True to Our Native Land, page 101
“Antidotes for Fear” is an exegetical study of 1 John 4:18. While acknowledging the helpful dimension of fear, King argues that some fears are abnormal, like imagined snakes under a carpet. “Our problem is not to be rid of fear but rather to harness and master it.”20 Love masters fear. Such love is not soft but strong and unflinching. This type of love casts out personal fears (e.g., aging) as well as widely held fears (e.g., racial injustice). “Not arms, but love, understanding, and organized goodwill can cast out fear. Only disarmament, based on good faith, will make mutual trust a living reality.”21 He continues, “If our white brothers are to master fear, they must depend not only on their commitment to Christian love but also on the Christ-like love which the Negro generates toward them.”22 King lived this love ethic, and many today continue to be influenced by his example.23
Another outstanding African American interpretation of this same passage comes from the late Bishop Joseph A. Johnson Jr. In his magnum opus, Proclamation Theology, Johnson argues that the nature of God is love and that Black Americans experience this divine love in spite of the discriminatory society in which they encounter life. Moreover, he criticizes white theologians for being preoccupied with God in abstraction, while Black theologians address the role of God as Sustainer. While fully acknowledging the reality and necessity of divine wrath, Johnson asserts that divine love has healing power, is fully manifest in Christ Jesus, and is outgoing, merciful, redemptive.24
Proclamation Theology
Joseph A. Johnson Jr. was a bishop in the Christian Methodist Episcopal (CME) Church at the time of his death. Prior to that he was a professor of New Testament at the Interdenominational Theological Center (ITC) in Atlanta. He had a PhD from Vanderbilt and a ThD from Iliff. Proclamation Theology is an excellent example of a Black American, biblically based neo-orthodox systematic theology. It represents a strong tradition in the Black church that theology must be relevant to be worthwhile. This work has not received the attention it deserves even in the African American community.
1 John
1:1–4, Prologue
Many have correctly noted that the prologue of 1 John (1:1–4) echoes John 1 in many ways.25 Though 1 John is not a typical letter, it still contains a message for a specific audience.26 Both John and 1 John refer to “the beginning.” While the Gospel refers to creation, the epistle refers to the birth of the Johannine tradition. In this subtle way, the writer joins creation and tradition, the past and the present. Moreover, the writer identifies the word of life as the incarnation, the coming of the Son of God in the flesh, Jesus Christ. It is precisely the incarnation that has been heard, seen, and touched by members of the community. Repeatedly, the author stresses the need to confess (1) that the Son of God came in the flesh and (2) that Jesus was that Son. Verse 2 continues the incarnation theme and then equates it with eternal life: “the eternal life that was with the Father and was made manifest to us” refers rhetorically to Jesus. Continuing in verse 3, John states that the gospel was established so that his audience might have fellowship with God and Christ by means of the Johannine tradition. If one adheres to this tradition, one’s joy shall be complete (v. 4).27 In these four verses, John not only advocates keeping the tradition but also asserts that by adhering to it one can maintain an unbroken fellowship with God. Finally, there is an unbroken line in this tradition from God to Jesus to John and to John’s audience. We have here an emphasis upon a given historical tradition and the importance of being faithful to it in order to be saved.28
Homecoming
Many Black congregations celebrate an annual “homecoming” to commemorate the founding of that congregation. Former members often return at this time to see family and old friends and to reminisce. A major feature of these gatherings is the reading of the church history during the afternoon service. In this way, homecoming becomes a means of passing the tradition on to the younger generation.
Moreover, many Black American families have “family historians” who can retain family history for several generations. Their histories are usually transmitted orally, but more are being written. Many family historians can accurately transmit pre-emancipation history. This mode of keeping history probably goes back to the west African griot, who retained family histories for an entire tribe. In these and other ways, tradition plays an important role in African American culture.
1:5–2:11, Light and Darkness
1:5–2:2
John next states that the tradition comes from Jesus; however, this aspect of the tradition is not about Christ but about God the Father. John employs dualistic language by associating light with God and darkness with falsehood (cf. John 1:9).29 Dualism is often employed when two sides believe that their positions are mutually exclusive (see v. 6). Neither side wants to compromise.
Dualism has played a significant role in the African American community. We have noted above both the positive and negative possibilities of a dualism. American culture has said that Black was bad, but African American culture has asserted that “Black is beautiful.” In the process, African Americans have affirmed their dignity, researched their history, established the positive contributions by people of African descent from biblical times to the present, and contributed to a sense of self-worth in a hostile environment. John wants as much for his community.
Fellowship is an important concern in the Johannine epistles. One proves that one has fellowship with God by having fellowship with those in community (1:7a). As is often the case, 1 John connects fellowship with salvation (v. 7b). The argument goes as follows: fellowship with those in community demonstrates that one has fellowship with God, and such fellowship shall lead to one’s salvation. Again, note the tradition: John passes on to his readers what has been given to him. In this way, he hopes to separate himself from his theological opponents.30 John’s argument is that Christians must live a righteous life (“walk in the light”). This implies that his adversaries did not walk in the light and that neither side wanted to compromise.
