The Moses of Her People

It was a kind of active faith in liberation that led to Harriet Tubman being called The Moses of her People.

Harriet’s propensity to step out in faith began at a young age. When she was only five years old, she was rented out as a nursemaid and was whipped every time the baby in the family cried. At the age of 12, she saw one of her masters prepare to throw a heavy weight at an enslaved man who had tried to escape. Harriet bravely stepped in front of the man, and the weight struck her head instead, leaving her to deal with severe headaches and narcolepsy over the course of her life.

When two of Harriet’s brothers, Ben and Henry, discovered they were going to be sold, Harriet began formulating a plan for the three of them to escape. Several of their sisters had already been sold further south, and she was not going to lose her brothers, too. However, halfway through their escape, Ben and Henry became scared of what might lie ahead. The risk, they said, was just too great, and they decided to go back. Harriet remarkably made the rest of the journey on her own.

She finally crossed into Pennsylvania and found work in Philadelphia, but she did not stay there long. She was not satisfied living free, knowing so many of her friends and family were still in slavery. She put her life on the line, time and time again, to return to the South to help more people escape. Her success became so well known that owners of the enslaved soon posted a $40,000 reward for her capture or death, but even that didn’t stop her.

In 1850 the Fugitive Slave Act allowed fugitive and free enslaved people in the north to be captured and enslaved again. This made Harriet’s work that much harder and forced her to lead people even further north to Canada. Nevertheless, she persisted. She went on to participate in the Civil War – not only as a nurse but also as a secret agent and military leader of a Union battalion in a raid against a plantation in South Carolina that freed approximately 700 enslaved people.

"Harriet Tubman was an illiterate woman of colour," says Catherine Clinton, author of one of her biographies. “She was not only physically challenged but also by her race and gender.” And yet, during a ten-year span, she made 19 trips back into the South, and it is believed she personally helped over 300 enslaved people escape to freedom, including her 70-year-old parents.

Artist Carl Dixon created a powerful representation of Harriet Tubman and Moses side by side in the carved wood painting he called Exodus: Journeys of Liberation.

On the left side of the carved painting, Moses with his staff in hand leads the people of Israel through the Red Sea, which has been divided to allow them to walk across it. In the corresponding image on the right side, Harriet Tubman watches as a group of freedom seekers on the Underground Railroad reach the banks of the Ohio River. The Red Sea and the Ohio River.

Even before the waters had begun to part, Harriet trusted God to show her the way. In fact, oral tradition tells how Harriet used the song “Wade in the Water” to interact with freedom seekers on the Underground Railroad: its coded language warning them to jump in the river, to “wade in the water” whenever people were hunting them so that the dogs couldn’t trace their scent. And day after day, year after year, Harriet led people to wade through the water and the wilderness, calling them to take that next brave step forward toward freedom.

The Seas that Have Not Opened Before Us

 Of course, as Harriet experienced, when we take the first step toward justice, it often does not feel anything like dry ground beneath our feet. The ground may be covered by water when we step into it. There are real risks to jumping into the water before the seas have opened! And, those of us who are on the margins often experience these risks to an even greater extent. Those of us in places of privilege would do well to continually remind ourselves of this, and to put ourselves in places of greater risk for and with our marginalized siblings, knowing that some of us have more lifesavers or rafts accessible to us than others do. Some of us can afford to wade into the waters until we are up to our shoulders, while others may not be able to risk wading in above their ankles.

Steps toward justice look different for different people. 

The words of civil rights activist and congressman, the late John Lewis, give us encouragement in these moments:

"Do not get lost in a sea of despair. Be hopeful, be optimistic. Our struggle is not the struggle of a day, a week, a month, or a year, it is the struggle of a lifetime. Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and get in good trouble, necessary trouble."

With a 60-year history of civil rights activism, Lewis was well acquainted with the risks and results of “good trouble.” He was repeatedly arrested and beaten for participating in sit-ins at lunch counters, and Freedom rides across the South. He would go on to help lead one of the most significant marches of the American Civil Rights Movement from Selma to Montgomery, which resulted in what became known as “Bloody Sunday” as police officers on horseback released tear gas on the protesters, brutally attacking them with clubs and whips. Even with a fractured skull, Lewis spoke to reporters and called upon President Lyndon B. Johnson to take action. Good trouble may sound enticing, but it doesn’t come without significant consequences. John Lewis felt that the risks were necessary in order to create change. Each of us will need to discern our steps as we risk wading into the waters.

During Lent, we cultivate qualities of sight, like Moses, Harriet, and John Lewis, to help us perceive beyond and endure the obstacles and real risks that come with good trouble. This awareness aids us to keep taking these steps as we wade deeper into these troubled waters with God.

How might God be challenging you to jump in the deep end, make some waves in the shallow end, and get into some “good trouble”? An old song reminds us to wade into the waters.

Why?

Because God’s gonna trouble the waters! May we find our own ways toward troubled waters, too. 

A Benediction (Or Miscellaneous Thoughts)

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