Transcription
The Pentecostal movement really started with a coming together of the races at Azusa Street. They call that a line had been erased at Azusa Street, but it was redrawn through the years. The Pentecostal movements between Anglo and African-American drifted apart. There was not much of any relationship. There had been instances of brutality and racism that had impacted big black people of our nation, and then the races were divided, especially our Pentecostal and conservative Christian brethren who had not participated to a great degree in efforts to obtain civil rights and freedom for black people in the United States. The Jews and Methodists and the Episcopal had rushed to our side during the demonstrations, and they were involved, but we were kind of broken by those who were most like us theologically. Doctor to me, the father is away from us in terms of the fight for civil rights.
I was on the board of the Pentecostal Fellowship of North America. They all played—I'm barely grew up for Pentecostal denominations—and we voted to dissolve to form the integrated PCC-NAPE because it was basically did not include any of the African-American churches. So in a meeting, we rewrote the Constitution, disbanded the PFN, and wrote the constitution for a Pentecostal Charismatic Churches of North America at which the African-American churches were in on the ground floor and part of that, the beginning of the organization. This was a new call, and when we heard that call, we responded to it, and with joy we came in 1994 to Memphis expecting to share our hearts. Then everything's are for me to be there; my name came up and I was invited. I went really as a novice because not only was I naive, but I didn't hold a position of leadership with organizations or institutions like universities like most of the Brethren that I was sitting among.
So the Memphis meeting in 1994 was really historic in that it was bringing together again the sons and daughters and the grandchildren of these—it was a revival. It was a truly remarkable and emotional event. There were—there was indeed an electricity in the atmosphere. Well, coming to the meeting was an unusual experience. These were not the individuals that we were accustomed to associating with; they were not individuals who we knew well because we had had little involvement with one another. In looking around, quite frankly, I didn't know most of the African Americans; probably only knew one in the whole group, which was the shame of the great divide that occurred. You know, it was a learning experience for both whites and blacks at Memphis. I learned it's not just sin to actively participate in sin; it is sin to see sin and remain silent and do nothing.
And so I was particularly hurt when I heard the stories of black leaders expressing their hurt at the absence of the white church during the civil rights movement. In essence, it was a time of brokenness because the whites had some repenting to do and forgiveness to seek. We also had some repenting for prejudices that might have existed and resentments that might have been within us. Most of us who were white, I think, would have rather prayed over the past and just gone onto the future, and that's why I had this sense that if God didn't do something, that we were raking—raking the scabs off of some old wounds. To those minorities with us, they weren't old scabs; they were running sores, and that's why it had to be said. I was being stirred on the inside of—of being used to do something. I approached the head table. I knelt on one knee by the edge of Bishop Underwood's seat and I explained I perceived that the Holy Spirit is asking me to make an act of contrition on behalf of whites to blacks. If Bishop Clemens would approve, I am offering to publicly wash his feet as this act of contrition. Bishop Underwood said, with startled, "I think this is God," and he motioned to his some handlers to come over and help me get situated. If my memory serves me correctly, a white minister, Don Evans, just spontaneously had managed to secure a basin with some water. I remember praying that as it was the act of one brother—para—who caused an offense to our brother Seymour, so can there be one act. It will not erase all that has been, but it will establish a new beginning in the name of Jesus—in the name of Jesus. And I would represent white humanity and all of its ugliness and now all of its honorable efforts to begin anew and do something—to begin to write a new story.
I know our own general superintendent at the time, Thomas Trask, said to Bishop Charles Blake of the Church of God in Christ that he wanted to wash Bishop Blake's feet, and Bishop Blake responded that if you wash mine, yeah, I've gotta wash yours. I offered—I can't wash mine—and so he agreed, and he washed my feet. I watched his feet—his time of tears and weeping before the Lord and repentance—a begging God to forgive us. The net worth of the time that was created—that was a sense of coming together, a sense of unity—a sense and they were all one. Walls are broken down. We ate together, we talked together, and we found ourselves coming together in a very, very special way, and it was—it was just a world-shaking event. There was such a spirit of tenderness and forgiveness and reconciliation that we really felt in that moment. We had sensed again what they experienced—it is—is that there was an equality among us. We were united by our faith, not by our color, and that was very, very meaningful. I think what the Memphis miracle did—I mean in the aftermath of it—was to teach us that we've got to be sensitive and recognize that we have a responsibility as Christians to be agents of reconciliation and healing in our society. And so we sensed that it was a time of change, and as we look back on it, that was a significant turning point in relationships between Pentecostals.
So Memphis was a turnaround point for me. In fact, I think it was one of the most painful experiences I've had because when you look at the mirror of God's Word and see yourself as you really are, sometimes he's not very pretty. And there was a recognition—we are—we are in the same room, but we really don't know one another. This is just the beginning, and indeed it has been in the beginning because since 1994 we've seen, I think, a lot of progress—still a lot more to accomplish—but a lot of progress that's occurred. As a result, without the Memphis miracle, we would not be where we are at today. Not to say that it was the end of something—the accomplishment of everything that was needed—but it certainly did move us in the right direction and set the precedent for black/white relationships in the Pentecostal church from that time forward. It was the work of the Holy Spirit; there was no doubt about that, and the Spirit of God was moving and working in that meeting in a powerful way. I'll never forget it. We're making some rich, wonderful plans; we're looking to go forward into the future. I'm not looking back; I'm looking forward. I'm not looking at the negative; I'm gonna get the positive. I praise God for what he's doing, and I see us in the future, and we look much better than we look right now.