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Stand and withstand
Commissioner DAVID EDWARDS, International Headquarters
An address delivered at the USA Eastern Territory's first Regional African Heritage Convention, Harlem, New York, October 1995. The script has been edited and slightly adapted for use here.
FOR THE CHILDREN of Israel, praise and thanksgiving to God did not come easily. Four hundred years of slavery had cultivated a spirit of complaint in them. As they wandered through the wilderness it was second nature with them to gripe and be ungrateful. Before they could become a mature people, enjoying a mature relationship with Jehovah God, they had to be rid of that spirit of complaint and rebellion. Before Israel could become a nation, she had to be taught the value of praise and Thanksgiving.
I believe that it was for this very reason that Moses introduced a religious system in which praise and celebration featured prominently. Religious festivals were celebrated regularly - festivals in which Israel acknowledged the goodness of God to them as a people. The Worship of God became central to their way of life. In this way praise and Thanksgiving to God became a central feature of their way of living.
In this final meeting of the Convention, I want to leave you with three challenges. These are as follows:
- Commit yourselves to praise and Thanksgiving;
- Stand up for truth and righteousness;
- Remember that we are all one in Christ Jesus.
The African-American experience
It is now more than 400 years since a Dutch man o' war sailed up the River James and landed the first generation of African-Americans at Jamestown, Virginia. Since then the African-American experience has not been a happy one. In spite of the significant progress which has been made over the last 40 years, that is still so.
The African-American has a lot to complain about. The lesson which Moses taught his people is just as relevant to the African-American situation today as it was hundreds of years ago for his people. For us to become a mature people, enjoying mature relationships with each other and with our God, we have to get rid of that spirit of complaint.
We have to learn the value of praise and thanksgiving to God. Praise and thanksgiving has to become a central feature of our way of living.
Minority within a minority
For many of you, it has not been easy being African-American and a Salvationist. There has been a lot to complain about. It has not been easy being a minority in an organization that is itself in the minority. It must be difficult as an African-American to try and convince other African-Americans that they are just as important to The Salvation Army as anybody else.
In some communities, African-American Salvationists might even be viewed with some degree of suspicion. It might even be a struggle to try and convince yourselves that the abounding opportunities which the Army offers are open to all, regardless of race, colour or sex.
In spite of all that, I am going to challenge you to cultivate a spirit of praise and Thanksgiving.
Praise for the past
The early missioners of The Salvation Army in the USA displayed a strong commitment to minister to African-Americans. In his book 'Marching to Glory', a book about the history of The Salvation Army in the USA, Ed McKinley makes the following observation (pp.64-65):
To the many obstacles that stood in the way of Army work generally was added the insurmountable fact of racial antipathy, against which even God's grace was not proof ... Major Frank Smith [believed] ... that the Army would be 'the first Christian community in America' that would 'faithfully and wholly break down the wall of partition', separating the races.
He tells how Smith laid strategic plans for the mission to African-Americans, even risking the anger of poor, white, working-class people, who formed the bulk of their supporters, by doing so. McKinley tells of the action of two white officers who tried to save a black man from being lynched by a white mob. He tells of the campaign by The War Cry of those early days to stop acts of lynching of black people.
We have to admire the courage and foresight of these missioners.
We have to thank God for them and for The Salvation Army.
We have to thank God for what has been done by The Salvation Army for African-Americans over the years, despite our limited success in encouraging African-Americans to become Salvation Army soldiers.
We have to thank God for what has been achieved by African-Americans in The Salvation Army over the years, in spite of the apparent lack of opportunity. We also have to thank God for the contributions of those African-Caribbean officers who came to
America at the time when it was difficult to recruit African-Americans as officers. They came and helped to build the Army in America.
We have to thank God for the progress that they have made as African-Americans today in The Salvation Army.
In his letter to the Ephesians Paul also drew attention to the need for us to stand up for truth and righteousness. He wrote:
(Ephesians 6:14).Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled round your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place
Philosophy of Anancy
As a child growing up in the Caribbean, I heard a number of stories about Brer Anancy.
Anancy is the Spider of African folklore. The stories of Brer Anancy were brought, I am told, from West Africa by our forefathers when they were carried as slaves to the West Indies. There was something about Anancy's character that appealed to the slave.
He was small and vulnerable. His life was always under threat from such animals as Brer Tiger and Brer Crocodile. They were always after Brer Anancy to kill and eat him. Anancy, however, was always able to outsmart them.
From these stories the picture we get of Anancy is that of a confidence trickster. He was forever capable of getting the better of the other animals by lying or telling half-truths, often playing them at their own game. He was just better at playing it than they.
Anancy was a survivor.
I don't know whether you use these stories of Anancy here in America but they were quite popular with us as children in the Caribbean. They reflect values and attitudes which, while they helped our people survive the harsh realities of their lives under slavery, tend to keep them in mental slavery even to this day.
The philosophy of Anancy is one that suggests that you always have to live by your wits; that you can try your hand at getting something for nothing; that manipulation is an important survival skill that we must master; that everyone has his price - if you can find out what that price is, you can buy them.
