The Forty-Day Journey of Promise

Day Fifteen: Hooked in the Heart

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.

The Fisherman of Conversion

How did African Americans become aware of the horrors of their sin, repent, see the wonders of Christ’s forgiving grace, and believe?

One unnamed ex-enslaved person interviewed between 1927-1929 by Andrew Watson, explains it brilliantly.

“Before God can use a man, that man must be hooked in the heart. By this I mean that he has to feel converted. And once God stirs up a man’s pure mind and makes him see the folly of his ways, he is wishing for God to take him and use him.”

God is the Author of conversion, or better, the Fisherman of conversion fishing for men and women. The hook God casts enlightens the eyes, enabling converts to see the foolishness of their sinfulness.

Spiritually Blind: Unaware of My Spiritual Sickness

African Americans understood that without Christ we are dead in our sins (Eph. 2:1-3). An African American minister from Tennessee known as Reverend H. offers an unflinching vision of spiritual blindness.

“A sinner is dead, but we who are born of God are live children. No dead child can understand the works of a live one, because he hasn’t had his eyes opened. This nobody can do but God. If God doesn’t open your blinded eyes, cut loose your stammering tongue, unstop your deaf ears, and deliver your soul from death and hell, you are dead and can’t understand the things we do. You got to be dug up, rooted and grounded, and buried in him.”

Reverend H. understands that apart from God’s spiritual laser surgery, sinners fail to perceive the cancer of sin spreading in their hearts.

New Spiritual Eyes

In turn, African Americans understood that only God can open blind eyes. Pastor Peter Randolph, looking back on his conversion experience, enhances our image of spiritual sightlessness and spiritual eyes.

“The eyes of my mind were open, and I saw things as I never did before. With my mind’s eye, I could see my Redeemer hanging upon the cross for me. I wanted all the other slaves to see him thus, and feel as happy as I did. I used to talk to others, and tell them of the friend they would have in Jesus, and show them by my experience how I was brought to Christ, and felt his love within my heart—and love it was, in God’s adapting himself to my capacity.”

Soul Physicians in Need of THE Soul Physician

In an age when we face the temptation to “water down” the Gospel to make it more “palatable” to “seekers,” we could learn much from Reverend H. and Pastor Randolph. As skillful soul physicians, their diagnosis was insightful and clear. They told themselves and their patients the truth about their spiritual condition. With their diagnosis came their sight-giving prescription. They opened blind eyes to see the Redeemer.

Cataracts removed, sinners saw what a Friend they had in Jesus. They understood that until we admit that we are sinners, we force away the Friend of sinners, for he came to call sinners, not the righteous to repentance. “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick” (Luke 5:31).

Join the Conversation (Post a Comment for a Chance to Receive a Copy of Beyond the Suffering)

1. African American soul physicians taught that sinners were spiritually blind and dead. How can we help seekers to become aware of their spiritual sickness?

2. What does the African American approach to salvation teach us about the dangers of watering down our gospel presentations?