Jarena Lee
1783-vers 1864 19th century
Persistence against a closed door, courage to preach without permission when permission never came, an authority claimed from conviction rather than granted by title.
Who was Jarena Lee?
Born free in New Jersey in 1783 but sent away to work as a servant from age seven, she found her calling shattered against the door of her own church: when she asked the founder of the African Methodist Episcopal Church for permission to preach, he told her the denomination had no provision for women preachers. She waited eight years, then simply stood up in a congregation one day and preached anyway, so powerfully that he reversed himself and let her continue.
In their own words
If the man may preach, because the Saviour died for him, why not the woman, seeing he died for her also?