don't feel no ways tired--
Come too far from where I started from
Nobody told me that the road would be easy--
I don't believe He brought me this far to leave me.
--James Cleveland, gospel singer & composer

The above words are from a song our own St. A's gospel choir sang on Sunday, Feb. 25, 2007 in celebration of Black History Month. On this day we'll also be honoring a remarkable man--Absalom Jones, sometimes called the "Black
Bishop of the Episcopal Church."

Not too many people may recognize his name today. But the words of this song express beautifully what Jones must have been feeling as he had to struggle with the religious and social establishment of his time -- a pre-Revolutionary
time in the American Colonies, when slavery was an accepted fact of life. Here's his story:

Absalom Jones was born a house slave in 1746 on a farm in rural Delaware, indentured from his birth. But the boy was smart and eager to learn. He taught himself to read out of the New Testament and any other books he could get his hands on.

When he was 16 his whole family was split apart. His parents and siblings were all sold off as slave property to different masters. Jones himself was sold to a store owner in Philadelphia, and so had to adapt from a rural life to an
urban one. But his eagerness for learning persisted. He went to a Quaker-run night school. At 20 he married another slave and bought her freedom with his earnings. At 38 he managed to buy his own freedom.

Jones served as lay minister for the black membership of St. George's Methodist Episcopal Church, a membership that dramatically increased under his leadership -- so much so that the white vestry became alarmed, and tried to segregate the congregation, relegating the black parishioners to an upstairs gallery. When ushers attempted to remove them, the black worshippers indignantly walked
out in a body.

In 1787 the Free African Society was formed, the first organized Afro-American society, with Jones as one of its overseers. The Society built a church in 1794, and applied for membership in the Episcopal Diocese of Pennsylvania. In
1795 Jones was ordained a deacon, and in 1802 was ordained an Episcopal priest-- one of the first two black Americans to receive formal ordination in any denomination.

Absalom Jones died Feb. 13, 1818, a man well-loved by his congregation and his community. He had a life-long persistent faith that God would never desert him. As the song we sing says: "Nobody told me that the road would be easy--I don't believe He brought me this far to leave me."