It is a philosophy of half truth, self-deception and downright lies.
Half truths
Let me give you some examples of some of the half truths we are asked to accept. One is that we must be excused from the demand for merit on the grounds that we are of a particular race or sex, or social status.
While I can understand and appreciate the need for affirmative action, our race, our sex. or our social status must never cause us to accept mediocrity in ourselves or from others. Nor should we use the same to justify dishonesty and criminality.
Another half truth we have been asked to accept is that black men in America and the Caribbean have been taught to behave irresponsibly towards women because of their experience from slavery.
Professor Carl Stone of the University of the West Indies once remarked in response to someone who was excusing certain tendencies on the basis of the slave experience that 'We might be victims of history, but we must never remain captive.'
Mental slavery
Yet another Anancyism that we are asked to accept, and so subtly, is that those of us in authority who are black are unable to conduct ourselves with objectivity when dealing with black people. This can display itself in three ways, or rather it comes from three directions:
- from the white person who feels threatened by our colour;
- from the black person who thinks that we are afraid of white people and therefore intimidated by their colour;
- and it comes from the black brother who wants a favour from us and therefore asks that whatever we do we must remember that we too are black.
Such behaviour questions our objectivity. It is manipulative. It is deceptive. In other words it is plain and simple Anancyism at its worst.
We have to rid ourselves of such mental slavery. We have to reject any action that is intended to deceive, manipulate, or enslave. We have to stand up for truth and righteousness.
I believe that a new day has come for the African-American in The Salvation Army. Any place is possible for African-Americans so long as they have the talent and the competence to do the job. It is important that we take note of that fact.
Just as African-Americans expect that the Salvation Army administration should ask no more of them than it does of other Americans, so we should ask no more of the administration than is asked by other Americans. In other words we should not expect any favours simply because we are African-American.
This new day, of which I speak, will place a heavy responsibility upon African-Americans to act with integrity. Let us have respect for ourselves. Let us have respect for others. Let us resist the temptation to manipulate or deceive.
All one in Christ Jesus
The focus in this convocation has been upon the African-American experience. While it may not have been openly mentioned or discussed implicit in all of our deliberations has been this issue of race.
Very early in the life of the Church, race became an issue. In Acts 4:32 we read that, 'All the believers were one in heart and mind.' This was true in so far as they were Jews or decided to become Jews. Most of the early Christians were Jews who wanted to preserve that heritage within the context of their newly-found faith. This pride in their cultural heritage caused very serious problems of racial bigotry within the early Church.
In one incident recorded in Acts 6: 1-10 we read of a breakdown in the daily distribution of food supplies. Jews from the Aramaic speaking community, who apparently had responsibility for the distribution, were accused of neglecting the Greek widows.
In another incident Peter was criticized by the circumcised believers for going into the house of a Gentile. They demanded an explanation from Peter for going into the house of an uncircumcised man.
There was a faction in the early Church that was intent on making every convert to Christianity an adherent of Judaism and despite the ruling of the Jerusalem Council, they continued to harass the gentile converts to Christianity.
In his letter to the Galatians Paul taught that Christianity transcends all differences. He wrote:
(Galatians 3:26-28).There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise
To the Ephesians Paul wrote that God's purpose in Christ was:
(Ephesians 2:15).to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace
God, through Christ, reached across the barriers of cultural differences between Jew and Gentile and made one people. In Christ Jesus therefore, black and white, American and Russian, English and Irish, Israeli and Palestinian, Jew and Gentile are all one people.
Reconciliation through the Spirit
In 1991 I attended the Congress for the Evangelization of the Caribbean which was held in the Dominican Republic. It was shortly after the military coup in Haiti. The Conference was attended by a large delegation of Haitian Christians.
In a very moving witness addressed particularly to the Haitian Christians, a young woman from Dominica told how she was so impressed by the contribution of her Haitian brothers and sisters both in music and in the delivery of the word that when she went back home the previous evening she began praying for Haiti.
She then proceeded to confess the abuse that her people had meted out to Haitians who had the misfortune to seek refuge in the Dominican Republic and she publicly asked the forgiveness of every one of the Haitian people present in that meeting.
In a symbolic gesture of reconciliation Dr Dieumeme Noeliste, a Haitian, went to the platform and following a similar confession of abuse by his people against Dominicans, the two embraced each other.
There was not a dry eye in that conference hall.
This is what the Spirit does in our lives.
The Spirit brings peace and love in our hearts and in our relationships. We no longer harbour within us the bitter feelings of race, nationality or ethnicity. We become one in Christ.
In closing I challenge you to search your own hearts. Ask God to give you a love for all people regardless of how they look, or where they may have come from. Remember that in Christ Jesus we are all one.
Commissioner DAVID EDWARDS was a corps officer, then DYS, DC, training principal, FS and CS in his home territory. Service in USA Eastern as Asst to the CS then DC, New Jersey, preceded appointment to IHQ as Undersecretary for the Americas and Caribbean.
He returned to the Caribbean as TC in 1990, and became the International Secretary for the Americas and Caribbean in 1995.
