Black people have a history of hungering for God’s truth, and loving character.

“The first institution [the formerly enslaved] created was their church, to honor God who gave them freedom. Black Christians shared the truth of the gospel message apart from supremacy,” says apologist Lisa Fields. She underscores that Black people kept alive the truth that God’s heart is for our souls, and that our whole being matters to Him.

Christianity is unprejudiced, and empowering. Lisa describes this gospel as “holistic, socially engaged,” and “empowers [people] economically, and educationally” according to Scripture.

The Bible clarifies our relationship with our Savior; we’re created in His divine image (Genesis 1:27). Jesus’ parable of the sheep and the goats tells us He judges our love for Him by how we’re living in our relationships. “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me’ ” (Matthew 25:35–36). The parable concludes: “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me” (v. 40).

God has distaste for discrimination, favoritism, and exclusion. He desires our love to reflect His concern for the soul and whole of each person.

How do you know if you love your neighbor the way God commands?

Clearly God’s command to love is as we love ourselves, and Rev. Dr. Michael Waters of Dallas uplifts Jesus as our model: “You can be distant when you’ve not fully loved your neighbor as yourself.”

Pastor Waters explains that embracing God’s love means moving to action. “When we love, we feel the pain that others feel. When you love your neighbor as yourself, you see that that’s not just a child over there that’s hurt. That’s my child. That’s not just a community over there that’s ostracized; that’s my community. You feel the pain through proximity, and act.”

When Jesus introduced himself in Luke 4, “he went into the synagogue and He dug into the crates of Isaiah and pulled out a hit jam,” Waters poetically says. Jesus’ preaching of Isaiah’s prophecy about himself as our loving Liberator is our model: “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Luke 4:18–19).

Jesus’ love for us is our measure for what it means to love. Being led by God’s Spirit is our method. Treasuring God’s Word guides us. Our call is to be Christlike.

Resting on God’s love and truth helps us when we need to have hard conversations with others.

The artist known as Reflect puts his musicality to work, engaging truths about slavery with a mix of wisdom, ingenuity, and kindness. Listeners experience a hard conversation in Reflect’s rap, “Tell Pharaoh, you gotta’ let go,” imploring us to let go of anything we might adore more than God and His commands.

Paraphrasing God’s repeated message to Egypt’s ruler (Exodus 5, 7–10), Reflect sings, “It’s not unique, God’s Word Moses had to repeat, ‘Let my people go.’ This is Juneteenth.” The lyrics parallel Pharaoh’s self-adoration that kept the Hebrew people in bondage with the refusals to emancipate America’s slaves. In each instance, people idolized personal power and selfish lifestyles.

Reflect reminds God’s people of the covenant directive: “ ‘Learn to do right; seek justice. Defend the oppressed. . . . Come now, let us settle the matter,’ says the Lord” (Isaiah 1:17–18). Alongside God’s strict command is the loving promise.

In His commands for justice, God’s love for us is apparent. Many enslaved in America survived on faith in this love seen in Moses’ conversations with God, in the Israelites’ exodus conversations, and in Jesus’ life and ministry.

God’s commands are rooted in love, even when we may fail to recognize this. His uncompromising love and truth empower us to overcome faulty thinking and actions.

Before she ever met her husband, Marc Evan Diaz, Kelly Yarn created lyrics for a worship song that Marc now sings. He croons, “Freedom, come and fill me with your truth, take me by the hand.”

The couple hopes their artistry provides clear spiritual truth so anyone can grasp that freedom is God’s invitation to all. God evidently planned for Kelly and Marc to produce this song together and for Marc, who grew up in Texas where Juneteenth celebrations first occurred, to sing “Freedom” as a centerpiece to a Juneteenth documentary.

God is our Master Planner. Long before Jesus’ birth, God planned for the Savior to free humans from sin, giving His life as our ransom. Generations of patriarchs, prophets, and witnesses have recognized that Jesus is God’s promised Deliverer.

