Finding Nuggets of Gratitude When Life Happens and All Words Matters


“Yea!! It’s official!!! I will be the new Academic Counselor with Uplift Education at Summit International Preparatory!!!! God is so good!! This is a huge blessing!!! Leslee loves the kids!!!” Reminiscing as those words were the joyous caption on this picture 3 years ago.

Now 3 years later, this same gal will begin her second year in law school to arm herself with knowledge and wisdom to effectively advocate for scholars, students and humankind. 


This spectacular stair step showed up to be a sequenced stage of a savvy, sassy, sensational, selfless, shaker-up individual who savors no silence in springing forward to speak out in support of ALL students/scholars in seeking schooling that surpasses the slanted surmise of society

Whew! It took a little time and energy for this wordsmith to write, research, write, research, write, research and deliberately write and research some more for the accurate wording in the above paragraph. After dismissing the exclamatory thought, “Has Miss Rainey  lost her mind?!”

What did it take for you to read and comprehend that paragraph?

I would venture to say it stimulated heightened thought processes to actuate the reading slow-down rate to take your time to read, reread, read, reread and carefully read and reread again to understand. 

Why? 

The realization that if you read too fast without giving proper singled attention to each individual “s” word, the whole of the words could become confused, mispronounced, run together, misunderstood or attract missed understanding and thus respectfully frustrated declarations be made that, “Miss Rainey, this that you wrote makes no sense at all!” Argh!

The truth is that the beginning “s” in ALL the words matters…a deserving consideration of embrace to understand the whole. Yep! It did take a little extra time, which many of us including me are short on, for comprehension. Feels like mental gymnastics. To capture the depth of understanding in the essence of what was written, you had to ‘slow your roll’ to read. In so doing, you perhaps had to research to get understanding before proceeding with wisdom. This is in alignment with Proverbs 4:7 (NKJV), “Wisdom is the principal thing; Therefore get wisdom. And in all your getting, get understanding.” Now insert a P-A-U-S-E break… and take a moment to read that scripture passage in different translations and Bible versions… then B-R-E-A-T-H-E in deeply and out slowly… and M-E-D-I-T-A-T-E intentionally. 

Whoa! This has unsuspectedly turned the direction of my simple-intended memory-sharing post into a lesson, which should come as no surprise when called to be a teacher. So WORDSMITH + TEACHER = PASSION of the word-riddled Miss Rainey. 

Let it be known that the Leslee is my daughter of whom I am very proud. Her passion began at an extremely young age. It is continually fueled by past and current events of social injustice physical and/or word-inflicted abuse and assaults hurled at the underserved, the voiceless, the stifled voice, the silenced and quenched voice of victims and the victimized. The nugget of gratitude found here is this discovery of one willing to choregraph world-changing words when life happens. Composing a rhythmic pattern of words that matter is a powerful  demonstration of a courageous stand in advocacy to make a positive difference globally, in our nation of America as well as internationally…all underscored by love to silence the hate. 

Miss Rainey signing off for now and #givingyouhope until next blogpost. 

Release and Forgive…Forgive and Release


A few days ago my spirit was weighty with an unrelenting message that would not leave until I obediently share it. It is an exhortation to “Forgive and Release” “Release and Forgive” as entrance is made into the new year to receive the full extent of the blessings that 2014 holds. Even though the Lord showed me several decades ago that I must not walk in unforgiveness, the message I am about to write is for me too.

Ephesians Chaps 3-5 lays out how we are to walk (not run) as the new person in Christ..in love, in the light, in wisdom. Chap 3 tell instructs us to PUT OFF the former conduct, be renewed in the spirit of the mind, to PUT ON the new person which “was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness”. We are very familiar with Galatians 5 that speaks of the fruit of the Spirit. It goes on to say that we are to live and walk in the spirit…”not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another”, thus putting off fleshly passions and desires. ICorinthians 13:3-8 so clearly states that love is an action word. Yet we seem to get it backwards. Decisions are made according to the Flesh to put on the actions of rude behavior, envying, parades of conceit and pride to make self look good, thinks all kind of evil, rejoices at at injustices and unrighteousness. Instead it seems choices are made to put off patience, put off taking no account of the evil done, put off allowing love to suffer long, put off being easily provoked, put off believing the best, put off rejoicing when right and truth prevail… All because offenses, perceived suffered wrongs, betrayals, etc have seemingly occurred..with justification to stand our ground to make a point. When in fact what has occurred is ground has been given for the enemy to Steal, Kill and Destroy. Choose to be resolute to forgive and release.. release and forgive. Do it even if that means taking a moment to ask forgiveness and releasing and/or releasing in order that you may humble self and ask forgiveness. Now go forth and walk in the actions of love and the blessings of the overcoming kind of 2014! Miss Rainey Giving You Hope…