Black leaders in predominantly white denominations have often not received the respect their offices and their skills demand. Their ministries have been limited frequently to their own ethnic community. Such practices have disrupted true fellowship in these denominations. What are Christians to think when their brothers and sisters in Christ treat them with the same disdain that they experience in society at large? The need for authentic Christian fellowship becomes more acute in such circumstances.
Verses 8–10 discuss sin and forgiveness. It appears as though John’s opponents professed that they “have no sin” (v. 8). Some might cogently argue that it is difficult to know whether they actually espoused this, since none of their writings have survived. However, I suggest that 1:8–10 represents the teachings of John’s antagonists while 2:1–2, 3:6, 8–9 and 5:18 are John’s hyperbolic statements to prove a point.
The point of 1:8–10 is to show the inadequacy of his opponents’ theology. First and foremost, John asserts that everyone sins. To believe otherwise is to deceive oneself (v. 8). Confession must precede God’s forgiveness (v. 9). The author reiterates earlier points in different words in v. 10.
Verses 8–10 represent three parallel statements on sin and forgiveness. In these parallels, the statements in vv. 8 and 10 are about human actions, while v. 9 is about God’s actions. The first parallel consists of the statements, “If we say we have no sin” (v. 8), “If we confess our sins” (v. 9), and “If we say we have not sinned” (v. 10). The first and third statements are about the human condition; the second, about God. Verse 9 tells us that if we acknowledge our transgressions, God will pardon us and put us in right relationship with God. Only God can accomplish this. This pattern is repeated in the second parallel, “We deceive ourselves” (v. 8), “he is faithful and just” (v. 9), and “we make him a liar” (v. 10). Again, the first and third statements are about humans; the second, about God. The third parallel is “the truth is not in us” (v. 8), “he will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (v. 9), and “his word is not in us” (v. 10). Again we note that the first and last statements are about humans; the middle, about God. Verses 8 and 10 are synonymous parallels that address inappropriate human actions, and they sandwich v. 9, which discusses God’s forgiveness of human sin.31
Fellowship
Fellowship is very important within the Black church. For example, the church became the place where African Americans could be themselves in music, in preaching, in response to preaching, and in many other ways in the days prior to and even after integration. Thus, in this sense the African American church became an important place where one could enjoy being Black in a setting where one’s culture is affirmed, confirmed, and validated. Moreover, these feelings of pride are reinforced as congregations create fellowship together across denominational lines. Fellowship within the group has the power to compensate for being marginalized by the general society. This is why fellowship was so important within Johannine Christianity. (For example, my home church when I was a boy was Methodist. Our choir participated in two “singing conventions,” in which area choirs met on Sunday afternoons on a regular basis to sing. One convention was solely Methodist; the other ecumenical. Years after the conventions dissolved people continued to talk about the excellent fellowship at those gatherings.)
In 2:1–2, John explicitly states how forgiveness occurs. John refers to his readers as “my little children” (2:1). This is at once a term of endearment and a statement of his spiritual parentage on their behalf. He states that if they do sin, they have an advocate (paraklētos; cf. John 14:16–17, 26; 15:26; 16:7–11) who will intercede for them with the Father, “Jesus Christ the righteous.” Here is a clear example of the Paraclete concept in the Johannine community. The Paraclete is a name for the Holy Spirit in John 14–16, where Jesus promises to send the community “another Paraclete” (14:16), implying that Jesus is the first Paraclete. At the very least, some in the community understood that Jesus was the first Paraclete and the Holy Spirit the second. In other words, the first Paraclete represented the word of God in his person; the second re-presented by spiritual means the witness of Jesus to the Johannine community.
John states in 2:2 that Jesus Christ is the means by which the sins of the entire world are removed (hilasmos). There has been much discussion as to the precise meaning of hilasmos.32 Some argue that it should be translated “expiation,” while others argue for “propitiation.” Raymond Brown makes a helpful distinction between the two terms: expiation refers to the offended person, propitiation to the offense itself.33
It is quite possible that John was not as refined a thinker as his modern exegetes and that he thought of Jesus as the means to remove the effects of human sin in a way that included aspects of both terms.34 In 2:1 the author states that Christ is an advocate before God, the one who is offended; 2:2 refers to the transgression itself. Thus, both expiation and propitiation are relevant terms. A better translation might be “and he is the means of the removal of our sins.” Such a translation does justice to both terms, while effectively communicating John’s intended meaning. John was not a systematic theologian trained in linguistic analysis. We should not expect him to be as precise or as consistent (cf. 2:1–2 and 5:18) as we would like him to be. He was a church leader attempting to exhort his readers to remain faithful to their tradition by any means possible.
