WSSN Stories

BJ, founder of The Garage Dance Studio

Do you like to dance? Do you like to move? This week BJ, founder of The Garage Dance Studio, is What It Do! Living in an urban community with many talented youth, I am so happy that a positive individual like BJ is giving back. What a breath of fresh air for our youth. Not everyone sings, raps, or plays an instrument; some simply dance! With that being said here’s more about the choreographer they call BJ.

As a young child growing up in the 1980s and 1990s, BJ sat in front of his parent’s TV set constantly mimicking dance moves from artists such as Michael Jackson. He eventually received a chance to perform in front of crowds of people. From family parties, to dance competitions, and dance studios, the talented dancer impressed the public with his street choreography. Watching artists and dancers perform moves motivated him to dance and get better. By his teenage years, BJ realized that dancing could be something to pursue, so he kept going.

BJ was introduced to the dance world when he began touring doing background dancing for upcoming artists and other dance crews in need of extras. His first tour was back in 2000 and from there he has been addicted to the popularity.

He continued to push fourth and was added to a popular tour called “Scream tour” with artists that included as Bow Wow, B2K, and other big names. BJ soon began to make a name for myself in the Dance community when he was a part of the Dance show called “Dance 360,” which aired on UPN where he was called out to battle amongst five other people and won.

With his journey and experience in dance, BJ believes that if he ever had the opportunity to open his very own dance studio he would in a heartbeat and that is exactly what happened. This dude turned his mother’s garage into a mini dance studio and name it “The Garage Dance Studio.”

“Knowing that there is no source of entertainment or dance here in the Lost City a.k. Colton, California motivated me to open the dance studio,” BJ states.“For me being a dance lover, I wanted to open the facility to give youth the opportunity to come and learn dance. A lot of these kids don’t have the means to go to LA. I figured why not give it a shot and open something for them. With over seventeen years of professional experience under my belt, I provide lots of variety to students. My dance instruction involves a mixture of hip-hop, pop, and old-school dance styles.”

“All in all, I feel like I have lived up to my childhood dream by becoming a hardworking, successful dancer and I will continue to push fourth until I reach the top. There are lots of things that I have to still accomplish until I past that bridge. I will continue to bless others with my gift of dance.”

 Make sure you support this young man and his efforts. Remember to make the world your DANCE FLOOR. L’z!

Lou Coleman

By Lou Coleman

You better check yourself before you wreck yourself!  Take God’s grace for granted if you want too! SUDDEN DESTRUCTION will come upon you so fast that it will have your head spinning.  God will not allow you to become complacent or neglectful concerning Him. He will not allow you to take Him for granted. Beware of taking God’s grace for granted! He does not take it lightly.  When God learnt of what Israel had done to His servants; when He learnt of how Israel had over and over again, betrayed His love and taken His grace for granted, God became furious. His patience had been tested by His very own people – Israel. And so God’s wrath came upon Israel. God used the Roman armies to destroy Israel and its Temple. “What shall you say then? Shall you continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid….”— [Rom. 6:1-2; 15-16]

Listen, God is NOT SLACK! We MUST understand that! And He says that He does not want ANY of us to perish, but that we should ALL come to REPENTANCE! And that is what this message is all about. Today, I plead with you, in love for your soul, not to be foolish, but to be wise, to consider your “latter end,” and to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ as your own personal Savior.  I want you to know that God is stirring up His Spirit in a few who are awake to the call to REPENT AND AWAKEN. We know that time is short, and we have remembered what Christ taught us through His Word and through all of His apostles, including His end time apostle. Those of us who are awake know that time is URGENT. We see the sword and we are heeding God’s instruction to WARN! “Again the Word of the Lord came unto me, saying….. Speak to the children of thy people, and say unto them, when I bring the sword upon a land … when the watchman see the sword come upon the land, he blow the trumpet, and warn the people; then whosever hear the sound of the trumpet, and take not warning; if the sword come, and take him away, his blood shall be upon his own head. But he that takes warning shall deliver his soul. So I have set thee a watchman unto the house of Israel; therefore thou shall hear the word at my mouth, and warn them from me…” [Ezekiel 33:1-4]

