Sermon Illustrations on Slavery — page 2

A Slave For Christ: Sudan's Bishop Gassis

Job 7:11

Most people don't spend Christmas day wading through chest-deep floodwater -- and then baptizing 500 people. But that's exactly what Bishop Macram Max Gassis did in Sudan a few weeks ago.

It was an expression of his deep and determined love for Christ, and for his people -- and it's one of the reasons Prison Fellowship is honoring Bishop Gassis with this year's William Wilberforce Award.

The award is named for the English parliamentarian who fought against the British slave trade 200 years ago. Every year, Prison Fellowship honors the person who best emulates Wilberforce's commitment to eradicating social injustice, and no one is more deserving than Bishop Gassis.

Born sixty-one years ago in Sudan, Gassis attended seminary in Italy and England. He returned to Sudan as a parish priest, and, in 1988, Gassis was consecrated a bishop.

It was then, as Sudan's civil war raged around him, that Gassis became a liaison between the country's Catholic bishops and its radical Islamic government. But Gassis got into trouble when he criticized Sudan's human rights record, which reads like an abstract on atrocity.

He spoke out against the slave raids that steal Christian children from their parents.

He spoke out against the bombing of Christian schools, churches, and hospitals.

He spoke out against the Stalinesque famines, through which the government deliberately kills hundreds of thousands.

He spoke out against attempts to force the country's entire Christian population to convert to Islam.

He spoke out when he saw Christians loaded onto trains and taken away to fearful fates in concentration camps.

He stood before the U.S. Congress, the European Parliament, and the United Nations Human Rights Commission and spoke out against the slaughter of two million Christian countrymen.

Western leaders did not always listen, but Sudan's dictators heard him loud and clear. They placed Gassis under criminal indictment. This gentle servant of Christ is now the most wanted man in Sudan. Each time he returns to his people, bringing food and medicine, Bibles and blankets, his life is in jeopardy.

Nevertheless, Gassis has taken responsibility for hundreds of orphans -- orphans who throw themselves into his arms whenever they see him.

"It is time to end the silence," the bishop says, and he's right. The torture, enslavement, and murder of Sudanese Christians must end, and there is much the U.S. can do to bring that about.

In his Christmas message, Bishop Gassis wrote, "While the world [prepares] to welcome the new millennium with joy and hope ... my people cry: 'Lord save us.' Lord Jesus, move the hearts ... of those who have the power to bring justice and peace to my people."

As Prison Fellowship salutes this courageous man tonight at the Wilberforce dinner, I pray that all of you at home will remember in your prayers the suffering church, that the shackles of those who are persecuted for our Lord's sake might be broken.

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Sudanese Christian's Courage Fuels Escape From Atrocities

Torn from his family, severely beaten and forced to live and work in subhuman conditions, Rol Deng has seen religious persecution first hand.

And he wants American Christians to know and pray about their fellow believers in Sudan who he says are being killed or sold into slavery because of their faith.

Deng and his family now live in Kansas City, Missouri. His war-torn homeland of Sudan is ruled by Muslim extremists who oppose Christianity.

"There is no work unless you are Muslim," Deng said in an interview. "The government keeps track. They want to send you to religious training to be Muslim. If you say no, then there is no job."

Civil war has raged in Sudan since 1983. More than 2 million people have died during the war, which pits Arabs in the north against Africans in the south. Tensions are rooted in attempts to impose Islamic values on all Sudanese people.

The U.S. Committee for Refugees reports that an estimated 300 Sudanese die each day of war-related causes, including disease and famine.

For Deng, life forever changed one day in 1990. The government sent militia to his village of Arkeyna. Before they left, the whole village was burned, and his father was killed.

Deng, his sister, his mother and three brothers were taken as slaves. A scar running up the side of his leg is a reminder of the beating he endured that day.

In anguish, Deng was forced to ride a camel with other village survivors after the town was razed. That day was the last time he saw his mother and his brothers.

His sister, Ayal, a toddler then, stayed with him. For the next two years, he was forced -- at gunpoint -- to care for cows in the middle of a field, the climate cold and rainy.

"I had to sleep with the cows," he said. "I had no blanket. I ate with the dog. I lived like an animal for two years."

Eventually, Deng and Ayal escaped their captors by following railroad tracks. Heading north to avoid an increased militia presence in the south, they went in search of a city.

When they came to Babanis, Sudan, they hurried into a church, looking for help. The preacher there told them not to leave. He hid them until he secured tickets to Khartoum and some money for the two.

From 1992 to 1996, Deng and Ayal lived as outcasts outside Khartoum in an area for displaced people. While there, he learned English. Also, it was during this time that Deng met and married Adut.

With only a cardboard shelter to sleep under and the food being designated for Muslims, Deng grew weary of not being able to provide for his family. He knew Christians were forbidden to go into Khartoum, but he was desperate to find work.

While traveling on the road, he was arrested by security forces. The plan was to train him for three months to be a soldier, and then he would be forced to fight.