Why have others not seen this? A Eurocentric approach is often an either/or approach that imposes a post-Enlightenment, Western European/North American perspective on an ancient eastern Mediterranean text. Such an approach assumes a logic that is not always at home in John’s Greco-Roman religious milieu. Religious literature, often written by non-professional or non-academic persons, is often more flexible and less precise than theological/philosophical literature written from an academic and professional perspective. A good example is Sunday school literature. Most Black denominations have their own publishing houses, and Sunday school lessons are written by seminary graduates in such a way that persons with a sixth-grade education can understand them. The aim is to make sound theological principles and concepts accessible to a more general audience. The Johannine epistles are much closer to Sunday school lessons than to philosophical/theological essays.
2:3–11
In this section John contrasts those who keep God’s commandments with those who do not. In particular, he refers to the love command (vv. 5, 10; see also John 13:34–35). He argues for ethics over theology, walking the walk, not just talking the talk (see also 3:18).35 Those who say “I know him” should love their sisters and brothers in the faith as well (for God is love, 4:7). The fact that they do not love their siblings in the faith is a clear indication, if not demonstration, that they do not actually know God. However, true Christians obey God’s commandments and have the truest, most complete type of love. Only this love connotes and denotes Christian discipleship (vv. 3–6). Often African Americans have not experienced Christian love from other Christians. From the trials of Richard Allen, James Pennington, Lemuel Haynes, James Walker Hood, William Paul Quinn, and many others, Black Christians know too well that Christian love has not been extended to them. John struggles to prevent this same lack of love from destroying his community.
Grandma Theology
In the late 1970s, Black seminarians at Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas began to describe their theology as “Grandma Theology.” Their goal was to express their theology in terms that any African American grandmother with a third-grade education could understand and hopefully affirm with a strong “Amen!” John attempts to do the same thing for his readers. The book is relatively free of technical terms and repeats traditional expressions important to the community. In this way, John wants to his readers to say “Amen!” to his message to them.
John returns to tradition in vv. 7–11. He begins by addressing his readers as “Beloved.” In other words, they both possess and express the love that his antagonists do not (v. 7). He then states that he is not teaching something new but something old; that is, he is repeating the tradition (“the word that you have heard”). For some reason, he then contradicts the preceding statement by referring to a new commandment and then employs dualistic, apocalyptic imagery.36 “The darkness is passing away” is an apocalyptic expression that means that the end of the world—or of this present age—is near. The contrast between the darkness and the light in this passage, an example of dualism, is also an apocalyptic motif. It is a symbolic means of denoting evil from righteousness.37 John’s point is that Christians must love comrades within the sacred community as a sign of one’s righteousness (vv. 9–11).
In the introduction I commented on the love command and the sectarian nature of the Johannine community. I now address it from a different perspective. Many African American Christians have experienced the lack of application of the love command by Christians from other ethnic communities (and, regrettably, vice versa in some cases) that have espoused a love ethic that they have enacted in limited fashion. It has been applied only to persons within one’s ethnic community. Only those persons within the community can be right and righteous.
More recently, some predominantly white denominations have drawn lines of theological demarcation. One example is the struggle within the Southern Baptist tradition between the fundamentalists, who now control the Southern Baptist Convention, and the more moderate Cooperative Baptist Fellowship. The result has been the widespread dismissal of non-fundamentalists in every segment of the denomination. The moderates have been expelled from the SBC as though they are not legitimate Christians. They have not been loved. This experience has not made the vast majority of the moderates more sensitive to those groups that have been suppressed historically. While the American Baptist Convention may be too liberal for the moderates, there are moderate African American Baptist conventions with which they hold more in common. However, that possibility is probably contingent upon the SBC refugees taking the major leadership roles. The odds that Black Baptist leaders would succumb to this are quite minimal. For example, the Baptist Theological Seminary in Richmond, which closed recently, never had any meaningful relationship with Virginia Union University in Richmond, a Black Baptist institution. However, they had a longstanding relationship with the predominantly white Union Presbyterian Seminary in Richmond. One common error among many CBF seminaries has been the attempt to revive the Southern Seminary tradition before their expulsion without acknowledging the racist origins of the seminary or asking how they might better serve their regions in the present.
The lone CBF exception is the Baptist Seminary of Kentucky, which (in 2017) became a part of Simmons College of Kentucky, an HBCU in the Baptist tradition. As an academic unit within Simmons, BSK has revamped its curriculum to reflect its place in an HBCU. As a result, in 2020, BSK became the official seminary of the National Baptist Convention of America International, Inc., an African American majority denomination. This union has made both institutions stronger financially and spiritually.38
2:12–3:10, God’s True Offspring
2:12–14
There is a threefold parallel that includes children, fathers and youths. In the first sequence, the elder writes to children to assure them that their sins have been forgiven because of their fidelity to Christ; to fathers because they have known Christ from the beginning; to youth because they have overcome Satan. All the verbs are in the present tense.