The Trumpet is sounding…… who will hear? Consider these Scriptures [Leviticus 26] and [Deuteronomy28], the “blessings and cursing” chapters of the Bible; in light of what you have just read: the increasing pressure that God applies in order to draw us closer to Him and to stop taking Him for granted. See how these curses are increasingly intensified each time Israel failed to repent of neglecting of God. What tragic results complacency toward God reaps! I tell you the Holy Spirit cries out for you who are Christians to take your Christian faith seriously, not to neglect it, not to take it for granted, and certainly not to despise it. You have been called out of darkness into the marvelous light of Christ. You have been baptized into Christ and called out of Satan’s kingdom and into the kingdom of Christ. But you’re not home free until you’re home; you have been shown wondrous grace. But you also have a warning from God in the pages of the Holy Scripture that you do well to heed, never to take His grace for granted. If only Israel had heeded this warning given by Christ. But, just like their forefathers who left Egypt with Moses, they took God’s grace to them for granted. Don’t let that be said about you!

You may assume that since you were once called to faith and baptized, you don’t need a living and active faith in Christ; you don’t need to hear His Word and receive His Sacraments as much as other people do. You may assume that since you have worked so hard to live a good and decent life, you now deserve God’s grace and recognition more than someone else does. Don’t be deceived! Satan will try to lead you to such false assumptions, to take God’s grace for granted and to imagine that you’ve earned His favor and deserve His goodness. But such wickedness drives out faith and the Holy Spirit and threatens to make your outcome like that of Israel. Payback is a Mother….. To whom shall I speak and give warning that they may hear?

July 1 is an important date for students and families: it’s when most changes to federal student aid – both loans and grants – go into effect. For the year starting July 1, 2016, new federal loans for undergraduates, graduate students, and parents will have lower fixed interest rates than loans taken out the year before, and the maximum Pell Grant will be higher. To help inform college borrowing decisions, there is a new easy-to-read chart with 2016-17 interest rates, loan amounts, and other useful information for the most common types of federal loans.

The coming changes include:

• On July 1, the maximum Pell Grant will be adjusted for inflation to $5,815, up from $5,775. Pell Grants help nearly eight million lower income students pay for college and limit how much they need to borrow.
• The new maximum grant for will cover less than 30% of the cost of attending a public four-year college, the smallest share in over 40 years. And under current law, the maximum Pell Grant will no longer be tied to inflation after 2017-18.
• On July 1, the fixed rates for new federal loans will be lower than the rates for loans issued last year.

• Stafford loans for undergraduates, subsidized and unsubsidized: 3.76% for loans issued in 2016-17 (down from 4.29% for loans issued in 2015-16).
• Stafford loans for graduate students: 5.31% for loans issued in 2016-17 (down from 5.84% for loans issued in 2015-16).
• Parent and Graduate PLUS loans: 6.31% for loans issued in 2016-17 (down from 6.84% for loans issued in 2015-16).
• On October 1, origination fees will increase slightly for new federal loans.
• For loans issued October 1, 2016 through September 30, 2017, fees will be 1.069% of principal for all Stafford loans (up from 1.068%), and 4.276% for all PLUS loans (up from 4.272%).

For more information about federal student loans for the coming school year, see the summary chart, Federal Student Loan Terms for 2016-17 below:

This chart summarizes the interest rates, loan limits, and other terms for federal student loans issued from July 1, 2016 through June 30, 2017.

Basic Eligibility Requirements

Stafford Loans

PLUS Loans

How Interest Rates are Determined

During Repayment

By Lue Dowdy

Aspiring Rap Artists, Sirr Jones is WHAT IT DO WITH THE LUE! OMG! So I met this dude via Facebook and it was all over from there.

The versatile Sirr Jones’ passion for all forms of music created his belief that, “Music is the soul of man.”  He practices this belief through his conglomeration of catchy and insightful tunes and at times hilarious freestyles. Hailing from California’s Inland Empire it was 2007 in the Tucson Desert where Sirr’s epic crusade began with small town hits such as “Light it Up.”

During his time in Tucson his stage presence and freestyle earned him the moniker “Sirr,” meaning all would have to address him with respect. Jones true strength is his ability to change with the mercurial world of Hip Hop and R&B, while maintaining his own distinct style. His high energy changeups and freestyles has also gotten the attention of many reputable artists, such as Lil Wayne, Kurupt, and Bone Thugs and Harmony, who invited Jones to be a part of different shows and acts. Sirr Jones’ passion and versatility only grows as he crusades to drop hits.

Not only does this talented recording artist make magic in the studio, he also has his own clothing line titled, “Multiple hustles,” because as we all know you gotta’ have multiple hustles these days in order to make it. Make sure to follow Sirr Jones on all media sites. Until next week folks, L’z!

