Tempie Cummins’ mother was a cook for her slave owner's family. Tempie told the story of how her mother would hide in the chimney corner and eavesdrop on dinner conversations. One day in 1865, she overheard her owner say that slavery had ended, but he wasn’t going to let his slaves know until they harvested another crop or two. Upon hearing this news, her mother walked out of the kitchen and shouted – “I’m free, I’m free!” She then ran to the field and told all the other slaves, held in bondage their whole lives, that they, too, were free!*
That is why Juneteenth is now a national holiday. It is a day to celebrate the end of slavery in this nation! It is a celebration of the day that the nation began a journey to right the corporate wrong of slavery and the accompanying social, spiritual, and economic injustices practiced by one people against another. So, on this June 19, let’s not just celebrate the end of the dreaded chapter of slavery, but let this holiday also be a day to recommit ourselves to extinguish all forms of oppression, prejudice, and injustice as well as to proclaim the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ who will, in our hearts as well at the “end of days,” right all wrongs and bring the justice that all oppressed, throughout the ages, have been clamoring for.
President,
Robert Folkenberg Jr.
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