During his ministry, Jesus himself told unbelieving Pharisees, “Very truly I tell you . . . before Abraham was born, I am!” (John 8:58). Though some may misunderstand the plan of grace that God initiated and reject His salvation, God has invited us to respond to His great plans for our lives by seeking Jesus (John 9:1–11). God sets us free indeed, free from every chain.

Even before experiencing physical freedom, enslaved African Americans experienced spiritual freedom as they trusted God’s invitation of liberty for eternity. In every generation, God invites each of us to respond to Him.

Faith allows us to hope when we can’t see (see Hebrews 11:1). It allows us to survive when we don’t know how to. Hope causes us to dream of what might be amid what truly is.

Jack Yates, born a slave in Virginia, living in Texas in the early 1860s, had hopes and dreams. In the Juneteenth documentary, Yates’ descendants and historian Debrah Blacklock-Sloan explain how Yates dreamed of a fresh start for himself, his family, and his community. After the Civil War, Mr. Yates traveled to Houston, helped the area known as Freedmen’s Town to thrive, and became minister of the influential Antioch Missionary Baptist Church. With foresight, he and other former slaves built a new edifice in 1879. They took title to the deed to their building and land, and nurtured members’ talents with education and training.

Genesis 37–42 tells of another dreamer, Joseph. Sold into slavery, he suffered under unjust masters, and languished in prison for years. Prisoners he tried to help betrayed him. Yet hope in God inspired Joseph and gave him the ability to dream—and to interpret others’ dreams. God empowered Joseph to gain Pharaoh’s favor, preserve lives during famine, and to prosper his family and community.

Joseph’s and Jack Yates’ legacies testify to God’s trustworthiness. Knowing about their and others’ faith in God, from biblical times to the present, inspires hope that God is with us, encouraging us to dream.

A minister and a professor of African American history, Carey H. Latimore IV was an answer to prayers. Prayers for expert, godly advisors on Juneteenth and more. Long before, this good brother was simply an answer to his parents’ prayers. Carey Latimore III and Anne Stephens Latimore lovingly raised Carey to know God’s grace and grasp the power of prayer.

Carey grew to become an ambassador of God’s love. Sharing unshakable faith in Christ at home, church, with his university community, and by writing and speaking to national audiences, Carey stood for Christ.

Writing to the Philippians, Paul, a missionary and teacher, encouraged many new believers in Jesus Christ. He encouraged them to live “worthy of the gospel” (1:27); to “press” in faith (3:12–14) and to “stand firm” for truth and reconciliation (4:1); and to live out love while focusing on Christ and being thankful (vv. 4–9).

Carey called his father his “rock,” and said about his mother, “Surviving illness and segregation, she boldly proclaimed the gospel of Jesus Christ her entire life.” She overcame by faith. Though doctors had given her less than eighteen years to live, doubting she could have children, she had Carey. Though Carey passed at age forty-six in 2022, his life continues to encourage faith in Jesus for eternity.

Opal Lee recalls: “I felt like there ought to be something else I could do. I decided if a little old lady in tennis shoes was walking up and down the highway, somebody would pay attention. From the church I walked two and a half miles to symbolize that the slaves in Texas didn’t know they were free for two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. I walked. . . . I was invited all over these United States. And people was so nice—who, too, wanted Juneteenth to become a holiday. My granddaughter got the word to go to the White House where President Biden was signing to make Juneteenth a federal holiday. I could have done a holy dance.”

Also named Jubilation Day, Juneteenth is more than a holiday. Its celebration hearkens back to God’s commands for redemption among His people (see Leviticus 25). God called the Hebrews to redemptive rest and worship (vv. 1–5), redemptive liberty (vv. 8–17), redemptive justice (vv. 35–43), and more. Scripture shows us that God’s plans are incompatible with prejudice and injustice.

Opal concludes: “I know Martin King, Rosa Parks, Malcolm X, and Sojourner Truth fought so hard to have everybody free. This is just a little push and the youngsters coming on are going to make it a tidal wave and everybody is going to understand that freedom is for all of us.”