raised in and for the service of God.  Motherhood was sacrificed fore Womanhood.

Abraham, our Father of faith was not perfect either.  But on the incline, his faith was greater than his faults; on the pendulum of his life’s experiences, his faith outweighed his faults.  Despite his humanity, God’s divinity overshadowed his humanity.
Sometimes we feel that we have to be perfect in order for God to use us, or that He won’t use or  bless us
because we doubt Him, or have moral failures.  Abe teaches us that God’s  mercy, at times, transcends our faults, our doubts.”
Be encouraged to know that He who knows our end from the beginning, has nevertheless called us, commissioned us, and still challenges us to press on to achieve His purpose in our lives.  He knows you, knew you, yet He called you.

TWENTY FEET + “

In Gen. 7:20 The Word tells us that God allowed the flood to cover the mountains by at least 20 + feet. Now that was NOT necessary, or was it?
Whatever God does is not accidental, but intentional. You ever heard about mountain goats? I could imagine that there were some other animals that could have climbed the mountains for safety. Some animals, some obstacles have a propensity toward skillful deceptions and craftiness. But 20 + feet allowed complete, comprehensive assurance of the death of every living thing-man and beast.
Now I know about being on a boat and riding deep waters. But sometimes, especially if you are in the waters of South Beach, there could be a rock that juts out and there goes your engine,the hull of your boat and YOU !
God allowed 20 + feet spacial difference between the highest mountain peak and the hull of the boat- LORD HAVE MERCY… I already feel a preechin’ comin’ on up in here, up in here.
May God allow you plenty distance, the security of comfort, and additional peace above the highest peaks of your enemy. May God allow you the 20 + feet of clearance,the security of peace, and comfort above your highest and greatest obstacle. May God allow you to float on the security, the peace and comfort of His promises to you.
You see, some obstacles sneak up on you. Some natural disasters just up on you and blind side you. They just seem to come out of nowhere. Some of your human enemies are crafty and might navigate the highest peaks of your patience, your blessings to damage your hull, your base, your God destined- foundation. Heaven knows you need the security, the comfort and peace of extra clearance.
And you know what, Noah did not even know about the extra grace of the 20 + feet. May God give you the spiritual and metaphorical comfort of 20 + feet today, and always.
May you experience this God of abundance, high clearance.
No wonder something deep on the inside caused Noah to offer a sweet smelling aromatic sacrifice to God when he embarked on dry ground.
Give God the Glory RIGHT NOW for your 20 feet.

I am somewhat skeptical of those who pride themselves on being data driven in education, especially as it relates to student learning outcomes.  Students are not machines, primarily to be seen as the producers of data, nor are they to be primarily the objects, i.e., the victims of data.  Now don’t get me wrong, we do need data to help us in policy and decision making, but we must be ever cognizant of the one sided, lopsided quantifiable  “reality” and “educational injustice” that being data driven can present.

Data is really a half baked cake.  There are at least two components of data: quantitative and qualitative.  Many do injustice to data and participate inadvertently and ignorantly when they put prime emphasis on quantifiable outcomes.  One can measure how many times a student did not come to class (quantitative), but never the amount of times they did come as a result of a teacher’s influence (qualitative).  A child might not “move” score wise (quantitatively), but they walk out of class having learned from the teacher’s lesson to respect their peers, themselves, or even adults in their lives( qualitatively). One can never quantify how a personal connection from a beautiful lesson on human value from Lord  of the Flies, or The Scarlett Letter may discourage a student from suicide, or school shootings, ad naseum.

We live in a post modern society that is built on scores, and grades and a multiplicity of tests to ascertain data.  Education, meaning to “draw out”,  was never intended to “draw out scores, measurable, quantifiable, or empirical data“.  We live in a data-driven, statistics- crazed society that “uses” data to incriminate, discriminate, and then eliminate and exclude rather than incorporate and include. Thus we induced a subtle form of educational racism, educational classicism, substantiated by systems that feed primarily on quantifiable data. Let me employ the honest child with “low scores”.  You can take the dishonest one with “high scores”.  Education is not all about scores, and grades and quantifiable data.  High scores make us and our schools look good, but at what price to the child’s desire to love, appreciate and value learning for the pure simple, intrinsic pleasure of learning?

Education should seek the appropriate ratio between soul and skills.  Anything less and we can educate individuals to be expert at white collar crimes.   Man has never been so brilliant, so “educated”, so scientifically educated, technologically advanced and yet so concomitantly socially regressive.  Dr. King long ago commiserated on the existence of “guided missiles and misguided men”. We are scientifically proficient and progressive and yet ever socially and  morally regressive and perverse. We destroy Darwin’s theory of human evolution.  Is education really making us “better”?  Are we really evolving? or is education participating in the accidental, incidental inadvertent process of of “devolving”?  To be or not to be- that is the question.  To  evolve (evolution) or devolve (devolution), that is the inquiry!

Enough of the drivel about being data “driven”.