Father Pfleger to Saint Sabina Academy Graduates: “You’re Lasers, not Losers, and you are beaming”

 

By Chinta Strausberg

 

Father Michael L. Pfleger’s message to the 42 eighth grade graduating Saint Sabina Academy was crystal clear: “You are lasers, not losers” and as lasers you never surrender but rather you stay focused and pregnant with possibilities.

Before giving each student a keychain laser as a reminder of who they are, Pfleger told the students they must have vision, expectation, focus tenacity/endurance and faith. Those are the essential ingredients to keep you from being a loser.

“Lasers are people who the light cuts through the night of life, cut through the stuff of life. Lasers over come odds. Lasers are greater than darkness. Losers are folks who surrender to the night. Losers are folk who become part of the night. Losers are those who are over come by the night,” Pfleger told the graduates.

“The Prophet Jeremiah declares that the God who made the world declared before we were even in the womb that He knew us. He knows me. Called me by name. Put me here with purpose and destiny and a divine plan, knew me before the foundations of the world before I was born, He picked me out and set me apart. He chose me, made me special, made me unique, had a plan for my life. I was set apart and I was called,” he said, “chosen and appointed to be prophets to the nation.”

Pfleger said they are not “just ordinary, by the chance, casual happen-to-be individuals, nobody.” He said they are chosen, called, set apart and are a “laser getting ready to beam.” If you know you’re a laser, then you ought to approach life differently than someone who thinks they are a loser.

“How you look, how you walk, how you talk, how you act, you send a message how you see yourself…. You ought to approach life differently. I don’t wait to see what life deals me; rather I take from life what is mine,” said Pfleger. “You want a blessing, you have to pull it down. You have to go after it. You got to recognize that is something for you and you have to go after it….. I am going to take what God has for me.

“I don’t just roll with life. I choose life. I take life. I make a decision for life. Every single day I’m self-determined. I come to get what God called me to be. I am a laser. I don’t respond to life. I take charge of life. You don’t wait to see what life is going to deal you today. You get up and tell life what it’s going to be today.

“You get what you go after. If you understand you are a laser…, you have to understand there are some foundations that I have to have if I am going to act like, be like a laser in the world today,” he said.

Pfleger said you must have vision. “It’s good to have sight as to where you are but sight is not enough. Sight can just show you what’s in front of you, but vision shows you what is waiting for you,” he told the students. “Vision is that spiritual revelation of where you are going. Sight tells you where you’re at.

“Sight is not enough because you need vision to know where you’re going because if I have vision to know where I’m going then there are some things I’m not going to do along the way because I know where I am on the way….”

“Some people will do stuff to you because they don’t really know who you are if they knew who you are they’d treat you like the precious gift you are,” he stated.

“Vision allows you to see beyond,” Pfleger said explaining Gandhi saw India free when they were still in bondage. Nelson Mandela , Pfleger said, spent 27-years in prison “because he had vision and saw himself walking out while he was still locked up. Dr. King had vision that is why he never lost hope even the night before he died he said, ‘I’ve been to the mountaintop. I’ve seen….

“Vision is what holds us and carries us when the sight ain’t pretty…. Vision sees you prosperous when you can’t pay the bills. Vision sees you going to college when you’re trying to come out of the eighth grade…. Vision sees you great when folk tells you that you’re nothing….”

Pfleger quoted Spike Lee who said, “Don’t look at how you are going to make money. That’s Western perversion. Do what you love doing and the money will follow it.” Pfleger said, “Do what you know what God called you to do, where your passion is, where your energy is….”

Pfleger told when he was suspended he was approached by people offering him six-figured jobs. He wondered if this is the way the Cardinal is blessing him. “Maybe God’s calling me into this thing…. Life will call and tempt you with stuff but you got to understand I want to do what I’m called to do and not what I want to do. That is when the faith element comes in because if I’m doing what God called me to do, God’s got my back.

“I can take a six-figured job and gets fired in six-weeks…. You can lose that job tomorrow, but if you’re doing what God called you to do, then God says I’ve got your back. I’ll take care of you. I’ll bless you according to my riches and glory….”

If you are going to be a laser, you need expectation.  “If you got the vision, you should have expectation….” He told of his late father who would wake up asking, “what’s God going to surprise me today.” “Expectation is what keeps you going when another person says give up….. Expectation is what reminds you that the best is yet to come….”

