The Journey: Forty Days of PromiseCelebrating the Legacy of African American Christianity
Day Twenty-Nine: Modeling Ministry Commitment
Welcome to day twenty-nine of our forty-day intercultural journey. From Martin Luther King Day to the end of Black History Month we are focusing on The Journey: Forty Days of Promise—Celebrating the Legacy of African American Christianity.
Day Twenty-Nine: Modeling Ministry Commitment[1]
African American founding fathers emphasized in their messages and modeled in their ministries a Black Protestant work ethic. The oft-imagined, but quite-mistaken view of African American male slaves as lazy and slothful was crushed by both slave and free African American pastors.
Some slaves in the South were able to establish independent churches during the Revolutionary era. Perhaps the earliest to do so was George Liele. Born in Virginia, in 1742, he moved with his master, Henry Sharpe, to Burke County, Georgia, a few years before the Revolutionary War. Liele was converted under the preaching of Baptist Matthew Moore at his master’s church. In 1777, Liele founded a Black Baptist congregation at Yama Craw, outside Savannah.
Eyewitness accounts applauded his commitment to ministry, even while still a lay person. “He began to discover his love to other negroes, on the same plantation with himself, by reading hymns among them, encouraging them to sing, and sometimes by explaining the most striking parts of them.”
Liele’s own account equally expresses his passion for serving God and God’s people. “Desiring to prove the sense I had of my obligations to God, I endeavoured to instruct the people of my own color in the Word of God: the white brethren seeing my endeavours, and that the word of the Lord seemed to be blessed, gave me a call at a quarterly meeting to preach before the congregation.”
Instant in Season and Out
Later licensed (by whites) as a minister, Liele served in Yama Craw and in Kingston, Jamaica. As a pastor, he preached twice on Sunday, and twice during the week. “I receive nothing for my services; I preach, baptize, administer the Lord’s supper, and travel from place to place to publish the gospel, and to settle church affairs, all freely.”
Like the Apostle Paul, Liele supported himself through his own industry. “My occupation is a farmer, but as the seasons in this part of the country, are uncertain, I also keep a team of horses, and wagons for the carrying goods from one place to another; which I attend to myself, with the assistance of my sons; and by this way of life have gained the good will of the public, who recommends me to business, and to some very principal work for government.” Like countless other African American founding fathers, Liele’s industry became a benchmark urging other African American males towards responsibility and productivity.
Liele’s model stuck. One of his converts and disciples, Andrew Bryan, accepted the baton of pastoral leadership at Yama Craw. Like his mentor, Bryan personified sacrificial ministry. White citizens, worried about slave rebellion, had him arrested and whipped twice for holding “illegal” meetings. According to an early Baptist historian, Andrew “told his persecutors that he rejoiced not only to be whipped, but would freely suffer death for the cause of Jesus Christ.”
Learning Together from Our Great Cloud of Witnesses
1. What impact could knowledge of an African American leader like George Liele have upon Americans? African Americans? African American males?
2. How could you apply Liele’s ministry commitment to your life?
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