Wednesday, May 20, 2026

It is the 20th of May 2026. Welcome to the Christian History Almanac, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org; I’m Dan van Voorhis.

 

Not quite live from the new CHA studios in Mission Viejo, California… the first show in the new digs…

 

Ok, so Adoniram Judson is considered the first American missionary- his Mission to Burma began in 1812. William Carey is considered the father of missions- his departure to India was in 1793. But what if I told you that there was someone who preceded them- a missionary from the very new United States- a former slave and African American whose story is underrated and under-told. He was George Liele (looks like lee-lee, rhymes with smile), and he was ordained- the first African American Baptist preacher, on this the 20th of May in 1775, just one year before the Revolutionary War.

 

He was born to enslaved parents around 1750 in Virginia. His master, Henry Sharpe, would move to Georgia, where he would come under the influence of the Great Awakening- the Wesleys and Whitefield having preached their way through Georgia. Sharp became a member of the Buckhead Baptist Church and was installed as a deacon. He encouraged young George to come to church, and when George was saved in 1773, around the age of 23, Sharpe encouraged George to take the gospel to his fellow slaves. Sharp even George his manumission papers- freeing him as a slave in order to preach. Between 1773 and 1775, he established a congregation that would take root in Savannah as the First African Baptist Church of Savannah- the oldest of its kind (and one that I visited in 2018).

 

His former master took up arms on the side of the loyalists during the Revolution and was killed. Sharpe’s heirs would seek to re-enslave Liele- he would be jailed but released when he could provide his papers. Nevertheless, he decided that his ministry would be best outside of the states- and so he borrowed $700 from a British colonel and took his wife and four children to Kingston, Jamaica, in 1783 in order to preach to plantation slaves on that island. Thus, the first missionary to set out from America to preach the Gospel in foreign lands.

 

He spent two years in indentured servitude to pay off the 700 dollar loan and began preaching in the fields of Kingston before they could construct a proper chapel. As an unlicensed preacher in an English colony, he was repeatedly imprisoned, but this likely saw his stock rise in the eyes of the slaves who began showing up to be baptized in droves. He would preach from the Kingston racetrack, get arrested, and be freed, and would repeat this until he was eventually able to establish himself as more minister than agitator.

 

One of the landmark documents produced by Liele was his “The Covenant of the Anabaptist Church, Begun in America, December 1777, and in Jamaica, December 1783”- early Baptists often used the designation of “Anabaptist” to put themselves in line with the free church tradition (that is, not state church) that also baptized confessing Christians alone. This was part political document and part catechism.

 

It was an important document for the appeasement of the white Jamaican landowners as it directly stated that all members of the church would remain obedient to their masters. The politics of church and slavery were tricky- to grow, they believed they needed some level of protection. While the covenant called for obedience to masters, it also set up a separate legislative body for Christians to use for disputes with one another and called for the abolition of splitting families through the slave trade. The covenant legitimized and protected the church as it began to grow.

 

 

And grow they did. When George Liele first arrived, the number of Christian slaves was minuscule. By 1814, there were some 8,000 “Ethiopian”, as they were called, Christians. BY 1838, that number had ballooned to over 20,000. That was the same year that Baptist missionaries won full emancipation for all slaves. Today, Christianity remains the majority religion on the island nation. George Liele, born around 1750, ordained on this day in 1773, died sometime in the 1830s- not seeing the emancipation, but a large factor in it- and was the first ordained African American Baptist in America and the first missionary sent out from the new nation.

 

 

The Last word for today comes from the daily lectionary and John 3:

31 The one who comes from above is above all; the one who is from the earth belongs to the earth, and speaks as one from the earth. The one who comes from heaven is above all. 32 He testifies to what he has seen and heard, but no one accepts his testimony. 33 Whoever has accepted it has certified that God is truthful. 34 For the one whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God gives the Spirit without limit. 35 The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in his hands.

 

This has been the Christian History Almanac for the 20th of May 2026, brought to you by 1517 at 1517.org.

The show is produced by a man who always thought Mission to Burma was one of the better ’80s post-punk groups… he is Christopher Gillespie.

The show is written and read by a man who notes their influence on both Yo La Tengo and the Pixies… right? It was one line in the beginning, I’m sorry… I’m Dan van Voorhis.

You can catch us here every day- and remember that the rumors of grace, forgiveness, and the redemption of all things are true…. Everything is going to be ok.