“You got to understand when you are a laser you are excited because you are a child of God, set apart, chosen, appointed by the nations that there is so much ahead of you that you get excited just thinking about the stuff God has in store for you,” he said.

Pfleger said the students must have focus and said the most dangerous thing is the devil distracting them from their goals. “Keep your eyes on the prize. The devil will always come beside you and say, ‘try this,’ always try to pull  you into something, distract you with something to get your eyes off the prize because the devil knows if you ever get to where God is calling you will be dangerous to the kingdom of hell and you’ll be mighty for the works of God.

“The devil knows he can’t beat you so he tries to distract you….” Pfleger said weed has cause people to go to prison, babies having babies, car accidents. “The devil says, he’ll come with you with the stuff I know you like and try to come distracting and make it look good. The devil knows how to dress up stuff and make it look good. Stay focused.”

And to the girls, he warned them about men hitting on them. “He does not love you. Don’t ever let a man hit you, ever, ever,” Pfleger stated. “You gotta go Color Purple on him…. If you are really understanding how wonderfully you are that you are too valuable….”

”If you are going to be a laser, you got to have faith.” Pfleger told them they cannot achieve divine destiny without faith.” “Do you want a plan or The Plan God has for you?”

“One of the most troubling thing for me as a pastor is to watch people with mansion destinies settling for studio plans,” said Pfleger. To the students, he asked them, “Would you rather have an iPod or an eight track? Would you rather have a computer or a typewriter? Don’t settle for less for your future….”

“What God has called you to, only God can bring you to,” said Pfleger. “If you want what God has for you, then you got to get with God to get it.” “The most powerful weapon that you’ll ever have is in you. The He in me is greater than the he in the world….”

Pfleger told the students to understand how wonderful they are. “In life, you are going to run across a whole lot of institutional racism, classism, sexism, going to tell you who you are, what you are and what you can’t do, but I speak in the name of a God who created you.”

Telling them to put their hand on their body, Pfleger told them, “I am a jewel. I am precious. There is so much talent, so much potential. I am pregnant with possibilities. I am pregnant with potential. I am pregnant with giftedness. I am awesome. Understand how precious you are, young people.

“You are not losers. You are lasers and the world is waiting for you to beam. I don’t want you to just beam for you and your destiny and your future and your potential. You need to be the kind of laser for the kind of kid out there selling drugs right now who doesn’t know he’s got a future.

“You got to be able to beam for the young girl who’s laying down with some grown man because she doesn’t value herself. You got to know how to beam for the man who is out of work and feels he’s nobody. You have to beam against the inequality and injustice that has foreclosures and locking people up because we’d rather lock them up than put them into schools and educate them and made them to the destiny they should have.

“We’ve got to beam for a world that is crooked and perverted and unjust. You got to beam for a world that needs hope again,” bellowed Pfleger. “Yes, young people, you’re not losers. You’re lasers, and I’ll wait for you to beam.

“The world outside is dark, but I got a crazy feeling like the light is ready to be switched on,” he said giving each of the student a keychain laser to remind them of who they are and what is waiting for you in the future –“vision, expectation, focus, tenacity, endurance, and faith. Get ready to beam….”

Father Pfleger’s sermon was based on Jeremiah 1:4-10 (New International Version)

The Call of Jeremiah

 4 The word of the LORD came to me, saying,

 5 “Before I formed you in the womb I knew^[a^] you, 
   before you were born I set you apart; 
   I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”

 6 “Alas, Sovereign LORD,” I said, “I do not know how to speak; I am too young.”

 7 But the LORD said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am too young.’ You must go to everyone I send you to and say whatever I command you. 8 Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you and will rescue you,” declares the LORD,

and the song, “I’m Beaming” by Lupe Fiasco whose lyrics were:

Today, nobody cares

But tomorrow they will, they will

Today, nobody cares

But, oh, tomorrow they will, they will 

They said my future was dark, you see me now?

Just look around, I’m beamin’

(We are lasers)

They used to talk when I wasn’t around

You see me now? I’m beamin’

(We’re not losers)

Chinta Strausberg is a Journalist of more than 33-years, a former political reporter and a current PCC Network talk show host.