Jason Byassee: The muse of church revival in Sudan<\/h2>\n\n<\/div>\n\nI think I met the Charles Wesley of the church of Sudan.<\/p>\n
Just as Charles’ hymns powered the Methodist movement across the
\nBritish Isles, the Americas, and now the Global South, so too did Mary
\nAlueel Garang’s songs power a revival in the Episcopal Church of
\nSudan (ECS), helping to bring in millions of members during that
\ncountry’s brutal two-decade long civil war. “I just found myself
\nsinging,” she explained when asked how she wrote so much and so
\nmovingly. If songs come to her, she writes them down, “if they
\nare meaningful.” She herself describes their themes this way: “During
\nthe war there was suffering, we ran from place to place, but we
\nencouraged people not to give up and to come to church. You can’t save
\nyour life on your own.”<\/p>\n
One can hear her songs’ power even in translation from Jieng (often called Dinka by outsiders) to English:<\/p>\n
Let us give thanks.<\/p>\n
Let us give thanks to the Lord in the day of devastation,
and in the day of contentment.
Jesus has bound the world round with the pure light of the
\n word of his Father
When we beseech the Lord and unite our hearts and have hope,
then the demons have no power
God has not forgotten us
\n Evil is departing and holiness is advancing,
these are the things that shake the earth.<\/p>\n
I went to Sudan with one question at the forefront of my mind: How
\ndid a church battered and on the run “in the bush” as they say, hiding
\nfrom government soldiers and bombers, grow like the ECS did? When
\nI asked the Sudanese, they gave me some answers I expected: Tertullian
\nwas right (“the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the
\nchurch”), there are no atheists in the bush, indigenous Christianity was
\na way to resist Arab and European colonialism. But they also
\ngave me an answer I did not expect: the singing.<\/p>\n
I caught a glimpse of the impact of song on the ECS at a Jieng parish
\ncalled Emmanuel in Juba. This service, in a former movie theater, had
\neasily 1000 people inside and as many people out. And most of
\nthe worship was singing, without hymnbooks, songs that went on for 10,
\n15, 20 minutes (a people until recently without literacy still
\nhave long memories). They were Mary Alueel’s songs mostly, telling of
\nGod’s faithfulness as people were on the run, and of hope for a
\nnew and glorious day in Sudan. They are the people’s songs, intersected
\nwith God’s song, and as they sang from memory and swayed, I gave
\nthanks for the songs and their composer.<\/p>\n
I think I met the Charles Wesley of the church of Sudan.<\/p>\n
Just as Charles’ hymns powered the Methodist movement across the
\nBritish Isles, the Americas, and now the Global South, so too did Mary
\nAlueel Garang’s songs power a revival in the Episcopal Church of
\nSudan (ECS), helping to bring in millions of members during that
\ncountry’s brutal two-decade long civil war. “I just found myself
\nsinging,” she explained when asked how she wrote so much and so
\nmovingly. If songs come to her, she writes them down, “if they
\nare meaningful.” She herself describes their themes this way: “During
\nthe war there was suffering, we ran from place to place, but we
\nencouraged people not to give up and to come to church. You can’t save
\nyour life on your own.”<\/p>\n
One can hear her songs’ power even in translation from Jieng (often called Dinka by outsiders) to English:<\/p>\n
Let us give thanks.<\/p>\n
Let us give thanks to the Lord in the day of devastation,
and in the day of contentment.