By Naomi K. Bonman

The Tea Rose Garden in Pasadena, California was filled with such positive energy of women, young and seasoned, uplifting one another and supporting each other on their journey to greatness at the 3rd Annual Phenomenal Women Tea presented by LyLuLs Mentoring.

LyLuLs Mentoring, which stands for ‘Love Yourself Like You Love Shoes,’ was founded by Charmel Sanders has a mentoring group dedicated to the empowerment of young women ages 14 to 18. LyLuLs was launched two years ago as an event to provide young women with a safe shopping environment at Sanders’ shoe boutique called, “The Shoe Lounge.”

“As the event grew, I added guest speakers and partnered with the Art Institute of Riverside Fashion Club to provide the girls with life skills and self-esteem tools for success,” Sanders stated. “My Motto is, ‘Stepping up to help others Step out into Success.”

Saturday’s tea was MC’ed by Matumaini “Matu” Taylor who did an excellent job of keeping the afternoon flowing as she introduced each guest speaker and activity of the day. The guest speaker of this year’s event was Danielle Holloway. Holloway poured motivation and knowledge to the graduating seniors on how to succeed on the next step in their journey.

Spelman graduate, Sabra Marie, also gave the girls inspiring words through a spoken word piece that she wrote about the journey that we go through in life as girls coming up to womanhood. In keeping the creative energy flowing, the Epifani Dancers gave a dance tribute to the tunes of “I Rise Up” and Jimmy Soul Smooth serenaded to the young ladies with a neo-soul piece to show them how they are appreciated and to always know their worth. That wasn’t the only singing though, Jackie Coco-Ford did an inspiring acapella piece for the girls.

The afternoon ended with a raffle and an award ceremony for the mentors and mentees who have assisted in making LyLuLs Mentoring a success, and those who have shown great community service. Mentors of LyLuLs presented Sanders with flowers for her dedicated work to the community and said a prayer over her vision for the organization as it continues to move forward.

Again, congratulations to the graduates, Destinie Wortham, Taylor Evans and Christine Jackson.

Blacks in the United States continue to lag far behind whites in key areas of economic well-being like wealth, income and homeownership, a new report from the Pew Research Center finds. While these trends have been consistent for decades, what’s particularly notable is that these disparities between blacks and whites persist regardless of the level of education they attain, said Juliana Horowitz, an associate director of research at Pew. “Even when we only look at people with bachelor’s degrees, we still see these gaps,” Horowitz said. Take income. In 2014, the median household income for whites was $71,300 compared to $43,300 for blacks. But for college-educated whites, the median household income was $106,600, significantly higher than the $82,300 for households headed by college-educated blacks.

Click here for the full story

Lou Coleman

By Lou Coleman

Our age is characterized by pathetic preachers and pitiful churches. Christ Himself gave this evaluation of the Laodicea church: “Thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, blind, and naked.” [Revelation 3:15-17]. The Head of the church [Jesus] was nauseated and said, “You make me sick!” You are a spectacle in the pulpit and a dis­grace in the community and need to be exposed for what you are. This was a church filled with self-deceived hypocrites. As a result of their ambivalence to spiritual things, Jesus would have nothing to do with them. He would “spit them out.” How did they get this way? [Jeremiah 14:3] says, “They came to the pits [cisterns], and found no water; they returned with their vessels empty.” The weeping prophet, Jeremiah, lamented, “They are not valiant for the truth… they know not me” [9:3].

Listen, you can’t put live chickens under a dead hen. There are too many preachers standing behind a sacred podium who have never been born again. They are spiritually dead. Their messages and manner of living reveal their inner condi­tion. Christ warned, “By their fruits ye shall know them” [Matt. 7:20]. Paul admonished, “But he that is spiritual judgeth all things” [I Cor. 2:15]. Don’t hate the messenger! I just deliver the mail….You cannot have the life of the kingdom of God until you have entered the kingdom of God. What you need is a conversion experience like that of Saul of Tarsus. You need a trip to Calvary. Let’s face it! Nehemiah was frank when he declared, “And, lo, I perceived that God had not sent him” [6:12]. Preaching is a calling. It is not enough to like to preach or merely feel that one ought to preach. There must be a holy compulsion that says, “Woe is unto me, if I preach not the gospel!” The spiritual plight of many ministers is found in the parable of the persistent friend [Luke 11:6]: “And I have nothing to set before him.” Job complained, “Miserable comforters are ye all” [6:2]. The Apostle Paul warned, “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradi­tion of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ” [CoI. 2:3]. Don’t get stuck on stupid! The religious world is full of un­sent preachers. “Wherefore wilt thou run, my son, seeing that thou hast no tidings ready?” [2Sam.18-22]

