Testimonies

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I was tired—tired of race being such a factor in our lives. For as long as I could remember, I had looked around me and wondered why people of different races could not get along and yearned for the day that we would.

I was angry—angry because it seemed as though the more things changed, the more they stayed the same. In fact, race relations were getting worse instead of better. I wanted so much to make a positive difference, but felt so powerless to change anything.

Then, an answer came from what I know now was the voice of God. It said: “Peace, be still.” It told me that if I wanted to help bring about racial harmony in this world, I had to first be at peace within myself.

I felt convicted by a truth that had never occurred to me before—that racial harmony is an individual decision, not a group effort. One-by-one we not only make the difference, but we are the difference in this world based on the condition of our own hearts.

This was a great revelation for me that at first I didn’t understand, or maybe didn’t want to understand. I had always imagined myself to be a basically good person, and yet I knew that what God was telling me was true—I needed to examine my own heart first if I really wanted to make a positive difference.

While I knew this was true, I didn’t know how to begin. By this time, I wasn’t sure of what truth was in my heart. There were so many confused feelings. There were so many false beliefs that somehow, somewhere along the way I had allowed myself to buy into as my own beliefs. I discovered that I didn’t know myself. I didn’t trust myself. I didn’t love myself. I thought I did, but I didn’t.

With this realization, I went to work. I went to work on myself. I began to pray like I had never prayed before for direction, for clarity, for forgiveness. I began to read the Bible and every other positive written work I could find for comfort and answers.

I felt so ashamed of how confused I had allowed my life to become. What was worse, I felt that I had really let God down. And because I felt I had let God down, I couldn’t imagine—I couldn’t believe that he could actually love me.

So many things convicted me as being lost and confused, but most of all as being a hypocrite for saying I loved God, but acting to the contrary. I cried many times—sometimes in reaction to a thought, a song or an expression.

I continued to pray, and cry and read and meditate and cry and read and pray and cry. I was led to begin writing my thoughts and feelings about all this down as they occurred to me, because it was too much for me to carry around in my head and in my heart any longer. I wrote it all down as brief notes in a small pad I carried with me for two years.

In time, I came to believe what God had been telling me all along—I was just too blind to see and to deaf to hear. I came to believe that God loves me, whether I’m right or whether I’m wrong. With all of my imperfections, he loves me unconditionally and always. He loves us all.

It was only when I had come to believe—not just know intellectually—but to believe in my heart this truth, that I was finally able to embrace and to share the insight God had given me.

I realized the answers had come in the form of the expressions I had been writing in my little notepad. I initially thought they were just for me to see. I never intended for anyone else to ever read them, let alone to publish them in a book. But God helped me see that it was not only insight that would help me but that I should share with others—many others.

The result of all of this is now the book, Peace Be Still—Inner Healing for Racial Harmony. After six years, I self-published the book on December 15, 1998. Since it’s release, Peace Be Still has sold more than 3,500 copies.

Although the book is now finished and is increasingly reaching people, I know that my inner and outer work is not nearly finished. It’s really just beginning. The difference now is that I have a greater peace with God and a much more obedient heart. With that, just as God told me he would, he is helping me make a positive difference.

Cynthia Legette Davis is author of the book, "Peace Be Still: Inner Healing for Racial Harmony," and its companion workbook, "Peace and Racial Harmony Inside Out." Her next book, "I Know How You Feel," is due to be published in November 2003. Cynthia has had numerous articles published in national, regional and local publications and frequently writes about spiritual growth and personal peace. She can be reached at [email protected]

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