Jareena Lee
Jarena Lee felt imbued with a religious mission in life, and because of this, she bravelydefied the conservative sex biases of the church to become, as she contended, the"first female preacher of the First African Methodist Episcopal Church". As anevangelist, Mrs. Lee sometimes traveled on foot to spread her religious message andwould walk as far as 16 miles to preach. When over forty years old, the unordainedminister logged 2,325 miles on the Gospel circuit. She preached up and down theEastern Shore and traveled into sections of Illinois and Ohio, converting blacks as well Believed to have been born free in Cape May, New Jersey, February 11, 1783,to parents who were "wholly ignorant of the knowledge of God," she left home at theage of seven to work as a maid sixty miles away. Her first religious experienceoccurred relatively late in life--in 1804 when she was twenty-one. Listening to a localProtestant missionary who was holding services in a schoolroom, she becameoverwhelmed by the "weight of my sins". Afterward, she contemplated committingsuicide and credited the "unseen arm of God" with preventing her. After moving to Philadelphia, she was i
Onesource has categorized it as a "narrative of her pilgrimage with exhortations to thefaithful and to those who might be falling away, designed, it appears, to make the storyof her life an extension of her preaching. And whyshould it be thought impossible, heterodox, or improper for a woman topreach? seeing the Savior died for the woman as well as for the man. Two children survived, a two-year-old and a six-month-old baby. Later writing in her journal, she reflected onthe decision, noting, "O how careful ought we to be, lest through our by-laws of churchgovernment and discipline, we bring into disrepute even the word of life. At that moment, she spang to her feet and gave a stirring exhortation, writing inher journal later, "God made manifest his power in a manner sufficient to show theworld I was called to labor according to my ability. Jarena Lee, Giving an Account of Her Call toPreach the Gospel. her suppressed calling to preach was miraculously released in the church ofReverend Allen, where she went to hear the Reverend Richard Williams give a sermon. I could not find arecord of her death, but there is a questionable listing of another work by a Jarena Leein Daniel Murray's Preliminary List of Books and Pamphlets by Negro Authors, for ParisExposition and Library of Congress (1900). From that time on, Jarena Lee's life was dedicated to evangelizing, and as shedid so, she challenged the prejudices against women as ministers of God. favored" the members with anexplanation of portions they could not understand. Jarena Lee'spassionate but stifled desire to preach caused her morbid suffering and ill health. In the same course of his preaching, she suddenly discerned that he had "lost thespirit".
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Acceptance Essays
