Thabiti M. Anyabwile - The Faithful Preacher (Foreword by John Piper): Recapturing the Vision of Three Pioneering African-American Pastors

The FAITHFUL PREACHER

The Faithful Preacher

Copyright 2007 by Thabiti M. Anyabwile

Published by Crossway Books
a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers
1300 Crescent Street
Wheaton, Illinois 60187

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher, except as provided by USA copyright law.

Cover design: Jessica Dennis

Cover illustration: Jessica Dennis

First printing, 2007

Printed in the United States of America

Bible quotations are taken from the King James Version.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Anyabwile, Thabiti M., 1970
The faithful preacher : recapturing the vision of three pioneering African-American pastors / Thabiti M. Anyabwile.

1. African AmericansReligion. 2. African American clergy.
3. Pastoral theology. 4. Haynes, Lemuel, 1753-1833. 5. Payne, Daniel
Alexander, 1811-1893. 6. Grimk, Francis J. (Francis James), 18501937.
I. Title.

BR563.N4A59 2007
277.3'08092396073dc22

2006017146

MLY 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 07

15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Above all...
for the glory of Christ Jesus the Savior.

With thanks to the Father for Kristie, my wife,
the tangible expression of the Father's favor to me.
(Proverbs 18:22)

With thanks to God for Afiya and Eden, my daughters,
who lovingly asked, Daddy, hows the book coming?
and spurred me on to completion.

To my God and my Savior,
my wife, and my daughters... with love.

CONTENTS

The Character and Work of a Spiritual Watchman
Described (1792)

The Important Concerns of Ministers and the People of
Their Charge (1797)

The Sufferings, Support, and Reward of Faithful Ministers,
Illustrated (1820)

The Christian Ministry: Its Moral and Intellectual
Character (1859)

The Divinely Approved Workman: Semi-Centennial
Sermon (1874)

By John Piper

I have been happily drawn into this book because it embodies four passions of my life. First, it is rooted in the big biblical vision of the sovereign God called reformed theology. Second, it expresses the wise conviction that knowing history and biography will protect us from trendiness in the ministry and will reveal the blind spots of our own age and enrich us with the insights that other generations have received. Third, it mines the unknown riches of the African-American experience and lays hold on the truth that their suffering was not in vain but has treasures for our time not yet dreamed of. Fourth, it lifts us above the low, managerial, psychologized, pragmatic, organizational view of the pastoral office and sets us in the high, clean air and bright light of the biblical vision of what it means to be called to shepherd the blood-bought bride of Christ.

You are about to meet three African-American pastorsLemuel Haynes (17531833), Daniel A. Payne (18111893), and Francis Grimk (18501937). Their pastoral and educational ministries total over 130 years of faithfulness to Gods people. You will be introduced to them biographically by the able hand of Thabiti Anyabwile. Then you will meet them in their own words. This book is mainly to be prized as the never-before- gathered collection of African-American writings on the pastoral ministry from a time that spans 150 years and stretches across the terrible Civil War of our nation.

In this book we who are not African-American receive the double profit of reading not only across a culture but across the centuriesand thus across another culture. And, of course, that implies that the AfricanAmerican reader will read across another culture as well. My guess and my prayer is that these unusual crossings will weave our lives and ministries together in ways we have not foreseen.

There are surprises ahead. Did you know there was such a thing as black puritans? The author describes all three of these brothers like this: They were puritans. They committed themselves to sound theology in the pulpit, theologically informed practice in the church, and theologically reformed living in the world.

Did you know that, in the words of John Saillant, From Calvinism, this generation of black authors (referring specifically to Lemuel Haynes) drew a vision of God at work providentially in the lives of black people, directing their sufferings yet promising the faithful among them a restoration to his favor and his presence?

Did you know that in 1835 the South Carolina Assembly passed a law that said, [If] any free person of color or slave shall keep any school or other place of instruction for teaching any slave or free person of color to read or write, such free person of color or slave shall be liable to the same fine, imprisonment, and corporal punishment as are by this Act imposed and afflicted upon free persons of color and slaves for teaching slaves to read or write? This forced the closing of Daniel Paynes school and led him to work out his vision for an educated black ministry within the northern context of the African Methodist Episcopal Church and in the leadership of Wilberforce University in Ohio, the first institution of higher education owned and operated by African-Americans.

Did you know that it was even possible for a free black man (Lemuel Haynes) in the eighteenth century to marry a white woman and pastor an all-white congregation in Vermont for over thirty years?

Did you know that Charles Hodge, professor of theology at Princeton Seminary, taught African-American students such as Francis Grimk, who took the great reformed vision of God and spent his life working out its implications for race relations in the church while serving as pastor of 15th Street Presbyterian Church in Washington, D.C.?

So there will be surprises. But what should be no surprise is that there are treasures of biblical wisdom in centuries before our own and in cultures not our own. I love the blow this book makes against chronological snobbery and ethnocentricity. May the Lord of the Church, for the good of His people and the ingathering of His lost sheep and the glory of His name, give this book good success.

John Piper
Pastor for Preaching and Vision,
Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis

God, in His kindness, allows some men and women to set ideas into print and to see those ideas published for others. Such an opportunity is a great blessing. And that blessing is accompanied by other blessings in the form of loved ones, family and friends, and critics who support your efforts and make it better. This acknowledgments page is an acknowledgment of both blessings from God.

To God alone belongs any praise for any edification that this volume offers the reading world. To God alone belongs the praise for the fruitfulness of the men and ministries featured here. To God alone belongs the praise for providentially ordering my reading life so that I would be introduced to these men and find opportunity to assemble a sampling of their work. I acknowledge God in all these things and more; to Him belongs the glory.

I thank God always when I remember my wife, Kristie, who without fail is my biggest encourager and cheerleader. She has ever had my back in life and ministry. Sweetie, I see you in my eyes.

I thank God too for Afiya and Eden, my daughters. Its an indescribable pleasure to have your six- and four-year-old daughters interested in your ministry. Thank you, girls, for all the times you stopped by my desk with snacks and presents and to ask, Daddy, hows your book coming? I pray and trust there are crowns in heaven for you for your tender example of love and service.