I tell you, there are a lot of windbags in the pulpit. Isaiah expressed the same opin­ion: “We have as it were brought forth wind; we have not wrought any deliverance in the earth” [26:18]. Jeremiah deplored, “And the prophets shall become wind, and the word is not in them” [5:13]. The writer of Proverbs states, “Whoso boasteth himself of a false gift is like clouds and wind without rain” [25:14]. Job declares, [13:4] “But ye are forgers of lies, ye are all physicians of no value.”  Shall I remind you that the Laodicea church is head­ed for judgment? “God says in [Jeremiah 12:10] you have destroyed my vineyard.” The Head of the Church, Jesus Himself, is nauseated with a flabby, flaccid, halfhearted church. It is dope ad­diction of the spirit, alcoholism of the heart, cancer of the soul, and blindness of the mind and pover­ty of vision from which the peo­ple perish.

How did you get this way? The Prophet Haggai put it thus, “Ye looked for much, and, lo, it came too little” (1:9). Isaiah gives the reason: “This day is a day of trouble, and of re­buke, and of blasphemy: for the children are come to the birth, and there is not strength to bring forth” (37:3). I tell you, the early church turned the world upside down. Today the world is turning our churches up­side down! Almost a generation ago A. W.Tozer wrote: “The preaching that once an­gered the atheists and brought them charging out against God and the Bible has pretty much disappeared. Hellfire, miracles, and the necessity that men please Almighty God are no longer a serious part of current Christian teaching. Christianity has been watered down until it is little more than “cheer-’em-up stuff.” We are so afraid of being nar­row that we have opened the doors to worldliness. Christ would share the grief of Jeremiah who grieved, “Mine heart within me is broken because of the prophets” (23:9). So many preachers these days are talking but not saying any­thing. The tragedy of today’s preaching is that most preachers give the people what they want to hear, not what God’s Word declares. Woe unto you!

So what can be done for pathetic preachers and pitiful churches you may ask? Consider the Potent Cure; “Begin at My Sanctuary,” says the Lord [Ezek. 9:6]. “Be ye clean, that bear the vessels of the Lord,” declared Prophet Isaiah [52:11)]. “Carry forth the filthiness out of the Holy place” [II Chron. 29:5].

Listen, Christ said, “He would spew the Laodicea church out of His mouth.”  “For the time is come that judgment must begin at the House of God…” “The hour is late. The invitation is open by the Savior Himself: Repent! “Behold, I stand at the door~ and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door~ I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me,” [Rev. 3:20]. Don’t wait too late! The clock is ticking… Tick, Tock, Tick, Tock!

By Ronda Racha Penrice, Urban News Service

The roots of soul food run deep.

Mary McCallum-Stewart isn’t as well-known as Sylvia Woods, purveyor of Harlem’s legendary eatery, Sylvia’s Restaurant. But McCallum-Stewart also built a soul food legacy.  The Jackson, Mississippi native launched her own soul food empire in 1969.  Los Angeles’ M&M Soul Food Restaurant was inspired by her nickname, “Mississippi Mary.”

Although McCallum-Stewart passed away in 1998, her contribution thrives through various restaurants that bear some form of her name. They reach from southern California to Las Vegas, where her younger brother Ventress McCallum expanded the business. Her daughters Nicole Shaw and Debra Ratliff run Mary Stewart’s Southern Soul Food in the city of Rialto in the L.A. metro area.

“We had to learn by our mom showing us,” Shaw says of their culinary inheritance. “It’s not like us cooking by watching Food Network, by measurement. You can’t cook by measurement . . . We had to learn by our mom showing us, ‘This is what you do,’ and you cook by taste.”

Oxtails — cow tails, actually — are their most popular dish, along with greens, mac and cheese, yams, and red beans and rice.

For most, the term “soul food” harkens back to the 1960s’ civil rights and black power movements. But the term has a longer history, says Adrian E. Miller, the Denver-based author of Soul Food: The Surprising Story of An American Cuisine, One Plate at a Time. Shakespeare employed the expression in his first play, The Two Gentlemen of Verona. During early American history, black Americans used “soul food” in a religious context for centuries. Black jazz musicians created a style of play in the 1940s known as “soul food” that white musicians couldn’t easily duplicate. Soul food became most popular, though, during the 1960s.