"I couldn't do that," Deng said. "I couldn't kill my own people." He escaped and returned to his family. But that was only a temporary solution. He knew he would be found and killed.

The only thing to do was to try to escape to Egypt. Through contact with a relative who worked for the government, Deng, Ayal, his wife, Adut, and their daughter, Adeng, were able to secure money for immigration.

Then, with the help of a security officer who was a secret Christian, they were taken to a boat in the middle of the night. They traveled by boat and then by train to their destination. The officer, who risked his life to save theirs, directed them to the boat and asked them not to look back at him, or ever to mention his name.

Deng found factory work in Abbiasa, Egypt, a place that was friendly to the refugees. But it was difficult to earn enough to support his family, which now included a son, Dut, and another daughter, Amou.

With assistance from the Red Cross, the family came to the United States as refugees on July 21, 2000. The Dengs, along with fellow Sudanese Christians in the Kansas City area, worship in their native language of Dinka at a Nazarene church.

While these refugees from Sudan are grateful to finally live in a country where they can be free to worship Christ without fear, they still carry the scars of their faithful persistence.

Dr. Joseph Resendiz, an internist at Samuel U. Rodgers Community Health Center in Kansas City, sees a large number of Sudanese patients. He said they frequently have multiple complaints, mostly stemming from years of oppression in their home country.

"Many of them, both men and women, have virtually been slaves," Resendiz said. "They have told me of widespread beatings, hard labor, rape and torture that characterized their tenure as slaves.

"It is hard to believe that slavery exists in this day and age. In our country, we fight for guns and drugs and money. Over there, they fight for their faith."

Some groups, such as Christian Solidarity International, attempt to aid Sudanese Christians by buying back those sold into slavery.

But Deng said such efforts are often futile. Solders make up an amount they want for a slave. The freed slaves are taken south, often only to be recaptured. The buy-back effort, Deng says, simply puts more money in the hands of the captors.

Deng is passionate about informing Americans of the plight of Sudanese Christians. "We are dying for Christ," he said. "Jesus Christ died for us, and that is why we are dying. We need Christian brothers to find a way to unify to help Sudan. Pray for us."

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Uncle Tom's Cabin: the Power of Story

The great nineteenth-century evangelist Charles Finney once declared, "I cannot believe that a person who has ever known the love of God can relish a secular novel."

Ironically, it was during Finney's lifetime that Christians turned a secular novel into a great weapon for Christ: UNCLE TOM'S CABIN. It's an illustration of the power of a story.

Probably no other novel has made such an impact on a nation. UNCLE TOM'S CABIN sold 300,000 copies in its first year and two million copies by the end of the decade. These are incredible figures, considering that America's population was less than a tenth of the size it is today. The book helped millions of Americans understand, for the first time, what a terrible thing it was to be a slave.

Today, "Uncle Tom" is a derogatory term, applied to blacks that treat whites with fawning servility. But in Harriet Beecher Stowe's novel, Tom is a Christ- like figure. He suffers the worst evils imaginable, yet refuses to strike back.

The book seared the consciences of Stowe's readers, and helped them realize that slavery was a great evil, not merely a problematic social institution.

Anti-slavery activists had been trying to get that message across for almost thirty years. But nothing they did had the impact of this book. In fact, most abolitionists didn't read novels. Like Charles Finney, they considered novels frivolous, if not downright immoral. The last place they would have looked for help in their cause was the bookstore fiction shelf.

UNCLE TOM'S CABIN is a reminder that one of the reasons we read fiction is because fiction helps train the moral imagination. As the late Russell Kirk put it, the battle for our hearts and minds is fought in the "land of the human imagination."

I know that when it comes to learning moral lessons, I've often been much more affected by works of fiction than by abstract theological discourses.

Biblical figures understood the power of a good story. Remember the prophet, Nathan, confronting King David about his affair with Bathsheba? Nathan did not offer David a dry lecture on the sin of adultery. No, he spun a story about a rich man who took the only lamb belonging to a poor man. In order to get past David's defenses, Nathan told an allegorical story.

Harriet Beecher Stowe received much of her insight into slavery from carefully documented abolitionist accounts. She then used her creative ability to teach the message that all men and women are created in God's image, and are infinitely precious to Him.

Twentieth century Christians ought to use the same strategy as we fight modern social evils like abortion, pornography, and the breakdown of the family. We must use books, film, music, and television to shock Americans out of their complacency.

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A Rebirth of Compassion?

Mark 5:2

When I was 6 years old my parents separated, my dad moving to Fort Worth, Texas, and my mother and I remaining in the county seat town of Decatur, Texas, where I was born. Those were halcyon days for Baptists, when church seemed at the center of family life, at least in Decatur, Texas. So every fall the Men’s “Brotherhood” would sponsor a “Father/Son Banquet” for the Royal Ambassadors (RAs) — Baptist Boy Scouts. And every fall from the time I was 6 until I was 10, when we moved to Fort Worth with my dad, I’d get a call from Johnny Ramey, a deacon at Decatur’s First Baptist Church, who, if memory serves, worked at the local Chevy dealership. “Billy,” he’d say, “I know your dad can’t make it, but I’ll take you to the Father/Son banquet. You’ll be my son for that night.” Over six decades later, the memory of that simple act remains my first cognitive lesson in Christian compassion, an entry point for spiritual formation.

