The spirit of the Lord God is upon me
because the Lord has anointed me;
he has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed,
to bind up the brokenhearted,
to proclaim liberty to the captives
and release to the prisoners
Isaiah 61:1
STORY
William Sallis was born on Aug. 27, 1934, in Tremont, Mississippi. He graduated from Mississippi State University with a degree in education in 1956, after which he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Army.
He described himself as a “benign bigot” from Mississippi. He went on to say, “In other words, I honestly believed blacks were inferior.” Though, the Army changed that life orientation. It was only after serving with Black Army officers at Fort Knox in Kentucky, and reading seminal books like Vernon Lane Wharton’s The Negro in Mississippi: 1865-90, that Sallis began to move out of the conventional Mississippi way of thinking, a change reflected in his doctoral dissertation, The Color Line in Mississippi Politics, which he wrote at the University of Kentucky before receiving his Ph.D. in 1967. He then taught history at Millsaps College, in Jackson, Mississippi, from 1968 to 2000.
As a native of Mississippi, Sallis had grown up bathed in his state’s conventional racism. But he had long realized that most of what he had been taught in public school was wrong: Slave owners were not benevolent, Reconstruction was not a tale of Black corruption, and white supremacy was not inevitable.
He was also disturbed that the current high school textbook being used in classrooms had a discriminatory presentation towards African-Americans. The standard textbook Your Mississippi, written by John Bettersworth, suggested that Reconstruction had been a period of unmitigated horror visited upon white people by Blacks, along with countless other racist falsehoods.
Sallis took upon himself a campaign to change the way young people in Mississippi thought about their state. In 1970, as the civil rights revolution raged, Sallis, a history professor at the relatively liberal Millsaps College, along with James Loewen, who was teaching nearby at the historically Black Tougaloo College, sat down to rethink their state’s past. They were joined by a small team of students and faculty from both schools.
Over the next four years the group produced a ninth-grade history textbook. The finished product was a textbook titled Mississippi: Conflict & Change. The academic volume was vigorous, frank, and unsparing in its review of the state’s grim history that the Mississippi State Textbook Purchasing Board barred its use in schools almost as soon as it appeared. Only after five years of struggles in court against stubborn state officials, a trial and a federal judge’s order in 1980 that Mississippi must allow the textbook to be used in the state’s schools.
Called to explain himself and the book at trial, Sallis was modest, saying that he and his colleagues had simply wanted to prepare a textbook that would be “an antidote or remedy to correct the racial imbalance in traditional Mississippi texts.” In an earlier deposition he decried “the failure of the nation to live up to its commitment of equality.”
DEVOTION
There are some Bible verses that bring us spirituals comfort. Other biblical passages give us a blueprint for living. Then there are those scriptural commands that thunder us forth into civic involvement. Such is the verse from our devotional reading this morning – we are to liberate the oppressed in society.
Oppression can take on many forms. Most often we think of political, racial, and sexual oppression. Though, let us not be myopic on this topic. There can be oppression at work, oppression in a marriage, oppression in a social club, and yes, one can even experience oppression in the church.
Isaiah was a prophet in Judah who was called forth to extol the leaders to rekindle their covenant relationship with God. They were to trust God for deliverance, disavowing any desire for a political and military alliance with Egypt. They had also become selfish and indulgent leaders, who had forsaken the welfare of their constituents. Isaiah summoned these men to be righteous and benevolent rulers. King Ahaz and his cohorts dismissed Isaiah and his message, resulting in a decapitated land.
Like Isaiah, we are appointed to be prophets in the land where we reside. You and I are to far removed from the power structure of Columbia and Washington to make a national and international difference, though we can be an outspoken voice in Florence. Our voice doesn’t have to be loud and boisterous; it can be very quiet and serene. In fact, we may not need a voice at all if our actions speak louder than our words.
The calling to be a social activist is quite simple – it simply means to be aware of the plight of others. We then do what we can to help, knowing that assistance can be manifested in multiple ways. The range, known to us all, is from a financial gift to offering a ride, from speaking to the oppressor to listening to the one oppressed, from befriending an individual to participating in group protest.
Donald Trump made a campaign stop at the National Religious Broadcasters association at the Gaylord Opryland Resort and Convention Center in Nashville, Tennessee on Thursday night, February 22. In his rambling address he said that the extreme left has targeted religion in recent years aiming “to tear down crosses where they can, and cover them up with social justice flags.” He went on to say, “But no one will be touching the cross of Christ under the Trump administration, I swear to you.”
The forty-fifth president is correct that those we have ladled as “woke” are placing a shadow over our Judeo-Chrisitan values; though, we can never dismiss the need for a society to have “social justice flags.” Society needs a cross that is draped in a social justice flag.
Jesus lived in the image of Isaiah when he enthroned the words of the prophet as a statement of his mission, proclaiming, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favour.”
This must be our mission as well – to let the oppress go free as we proclaim this is the year of our Lord.
After the death of George Floyd, a Black man killed in 2020 by a white Minneapolis police officer, Michele Jenkins and Stephanie Moore, who have known each other for almost three decades felt compelled to do something that combined their faith and their desire to advance racial and social justice. They decided to write a translation of the Bible that addressed the issue of social justice.
Regarding the project Jenkins said, “Stephanie and I started talking, and really the question before us was: There’s so much happening, there’s injustice, we’re feeling oppressed. What are we supposed to do as Christians? Are we supposed to go into our prayer closets and not come out? Throw Molotov cocktails through Macy’s window? That’s what caused us to want to do this project, to talk about how we as faithful people are supposed to respond, no matter what’s thrown at us.”
The result is The Breathe Life Bible, that was published in February of this year, the title echoing Floyd’s repeated insistence “I can’t breathe” as he was restrained with the officer’s knee on his neck. The Bible includes devotions written by 30 Christian leaders. Each of these contributors expands upon different imperatives summed up in the acronym BREATHE: believe, reconcile, exalt, act, trust, hope, elevate.
The tome introduces each biblical book with a “Breathe It In” segment and features “Oxygen” tidbits that point to what the authors consider promises in the scriptural verses. There are sidebars labeled “Inhale” and “Exhale” for the purpose of reflection and meditation.
Moore explained that the Bible should encourage individuals to become involved, saying, “When you think about faith in action, there’s no other way to walk with the Lord than to have the Bible, every piece of it, your favorite scripture, what your pastor might say from the pulpit in taking a passage from the Word. It’s a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path.”
The spirit of the Lord God is upon you and he has sent you to bring good news to the oppressed.