“What happens in the ’60s is that ‘soul food’ as a term gets racialized and radicalized,” says Miller, also known as “the Soul Food Scholar.” “The Black Power advocates were trying to figure out, ‘How do we connect the very diverse African-American communities around the country?’ because what was happening in the rural South resonated with people to some extent, but what was going on in the urban North and out west was different. So they decided that culture was one of the best ways to connect people, and food was the great connector.

“[Also,] the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, by this time in the mid-’60s, had expelled all the white members. A manifesto of theirs was leaked to The New York Times, and that manifesto said that white people can’t understand things like ham hocks, brains, pig’s feet, which was news to white Southerners because they’d been eating the same foods for 200 years.

“So, at that point, in that decade, ‘soul’ becomes ‘black,’ and ‘Southern’ becomes ‘white,’ and we’re still living with the legacy of that today. So much so that African-American contributions to Southern cuisine have been obscured,” Miller says.

National Soul Food Month, observed in June, is in its 15^th year, says Charla Draper, a former food editor for both Ebony and Southern Living magazines. She now provides food consulting and public relations through her company, It’s Food Biz.

“National Soul Food Month grew out of a conference that was hosted in Chicago by one of the organizations I belong to, the Culinary Historians of Chicago,” Draper says. “The conference occurred in 2000 and 2001. The conference was called Grits and Greens and, in the second year of the conference, we created the National Soul Food Month identity, just really to help spread the word.”

Today some may view soul food as the unhealthy cuisine that black Southerners carried over from slavery. But the “unhealthy” assessment, Miller says, is untrue. “When you look at what people were eating, it’s actually closer to what we call ‘vegan’ today because there wasn’t a lot of meat,” he says. “[Meat] didn’t anchor the meal the way it does now.”

Food pioneer Edna Lewis — whose grandparents were enslaved — recalled in her revered 1976 cookbook, The Taste of Country Cooking, fried chicken was “a very special dish … produced only once a year in late spring through early summer” in her native Freetown, Virginia. Today, fried chicken is widely considered a soul food staple.

One main soul food feature never changes, however. “We just cook from the heart,” says Nicole Shaw. “We just cook from the foundation of what we were brought from.”

Minister Keith Pringle

SAN BERNARDINO, CA- Ephesians New Testament Church is hosting a FREE Concert featuring Minister Keith Pringle along with Special Guest: The Pentecostal Community Choir. The concert will be held on Sunday, June 26 at 5 p.m. at the church’s new location, Mountain View Community Church, 8833 Palmetto Avenue, in Fontana.  For additional information, contact the church office at (909) 823-2310 or visit www.ephesianschurch.com.

D’zyl

Big package with a lot of talent is What It Do With The LUE this week! I’ve always heard about the rapper known as D’zyl but never had the opportunity to meet him in person until this year through a mutual friend. .I was able to get ahold of his music and was like WOW! His flows and lyrics are definitely inspired by true Hip-Hop. Please take a moment to know more about D’zyle.

D’zyl 5k1 (Diesel 5001) born Daniel Edward Fromm, a man of German and Black descent, as well as a Gemini, fully understands duality and the nature of relativity, especially with music. He boasts of listening to literally almost all types of music and being able to relate and pull from those genres to help mold his own sound. Born in Hollywood, California but raised in a gritty place known as the Inland Empire, San Bernardino to be exact, he chose to never let his environment limit his imagination or dictate his future, but rather inspire it.

Primarily a hip hop artist, he believes that he should never be confounded by titles or barriers. He enjoys singing, of all styles, and will even try to sneak in some opera at any chance he can. With a novelist’s wit, he has penned songs for numerous artists, has written a book, and a few scripts. There is no limitations to what he can or will do.

One of his goals is, “to be one of those names that people drop when they’re trying to sound cool haha.” With the way things are going and the tenacity he displays day in and day out, that day will soon be among us.

D’zyl has opened for Chino XL, Planet Asia, Layzie Bone, X-Clan, Keith Murray, Percee P, Bomshot, Coolio, Dirty Birdy, Speak, Reverie, Big B of Kottonmouth Kings, and many more. He has several song placements in various films, has performed at SXSW and countless festivals, including headlining the first ever Community Fest of his city and being among the first rappers to perform at the National Orange Show, and has been in the newspapers and radio on more than a few occasions. He is barely scratching the surface and will continue to spread his therapy to the world in years to come. Make sure you check him out links are located at www.wssnews.com. Until next week L’z!