Precious Lord

Reverend Aaron James Jamison sat, alone, crying in his car, three blocks from the church where he was to preach in twenty minutes.

He cried hard.

Mutilating surgery. That’s what the doctor said. If only your father had come earlier. But, of course, he hadn’t. Believing in signs, he prayed instead. Prayed! Because that’s what old black folks do; they pray. Because Deacon Jamison believes that Jesus can fix it, will fix it. He loves to talk, but how will he talk without a tongue? No tongue. No left cheek. If only he hadn’t waited. His tongue, for Christsakes!

The thought of his father’s face, mangled and unholy, caused him to cry aloud.

Entering Mount Sinai Baptist Church, he was a man crawling through a fog. They knew him there; women pulled him forward, men beat his back, children stared, and the fog thickened. A cannonade of thrusting hands, of begging voices: Bless you, Brother Jamison. Give me a hug. Sho, looking good, Preacher. Shake my hand, Sir. Preach good tonight. Come here, Son. Let me shake your hand. You forgot me? Hug my neck. How’s your daddy? Tear it up today, Preacher. He extended his hand and voice, by rote, but he needed a place to turn, to walk, to sit. They had not expected to get this close, so they drew closer.

“Let him through,” said Pastor Samuel Ely, making his way to Reverend Jamison. The young preacher, surrounded, his back pressed against a wall, nodded, smiled, and mumbled: “Yes, good to see you. Good to see you. Yes, good to see you. Yes.” His eyes hurt. And the back of his head hurt. “Come on, people, let him through.” The pastor, though embarrassed, managed a smile. “Please, go inside,” he pointed the crowd toward the sanctuary, “we’ve already begun.” They obeyed reluctantly. The older man, his arm on his guest’s shoulder, led him into the pastor’s study. “Yes, so good to see you. Yes, so glad to be here. Yes.”

On the day before his seventh birthday, Aaron James’ mother, tired, returning from a trip to visit her sister in Atlanta, had ignored a flashing red light and raced a train to the crossing at Old Mill Junction. The train slammed into her car, lifted it, then, with the vehicle stuck like iron to a magnet, shoved it along for several miles. She died, her face lacerated grotesquely.

When Aaron James was nine years old he had preached his trial sermon. His home church, Pine Grove Baptist, was packed with the curious and the bored that Sunday night. His father, not yet a deacon, had introduced him, saying, “If Aaron only says ‘Jesus is good,’ then he has said enough.” How could he have known? Aaron James hadn’t said much, but when he sat down it was to a stunned congregation, weeping and dazed. Sister Marie Gross had been told that Jesus loved her for four decades; when Aaron James preached, she finally believed it, nor was she the only one. “Doesn’t He love you? Won’t He find you? Let Him in.” Perhaps it was because he was only nine, or was cute, or because his voice cracked when he shouted—“Say He loves you. Say you will let Him in.”—or perhaps it was the smile, the ease, the left hand in his suit coat pocket, the right hand punching the air. Or was it the way he shouted—“Do you love Him?”—and then looked at his nodding father, but, whatever it was, it drew two dozen of his neighbors forward to hug him and to accept Jesus. Aaron James began singing “Precious Lord,”—I am tired, I am weak, I am worn. Sister Gross got happy and began to shout.

That night the elder Jamison knelt beside his bed to thank God for his son. Aaron James saw him and heard him.

Come See And Hear God’s Little Preacher.

Aaron James preached throughout Alabama. Small churches, big crowds. He stood on a peach basket or a chair. In Selma, over five hundred people...