A Word from Bob: You’re reading Part 4, in a blog mini-series on Black Church History.

I’ve developed this series from my book, Beyond the Suffering: Embracing the Legacy of African American Soul Care. I’ve also based this blog series on a presentation I shared at Bethel Church in Gary, Indiana. You can find the PowerPoint presentation of that session here (here’s a shortened link if you’d like to easily share it: http://bit.ly/10LegaciesPPT). The focus of this blog mini-series is on: Learning from the Legacy of the Heroes of Black Church History. 

Leaving a Lasting Female Legacy: Christlike Sisters of the Spirit

Today we learn from the legacy of three African American Christian sisters of the Spirit. These godly women often described their external situation as being in a “double bind.” That is, they were black, in a day and age where that was disrespected. And they were female, in a day and age when that, too, was disrespected. Regardless of their external situation, internally they clung to Christ and they ministered Christ to one another.

Sister Octavia Albert: Sharing Christ in Suffering—Jesus with Skin On! 

We see that in and through the life of Octavia Rogers Albert. Before the Civil War, Octavia and her husband were enslaved in Virginia. After the war, when their freedom was won, they moved to Louisiana. There, both she and her husband earned their college degrees—which was particularly rare for an African American woman in the deep south in the 1870s. Octavia’s husband became pastor of a prominent African American church, where Octavia was known, as was common with many black pastor’s wives, as “The First Lady” of the church.

Octavia was also an author, in fact, you see the cover of her book, The House of Bondage. In this book Sister Octavia spent hours interviewing formerly enslaved African Americans. Prominent among those interviewed was Charlotte Brooks. Sister Octavia introduces us to Aunt Charlotte.

“It was in the fall of 1879 that I met Charlotte Brooks. I have spent hours with her listening to her telling of her sad life of bondage in the cane-fields of Louisiana.”

No one had ever listened to or cared about Charlotte. Now we have this college-educated, First Lady, author spending hours listening to her telling of her sad life of bondage. If you and I today, learned nothing else other than the need to listen well to our hurting brothers and sisters, then we have learned a great lesson about one-another ministry in the Body of Christ.

But there are more lessons. We not only listen well, we feel deeply, as Sister Octavia does.

“Aunt Charlotte my heart throbs with sympathy, and my eyes are filled with tears, whenever I hear you tell of the trials of yourself and others.”

Sister Octavia also teaches us that shared sorrow is endurable sorrow. We were never meant to suffer alone. God calls us, in the Body of Christ, like Sister Octavia models, to enter deeply into the suffering of our brothers and sisters.

Let’s see what impact this had on Aunt Charlotte:

“I never thought anybody but Jesus would care enough for me to tell of my trials and sorrows in this world. I thought none but Jesus could know what I have passed through” (Charlotte Brooks).

Aunt Charlotte had assumed that only Jesus cared. But now Charlotte knew that at least one other human being—Sister Octavia, cared for her and shared in her pain. Sister Octavia teaches us to be Jesus with skin on for our brothers and sisters—caring like Christ. 

Sister Charlotte Brooks: Finding Christ in Suffering—Filled with the Love of Jesus

Charlotte not only learned from Sister Octavia. Sister Octavia learned from Charlotte, as we can. Aunt Charlotte had had all of her children sold away from her. Just ponder that as a mother, as a parent. So when she talks about suffering and finding Christ, we need to listen.

First, she teaches that trials make us God-dependent:

“You see, my child, God will take care of his people. He will hear us when we cry. True, we can’t get anything to eat sometimes, but trials make us pray more. I sometimes think my people don’t pray like they used to in slavery. You know when any child of God gets trouble that’s the time to try their faith. Since freedom it seems my people don’t trust the Lord as they used to. ‘Sin is growing bold, and religion is growing cold.’”

We don’t want trials; we don’t pray for trials, but we all know that Aunt Charlotte is right: trials motivate us to pray more. And we pray more when we remember that God will take care of His people. That God is good even when life is bad. He’s good all the time.

Aunt Charlotte, like so many of our African American sisters of the Spirit, also teaches us that we find our joy not in our circumstances, but in our Christ.

“I tell you, child, Christianity is good anywhere—at the plow-handle, at the hoe-handle, anywhere. If you are filled with the love of my Jesus you are happy.”

Aunt Charlotte said this not as a woman who had the best of this world, but as a woman who had almost nothing in this world. Yet she still clung to Christ and was filled with the love of Jesus. 

Sister Maria Stewart: Clinging to Our Identity in Christ—In the Image of God

Of every person whose life I learned from in Beyond the Suffering, I think Maria Stewart is my number one hero of the faith. Maria was born enslaved in 1803 to a Connecticut clergy couple (let that sink in…). She married at twenty-three, was widowed at twenty-six, was saved by Christ at twenty-seven, and challenged a nation at twenty-eight.

We talked earlier about African American women being in a double bind. Well, Maria Stewart was in a quadruple bind—she had four strikes against her in the culture of her day. She was black in a day and age where that was disrespected. She was a woman in a day and age when that was disrespected. She was young in a day and age when that was disrespected. And she was widowed/single in a day and age when that was disrespected. She easily could have given up on God and on life. But through Christ, she did the opposite.

At age twenty-eight, in 1831, she marched into the offices of William Lloyd Garrison, the abolitionist publisher of the newspaper The Liberator. She insisted that he publish a series of letters that she had written to her fellow sisters of the Spirit. And he did. Here’s just a small excerpt of her powerful words that impacted a nation for Christ.

“Many think, because your skins are tinged with a sable hue, that you are an inferior race of beings; but God does not consider you as such. He hath formed and fashioned you in his own glorious image, and hath bestowed upon you reason and strong powers of intellect. He hath made you to have dominion over the beasts of the field, the fowls of the air, and the fish of the sea (Genesis 1:26). He hath crowned you with glory and honor; hath made you but a little lower than the angels (Psalms 8:5).”

No one in 1831 was telling young black women that they were formed and fashioned in God’s glorious image. Except Maria Stewart. No one was telling young black in 1831 that God had bestowed on them reason and strong powers of intellect. Except Maria Stewart. No one was telling young black women in 1831 that they had dominion over anything. Except Maria Stewart.

Sister Maria could do this because she understood and applied God’s Word to her life, to her times, and to her sisters of the Spirit. She teaches us that no matter how many strikes we have against us, in Christ we can do all things. She teaches us that no matter how the world treats us or how the world sees us, we must see ourselves in Christ; we must cling to our identity in Christ.

Like every quote we’ve read, like every African American Christian we’ve heard from in Black Church history, Sister Maria Stewart reminds us to “Look to Jesus!”

Join the Conversation 

Which story today was most moving and powerful for you? Why?

In your life, what lesson do you want to apply from these sisters of the Spirit?

In your ministry, what lesson do you want to apply from these sisters of the Spirit?

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