“Testimony occurs in particular settings — a courtroom or a church — where a community expects to hear the truth spoken.”
— Thomas Hoyt, Jr.
Thoughts and questions to help you consider this practice
The practice of testimony requires that there be witnesses to testify and others to receive and evaluate their testimony. It is a deeply shared practice — one that is possible only in a community that recognizes that falsehood is strong, but that yearns nonetheless to know what is true and good.
Testimony is basic to community and happens in every vital Christian community where words of freedom are spoken and heard. In Acts 2, Peter's testimony in Jerusalem defined the early church as an open, inclusive community. What part of corporate worship do you experience as testimony, i.e., people building up the faith community by telling what they've experienced and seen?
In North American society, advertising shapes most of our public discourse. How can people without economic and political power be heard when commercial gain drives the speech of advertising?
Storytellers in the brush arbors kept alive the heritage of African slaves throughout their years of oppression in a strange new land. In the same manner, African American preachers reinterpreted stories of the Hebrew slavery and liberation in light of their own people's needs and experiences. What therapy does hearing and giving testimony offer to oppressed communities?
Preaching is a witness intended to evoke other forms of witness. Preaching is the activity of the whole church and not of the preacher alone. What challenge does this present to the preacher? What grace does it offer? How is the testimony of a preacher distinct from the other "testifiers"? How do preacher and people work together to practice testimony? How does the call and response pattern common in African American worship support the preacher in giving testimony? If this is not the pattern in your own community, by what other means do the people support the preacher in giving testimony?
To know the real life and history of a people, study the testimony it makes in its songs. What tuneful testimony did Miriam make in Exodus 15:21? What testimony does the hymn "Amazing Grace" make? When have you been better able to sing your testimony than speak it? How do songs help people make sense of their lives? What songs point disenfranchised people to a time when their needs will be met?
Sojourner Truth, Martin Luther King Jr., and Mohandas Gandhi all testified with their bodies, their actions, their lives. The New Testament word for witness is "martyr." How does the witness of martyrs — famous or not — inspire you to greater witness? When have you seen a quiet act of compassion speak powerfully of God's presence? In what ways do the church's rituals offer nonverbal testimony to the story of Jesus' life and death and continuing power in our lives?
Christian testimony has two dimensions: telling the truth to God about our lives, and bearing witness to others about God's redemptive activity in the world. How are these two dimensions of testimony related to each other? How do groups like Alcoholic Anonymous draw upon the healing power of both dimensions of truth-telling?
In Central America, Archbishop Oscar Romero urged truth-telling that risked lives. What risks are inherent in giving unpopular testimony? How can people support one another in bearing witness and speaking the truth? How can we draw strength and inspiration from "the great cloud of witnesses" who have gone before us (Hebrews 12:1)?
"I give thanks to my God always for you because of the grace of God that has been given you in Christ Jesus, for in every way you have been enriched in him, in speech and knowledge of every kind — just as the testimony of Christ has been strengthened among you."
— 1 Corinthians 1:4-6
Then I said, "Ah Lord God! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a boy." But the LORD said to me, "Do not say, 'I am only a boy'; for you shall go to all whom I send you, and shall speak whatever I command you. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you, says the LORD." Then the LORD put out his hand and touched my mouth; and the LORD said to me, "Now I have put my words in your mouth."
— Jeremiah 1:6-9
There are two dimensions to testimony: telling the truth to God about our lives, and telling the truth about God. Testimony is the task of every Christian. The following resource helps people make their own testimony. It could be used during the testimony time in worship, or as a part of the offering, since we offer testimony. It has two parts: a guided meditation, and a guided sharing of testimony within the faith community.
Why are you here (this morning, today, this evening)?
Do you come to give thanks?
Do you come because someone has coerced you to come?
Do you come out of habit?
Do you come out of obligation?
Do you come out of desperate need?
Tell God the truth. God's Spirit will listen.
