The Forty-Day Journey of Promise
Day Twenty-Two: Everybody Could Be a Somebody!
Note: Welcome to The Journey, our forty-day blog series from MLK Day through the end of Black History Month. We’re learning life lessons from the legacy of African American Christianity. The series is based upon material from my book Beyond the Suffering. To learn more about Beyond the Suffering, including downloading a free chapter, click here.
Sharing Stories of Encounters with God
In the Invisible Institution (hidden Christian worship services on the slave plantations) everybody could be a somebody because they could participate as the Spirit moved them. Every believer had the opportunity, as led by the Spirit, to testify. In testifying, men and women told the stories of their encounters with God. In narrative fashion, they articulated common spiritual realities, provided proverbial wisdom for life’s journey, shared advice concerning the normal problems of life, offered consolation, and, when necessary, confronted the community.
Aunt Jane testified to and discipled Charlotte Brooks.
“She would hold prayer-meeting in my house whenever she would come to see me. . . . She said people must give their hearts to God, to love him and keep his commandments; and we believed what she said.”
Sharing the Word: Exhorting
“Exhorting was the next “level” of speaking ministry. Exhorters ranged from unofficial prayer leaders on the plantation to lay people licensed to deliver short sermons, often traveling from one plantation to another. James Smith shares about his exhorting ministry.
“Soon after I was converted I commenced holding meetings among the people, and it was not long before my fame began to spread as an exhorter. I was very zealous, so much so that I used to hold meetings all night, especially if there were any concerned about their immortal souls.”
Shepherding God’s People: Preaching and Pastoring
Of course, none of this suggests that it is Christ’s plan for His Church to be without called-out leaders—pastors, shepherds, soul physicians. The Invisible Institution maintained a remarkable equilibrium between lay and pastoral ministry. W. E. B. Du Bois submits a compelling portrait of the African American plantation pastor.
“He early appeared on the plantation and found his function as the healer of the sick, the interpreter of the Unknown, the comforter of the sorrowing, the supernatural avenger of wrong, and the one who rudely but picturesquely expressed the longing, disappointment, and resentment of a stolen and oppressed people. Thus, as bard, physician, judge, and priest, within the narrow limits allowed by the slave system, rose the Negro preacher, and under him the first Afro-American institution, the Negro church.”
All Participants; No Spectators
In sharing the Word, the Invisible Institution modeled for us a host of ways to engage every believer. No one came or left feeling like they were simply a spectator. Everyone came with anticipation, participated with meaning, and left encouraged that God had used them to encourage others.
Join the Conversation (Post a Comment for a Chance to Receive a Copy of Beyond the Suffering)
1. What steps could you take to more boldly and effectively share God’s Word?
2. How could our churches today better practice the biblical truth of every member a minister?
