The Negro's church,.

The Message of the Minister

67

good job and he seemed to be in good circumstances. In talking
he said he did not like the city. When asked why, he remarked
that he never got a good hunting game here...! They never
take me where the game is good. I am going back to Mr. Jim
(white folk). Nobody bothers Mr. Jim's niggers-white folks
don't bother Mr. Jim's niggers! There he was wishing himself
back in Egypt eating onions and garlic-back in slavery under
the white man. We have a lot of folks serving as slaves and don't
want to be anything else but slaves; live in a hut, sleep on a straw
bed, have three meals a day of cornbread and side meat, rather
than shoulder the responsibilities of freedom. He was bound by
the lure of the flesh pots of Egypt. We ought to try and find
some way to help such people. We must vote for the land of
milk and honey instead of Egypt's flesh pots.
As I preach from Sunday to Sunday I never fail to emphasize
to our people to respect each other in business. We have been
taught to disrespect members of our race. When I was pastoring
in a certain city a supposedly very fashionable, intelligent lady of
the church came there one Sunday morning and listened to my
sermon-went home without commenting upon the same. That
afternoon Mr. X, the white minister, said the same thing over
the radio in one of his talks-That night she got up and related
what a wonderful preacher I was. She did not value my sermon
until she tuned in and heard a white pastor say some of the same
things her pastor had said earlier in the day; then she came back
to church and recognized her pastor as being great. She could
not recognize his greatness until the white man had said the same
things. We must be able to recognize the greatness among our
own people.
I spend a dollar with somebody's colored business nearly every
day. It may so happen that same person may marry my daughter
or my son. Sort of, "Bread cast upon the water may return after
many days." A loaf of bread bought from a man of your own
race with courtesy is just as good as any white man's bread; yet,
we like to buy from the disrespectful white man, who calls us
Jim or Sallie or anything he thinks or cares to call us. Let us
spend our money where we can receive courtesy, and by so doing
it will cause us to flee from Egypt's flesh pots. We cannot render