One Night I Went to Church — Sermon Illustration Tuesday

One night I went to church

Confronted by rampant inequality and discrimination built into the laws, Black Christians were a driving force in making the American public confront the racism in our midst.

But what is important to remember is that it took a lot of courage, just like this story from Fannie Lou Hamer reminds us,

One night I went to church. They had a mass meeting. And I went to church, and they talked about how it was our right, that we could register and vote. They were talking about [how] we could vote out people that we didn’t want in office… that sounded interesting enough to me that I wanted to try it. I had never heard, until 1962, that black people could register and vote…

When they asked for those to raise their hands who’d go down to the courthouse the next day, I raised mine. Had it high up as I could get it. I guess if I’d any sense I’d a-been a little scared, but what was the point of being scared. The only thing they could do to me was kill me and it seemed like they'd been trying to do that a little bit at a time ever since I could remember.

Fannie Lou Hamer, in Modern America, qtd in The President's Devotional