What obstacles kept you from God this week?
Anxiety about money?
Illness?
Anger with someone?
Lack of time?
Disappointment with God?
You own reluctance to lay open your heart even to God, the one who knows you better than you know yourself?
Tell God the truth. God's Spirit will listen.
Where did you meet God this week?
In worship?
In your family?
In a store?
On a street?
By water?
Tell God the truth. God's Spirit will listen.
Where did you meet God this week?
What was God doing?
How did you know?
What witness would you like to be able to make this week? About what issue?
Will you make this witness with words or with your body?
What do you hope for this body of believers in the next month?
How might this body be Christ to you?
How might this body be Christ to your community?
— Lani Wright, Cottage Grove, Oregon
"I love to tell the story of unseen things above,
of Jesus and his glory, of Jesus and his love.
I love to tell the story because I know 'tis true.
It satisfies my longings as nothing else could do.
I love to tell the story, 'twill be my theme in glory,
to tell the old, old story of Jesus and his love."
Text: Catherine Hankey
"Go, tell it on the mountain
Over the hills and everywhere
Go, tell it on the mountain
That Jesus Christ is born."
Text: African-American spiritual
"What language shall I borrow to thank thee, dearest friend,
For this thy dying sorrow, thy pity without end?
O make me thine forever, and should I fainting be,
Lord, let me never, never, outlive my love to thee."
Text: Attributed to Bernard of Clairvaux, tr. James W. Alexander
"O Lord, with your eyes you have searched me,
kindly smiling, have spoken my name.
Now my boat's left on the shoreline behind me;
by your side I will seek other seas."
Text and music: Cesáreo Gabaráin
Translation copyright (c) 1989 The United Methodist Publishing House
At once tough, personal, affectionate, wise, and very funny, Traveling Mercies tells in exuberant detail how Anne Lamott learned to shine the light of faith on the darkest part of ordinary life, exposing surprising pockets of meaning and hope.
Ranging from gentle reflections to heart-rending invocations, these selections are powerful, thought-provoking explorations of the meaning of faith, the person of Christ, and the communion of believers.
In her bestselling preaching autobiography, Barbara Brown Taylor writes of how she came to be a preacher of the gospel as a priest in the Episcopal Church.
This memoir reflects on key moments of the author’s early life, from childhood to his entering seminary, that reveal how God speaks to us in a variety of ways every moment of every day.
Beginning with a solid theological basis, veteran preacher and best-selling author Thomas G. Long offers a practical, step-by-step guide to writing a sermon. Long centers his approach around the biblical concept of witness. To be a preacher, Long posits, is to be a witness to God’s work in the world — one who sees before speaking, one whose task is to “tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth about what is seen.”
“Sonny” Dewey is a Texas evangelist on the lam after clubbing his wife’s lover into a coma with a baseball bat. Baptizing himself with the new name “Apostle E.F.,” he flees to a small town in the Louisiana Delta and continues his ministry by preaching on a local radio station and renovating an old church.
The story of an 1839 slave mutiny and the legal status of the Africans who rose up against their captors on the high seas and are brought to trial in a New England court. The court must decide whether the defendants were born of slaves — in which case they are guilty of murder — or were illegally brought from Africa and therefore had a right to defend themselves against kidnapping.
Set in Mingo County, West Virginia, in 1920, this story relates the experiences of a local teenage preacher caught in a struggle between coal miners, union organizers, company operators, and gun thugs. Note the testimony shared about the power of non-violent resistance (Mennonite bravery). Note also the young preacher’s skill in using indirect communication through his clever recounting of Joseph being framed by Potiphar’s wife.
Lillian Daniel shares how her congregation re-appropriated the practice of testimony one Lenten season, a practice that would eventually revitalize their worship and transform their congregational culture.
This is the companion study guide for the book “Testimony: Talking Ourselves into Being Christian,” by Thomas G. Long.