These days, compassion seems elusive in American culture in general and American Christianity in particular. While Christian congregations and individuals offer compassionate witness and action every day, our theological squabbles, ecclesiastical divisions, and a tendency to write all sorts of people (right and left) out of the gospel often seem among our most distinguishing characteristics. For many observers we look downright mean, a public reputation more concerned with throwing people out than letting them in.

In a new book entitled, Mean Christianity: Finding our Way Back to Christ’s Likeness, Western Carolina University professor Billy Ogletree writes that such pietistic meanness “resonates with the experiences of countless individuals, yet it is absolutely antithetical to Christ and His teaching.” He asserts that, “A mean Christian claims Christ yet, at least some of the time, treats others in petty, offensive, or despicable ways. Selfishness may also motivate mean Christianity. Furthermore, a mean Christian may feel that their actions are justified, that their meanness is righteous.” Ogletree urges Christians to reconnect with Jesus as the primary guide toward forsaking the meanness that so easily besets us. Reading his impassioned study convinced me that we require a rebirth of compassion, and as quickly as possible.

Defining, let alone agreeing on, the nature of compassion is challenge enough. The Jewish Encyclopedia describes compassion in the Hebrew Bible as: “Sorrow and pity for one in distress, creating a desire to relieve, a feeling ascribed alike to man and God; in Biblical Hebrew, (“riḥam,” from “reḥem,” the mother, womb), “to pity” or “to show mercy” in view of the sufferer’s helplessness, hence also “to forgive” (Hab 3:2).”

In a 2017 Sojourners commentary entitled, “Can we Measure Christian Compassion in America,” Shively Smith writes: “In the Gospel of Matthew, the word for “compassion” (esplagchnisthē) occurs only five times, with Matthew 9:35-10:8 representing the first occurrence. Each time the language of compassion appears in the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus is the one feeling it after he has observed the state of those around him. He feels compassion for people afflicted physically and socially.” The Greek word literally means “from the bowels.” So from the womb or from the bowels; etymologically, biblical compassion begins in the depths of our being.

In Wishful Thinking, Frederick Buechner says that compassion “is the knowledge that there can never really be any peace and joy for me until there is peace and joy finally for you too.” In its most basic sense, compassion is “the sometimes fatal capacity for feeling what it’s like to live inside somebody else’s skin.”

Writing in Meditations of the Heart, Howard Thurman distinguishes between pity as a “mixture of pride, arrogance, cunning,” and compassion, “the awareness that where my life begins is where our life begins; the awareness that the sensitiveness to your needs cannot be separated from the sensitiveness to my needs; the awareness that the joys of my heart are never mine alone — nor are my sorrows.” Compassion, he insists, is God “enlarging the boundaries of my heart.” This gospel-compassion is no mushy sentimentalism, but a liberating response to and for human beings, a radical kindness that sometimes outdistances our best efforts to control its boundaries.

Such gospel-compassion overtakes marginalized folks even when we try to withhold it from them. In slavery time, Southern white church-members qualified the gospel by insisting that baptism changed only the slaves’ eternal status, not their early condition. But try as they might, they could not keep the gospel’s liberating power from engaging and liberating the souls of the black folks. So in 1807, a Kentucky slave woman named Winney was disciplined by the Forks of Elkhorn Baptist Church where she was a member for saying that “she once thought it her duty to serve her mistress and master, but since the Lord had converted her she had never believed that any Christian kept Negroes or slaves.” And she got into more trouble for saying “she believed there was thousands of white people wallowing in hell for their treatment to Negroes — and she did not care if there was as many more.” Winney’s Baptist congregation “excluded” her from membership, but her witness remains, a conversion-based compassion that made chattel slavery a gospel impossibility. Whose conversion-compassion are we “excluding” right now?

That Baptist slave-woman-forebear teaches us this: A rebirth of compassion is inseparable from conversion, not as Jesus vaccination, but as a continuing religious experience with the resurrected Christ. We encounter a rebirth of our identity as followers of the Jesus Way, a compassion that compels us to revisit the meaning of the gospel at every human/humane turn.

So the Jesus of the Gospels becomes the radical hermeneutic for interpreting his and our message. Just when you think you know where he’s headed and where the kingdom of God is taking you, Jesus challenges yet another religious assumption, offers compassion to yet another theological and cultural “loser” — a “demoniac,” a Syro-Phoenician outsider female, a man the disciples thought blind because of his or his parents’ sin. In short, Jesus upends the accepted biblical/theological hermeneutic for the sake of compassion. Scary gospel; radical compassion; sinners reborn (again and again). Amen.