Blog 16/ Faith Over Fragility: A Love Letter to Black Women Fighting Through a Hard Season
“My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” ~2 Corinthians 12:9
There are moments in our lives when the world seems to shift beneath us — when the headlines mirror the heaviness we have been carrying quietly, privately, faithfully. Fall 2025 was one of those moments.
As Faith Over Fragility made its way into the world, the nation was finally acknowledging what Black women had already been living:
over 300,000 Black women pushed out of the workforce in a single year — an exodus so massive that Forbes published an article in August 2025.
For many of us, it was not just a statistic.
It was our reality.
Our prayer list.
Our journal entries.
Our late-night conversations with God.
It was the collective breaking and the collective becoming. And that is why this little purple book matters (The 1st book I wrote to give a voice of hope in this season).
“The Lord will fulfill his purpose for me; your steadfast love, O Lord, endures forever.” ~ Psalm 138:8
A Dedication to the Women Who Kept Going
Faith Over Fragility is not just a devotional. It is a dedication — a small but powerful altar built for Black women who have endured a tectonic shift in their livelihoods, identities, and sense of stability.
We’ve been the backbone of organizations that later forgot our names.
We’ve been the quiet innovators in rooms where our ideas were repackaged without credit.
We have been loyal to institutions that were never loyal to us.
And still…
we rise, apply, pray, interview, hope, rebuild, and believe again.
This book was born in my own season of instability — job searching for my new role, navigating my Ed.D., navigating dreams that felt too heavy to carry and yet too sacred to abandon (cultivating the seeds sowed, that I await a harvest…an abundant one). It was birthed in a time when I needed God to whisper through the noise:
“Daughter, do not confuse a hard season with a dead future.”
“When you pass through the waters, I will be with you… when you walk through fire you shall not be burned.” ~Isaiah 43:2
When Chadwick Boseman Spoke to Our Spirit
During my Ed.D. journey, I returned often to Chadwick Boseman’s iconic Howard University commencement speech — especially the moment he said:
“He was transferring the spirit of the fighter to me.”
That line was more than inspiration; it was impartation.
A reminder that struggle is not evidence of defeat — it is evidence of calling.
Chadwick told us:
Sometimes you need to feel the pain and sting of defeat to activate the real passion and purpose that God predestined inside of you.
Black women know this intimately.
We have felt the sting.
We have rebuilt through it.
We have reintroduced ourselves on the other side of it.
This book honors that fighter spirit.
The one you inherited.
The one you sharpened.
The one that refuses to disappear even when systems try to erase you.
“For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.” ~ Jeremiah 29:11
Jeremiah 29:11 — God’s Whisper in the Wilderness
The scripture that sustained me through every chapter of my Ed.D. and every closed door was Jeremiah 29:11:
“For I know the plans I have for you… plans to prosper you and not to harm you… plans to give you hope and a future.”
It is not a cliché.
It is not a soft comfort.
It is a divine proclamation — especially for those of us who have carried disappointment while still showing up in excellence.
The truth is:
God’s plan does not tremble when earthly systems collapse.
God’s promise does not shrink when institutions retract.
God’s purpose for Black women is not negotiable, retractable, or conditional.
When the workforce pushed 300,000 of us out, heaven did not.
Heaven still said: “I have plans for you.”
And Faith Over Fragility was written to help us remember that.
Why This Book, Why Now
Because the world is finally confessing what Black women have always known — that we are expected to be strong while living inside structures that constantly test our strength.
Because we are entering a season where faith is not just inspirational — it is strategic.
Because healing is not passive — it is warfare.
Because Black women deserve resources designed for us —
for our exhaustion,
for our brilliance,
for our spiritual stamina,
for our dreams that refuse to die.
This book is a small offering toward that healing.
A soft-landing place.
A pocket-sized reminder that fragility does not mean failure; it means we are human.
And faith is how we navigate the spaces that try to break us.
“God is in the midst of her; she shall not be moved; God will help her when morning dawns.” ~ Psalms 46:5
To Every Black Woman Who Has Endured a Hard Season…
This is for you.
For the educator rebuilding after a layoff.
For the mother interviewing while praying.
For the leader navigating a purpose that feels bigger than her resources.
For the woman watching bills stack up and still believing in a future God already wrote.
This book is my offering.
My gratitude.
My heart extended to yours.
May it remind you that your fight is holy.
Your survival is sacred.
And your future is already secured.
Because even in fragility, you are fortified.
Even in loss, you are becoming.
Even in uncertainty, you are held.
And God’s plan is still unfolding — beautifully.
Standing with you in faith and in the fight,
Dr. Courtney Nicole Johnson
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