Jesus has bound the world round with the pure light of the
\n word of his Father
When we beseech the Lord and unite our hearts and have hope,
then the demons have no power
God has not forgotten us
\n Evil is departing and holiness is advancing,
these are the things that shake the earth.<\/p>\n
I went to Sudan with one question at the forefront of my mind: How
\ndid a church battered and on the run “in the bush” as they say, hiding
\nfrom government soldiers and bombers, grow like the ECS did? When
\nI asked the Sudanese, they gave me some answers I expected: Tertullian
\nwas right (“the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the
\nchurch”), there are no atheists in the bush, indigenous Christianity was
\na way to resist Arab and European colonialism. But they also
\ngave me an answer I did not expect: the singing.<\/p>\n
I caught a glimpse of the impact of song on the ECS at a Jieng parish
\ncalled Emmanuel in Juba. This service, in a former movie theater, had
\neasily 1000 people inside and as many people out. And most of
\nthe worship was singing, without hymnbooks, songs that went on for 10,
\n15, 20 minutes (a people until recently without literacy still
\nhave long memories). They were Mary Alueel’s songs mostly, telling of
\nGod’s faithfulness as people were on the run, and of hope for a
\nnew and glorious day in Sudan. They are the people’s songs, intersected
\nwith God’s song, and as they sang from memory and swayed, I gave
\nthanks for the songs and their composer.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/faithandleadership.duke.edu\/sites\/default\/sites\/137\/mary_alueel.jpg\")
Permalink<\/a> | Comments (2)<\/a> | Post a comment<\/a><\/p>\nThe Charles Wesley of the Sudan - The Bible and Culture<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Charles Wesley of the Sudan - The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Jason Byasse is, like myself, a John Wesley Fellow, part of the ever growing network of orthodox Methodists who are concerned with church renewal, church growth, missions, and in general the revitalization of the church. Here is an interesting story he posted on his blog—– Jason Byassee: The muse of church revival in Sudan I…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Bible and Culture\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-09-29T16:13:38+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/faithandleadership.duke.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/mary_alueel.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Ben Witherington\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"The Charles Wesley of the Sudan - The Bible and Culture","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"The Charles Wesley of the Sudan - The Bible and Culture","og_description":"Jason Byasse is, like myself, a John Wesley Fellow, part of the ever growing network of orthodox Methodists who are concerned with church renewal, church growth, missions, and in general the revitalization of the church. Here is an interesting story he posted on his blog—– Jason Byassee: The muse of church revival in Sudan I…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html","og_site_name":"The Bible and Culture","article_published_time":"2010-09-29T16:13:38+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/faithandleadership.duke.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/mary_alueel.jpg"}],"author":"Ben Witherington","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html","name":"The Charles Wesley of the Sudan - The Bible and Culture","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"http:\/\/faithandleadership.duke.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/mary_alueel.jpg","datePublished":"2010-09-29T16:13:38+00:00","dateModified":"2010-09-29T16:13:38+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/d1fd6c7893819eabc624db38ecfd8426"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html#primaryimage","url":"http:\/\/faithandleadership.duke.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/mary_alueel.jpg","contentUrl":"http:\/\/faithandleadership.duke.edu\/sites\/default\/files\/mary_alueel.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/2010\/09\/the-charles-wesley-of-the-sudan.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"The Charles Wesley of the Sudan"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/","name":"The Bible and Culture","description":"All Things Biblical and Christian","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/d1fd6c7893819eabc624db38ecfd8426","name":"Ben Witherington","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/75e\/75ec11e1916a2008bc4cc638a0a0de2fx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/75e\/75ec11e1916a2008bc4cc638a0a0de2fx96.jpg","caption":"Ben Witherington"},"description":"Bible scholar Ben Witherington is Amos Professor of New Testament for Doctoral Studies at Asbury Theological Seminary and on the doctoral faculty at St. Andrews University in Scotland. A graduate of UNC, Chapel Hill, he went on to receive the M.Div. degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and a Ph.D. from the University of Durham in England. He is now considered one of the top evangelical scholars in the world, and is an elected member of the prestigious SNTS, a society dedicated to New Testament studies. Witherington has also taught at Ashland Theological Seminary, Vanderbilt University, Duke Divinity School and Gordon-Conwell. A popular lecturer, Witherington has presented seminars for churches, colleges and biblical meetings not only in the United States but also in England, Estonia, Russia, Europe, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Australia. He has also led tours to Italy, Greece, Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and Egypt. Witherington has written over thirty books, including The Jesus Quest and The Paul Quest, both of which were selected as top biblical studies works by Christianity Today. He also writes for many church and scholarly publications, and is a frequent contributor to the Beliefnet website. Along with many interviews on radio networks across the country, Witherington has been seen on the History Channel, NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN, The Discovery Channel, A&E, and the PAX Network.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/author\/bwitherington"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1206","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/199"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1206"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1206\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1206"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1206"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/bibleandculture\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1206"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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Jason Byasse is, like myself, a John Wesley Fellow, part of the ever growing network of orthodox Methodists who are concerned with church renewal, church growth, missions, and in general the revitalization of the church. Here is an interesting story he posted on his blog—– Jason Byassee: The muse of church revival in Sudan I…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":199,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1206","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\n