quartet that accompanied the late Adventist evangelist Earl E. Cleveland years ago used to sing that old-time Negro spiritual “I’m Going Home on the Morning Train.”
The “Morning Train” was a symbol of an American slave’s successful escape to freedom in the northern states and Canada. “Evening train may be too late!” they sang—a way of signaling that members of the community should strike while the iron is hot, should “get it while the getting is good.” The evening train meant opportunity squandered. They would sing, “Heap of people comin’ but the train done gone.”
Shakespeare had the same idea when, in the mouth of Hamlet, he said of providence: “If it be now, ’tis not to come; if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now, yet it will come.”1
What was true of providence was always true of any slave’s successful escape. They were to be ready when the opportunity came. They were to seize the moment. They might not get another chance!
A Native Sense
The African-American slave possessed a clear genius in being able to connect the intimate with the ultimate. This is not difficult to understand when one realizes that in their native Africa they had been nurtured in the belief that all of life was sacred. Spiritually sensitive and experientially brilliant, they managed to communicate in code language throughout the plantation, and from one plantation to another.
For example, the cook in the kitchen in the “big house” (the plantation house) might start singing, “Steal away, steal away to Jesus!” And while she was thus giving signals to the house slaves, the water boy would begin to walk through the cotton rows giving word to the field hands. And his song might be “Going to lay down my burdens, down by the riverside.”
And when the shadows of night fell on the plantation, men and women, darkened by nature’s sun, would steal away for fellowship and authentic worship. One member of the group would preach to them redemption’s story, and together they would tell God about their troubles. When they got through, they would have had enough soul power for the next day’s toil.
Early the next morning, someone who did not make the evening meeting—having stayed behind as a lookout—would then let the attendees know that none of the slave masters knew about the meeting. The coded message would be: “Oh, they couldn’t hear nobody pray.”
The Invisible Church
Amid the agony and affliction of slavery, these noble souls were used of God to bring into being what we might call the invisible church—a church without walls, a community of faith. This buoyant faith became the source of their strength, the joy of their lives, the hope of their future. To borrow the sentiments of former Harvard theologian Harvey Cox, their faith was “evoked by the mystery” that surrounded them—in their native Africa and in the setting to which they’d been transplanted. But theirs was not so much a propositional faith as one generated by the realities and toughness of their existence.2 In other words, for these slaves faith was more an embodiment than some theoretical rule or principle. It was something they lived, part of their very being.
In this invisible church they not only learned and spoke the language of the Spirit; they lived in the Spirit. Their faith propelled the fuel for a freedom movement that eventuated in planned escapes to the North. They called the North the “Promised Land.” And whenever the Underground Railroad was about to spring into motion and carry members of their group to the “Promised Land,” notice was given the day before through the song “I’m Going Home on the Morning Train!”
Now, that was genius! With neither trains nor tracks in sight, these folk sang about the “Morning Train,” and their captors never were able to interpret the cryptic language. Only the slaves, members of the invisible church that met down in the brush harbor—only they understood the meaning.
Effect on Me
The more I study the experiences of slavery, the more I consider the faith and the religion of the oppressed, the greater my appreciation grows for these giants of faith.
It is not conclusive evidence that a person is a Christian just because they manifest spiritual ecstasy under extraordinary circumstances. As Ellen G. White put it: “Holiness is not rapture: it is an entire surrender of the will to God; it is living by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God; it is doing the will of our heavenly Father; it is trusting God in trial, in darkness as well as in the light; it is walking by faith and not by sight.”3
Yes, faith was a total life experience for these oppressed people. God, for them, was an ever-present reality. And worship took place anytime and anywhere the Spirit moved. “Every time I feel the Spirit moving in my heart, I will pray,” they sang. In a real sense they didn’t miss the “Morning Train.” They met it at the station, got on board, and rode it all the way from earth to glory!
An Even Larger Vision
Beyond all this, however, they saw the spiritual significance of the morning, as such. They saw their enslavement in America as analogous to the enslavement of the Israelites in Egypt. Moses was their Old Testament hero; and “morning” was regarded as “blessing time.”
God moved mightily in the morning, for, says the text, “In the morning you shall see the glory of the Lord” (Ex. 16:7). “Weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning” (Ps. 30:5).
They sang “I’m Going Home on the Morning Train,” and when the train rolled out, they didn’t want to be trying to make it to the station. That is a real problem for the church. There are a lot of people who are members of the church who never really board the train.
During the 1950s my family lived in Chicago while my father served as president of the Lake Region Conference. Early one morning I woke up to see him preparing for a trip.
“Daddy, where are you going?” I asked.
“I’m going to a meeting in California!” he said.
“May I go, too?” I asked impulsively.
“Yes!” my father replied.
Within minutes, literally, we were off to the train station to catch the Santa Fe Chief! The Santa Fe Chief was state of the art in those days, when trains were the preferred form of transportation. We boarded the train! We were off to Los Angeles!
A lot of people go down to the train station, but never get on board. They aren’t train riders, they’re train watchers. They get a certain thrill watching the experience. They get excited just hearing the train whistle; or from seeing people get on and off; or just gazing as the train fades away into the distance beneath belching puffs of smoke.
Now train watching is all right, but it doesn’t do anything for the railroad. A train needs riders. And that is what the church needs—riders, not simply watchers. A watcher never gets beyond the station, and they have a tendency to confuse the station with the train.
The physical building in which we worship is just the station. The true church is analogous to a train. The church building isn’t going anywhere, but the real church is going somewhere. The station serves the train. It is for the convenience and comfort of the passengers. You secure your ticket at the station. But it’s the train that takes you to your destination. We must move from being simply observers to “riders.” We must get on board!
Now this “Morning Train” is a passenger train and not a freight train. This means that there are luggage restrictions—passengers must carry limited baggage. It’s a passenger train, and we must leave a lot of stuff behind. Excess baggage slows down the train. This “Morning Train” is bound for glory, and some things have no business on board. Carousing, for example; hypocrisy; backstabbing; envy; jealousy; uncleanness; and every form of evil. It is a holy train, with a holy mission, and with a holy destination.
None but the pure in heart shall see God!
This Train Called the Church
A typical train in years past was composed of several cars, an engine, and a caboose.
The engine supplies the power that pulls the cars, and the caboose brings up the rear. The caboose carries the flagman, who signals the other train in case of trouble.
Between the engine and the caboose are the passenger cars, hooked together by a process called coupling. In order for everybody to get to their destination, the cars have to be coupled. And that’s the way it is with the church.
A real church is composed of people coupled together by Christian love. We can’t grow in grace and move forward in power unless we are coupled together in love. The church is social by definition; Christ has hooked us together. He said in Matthew 18:20 that “where two or three are gathered together” in His name, He will be “in the midst of them” (KJV). And the book of Hebrews admonishes us not to forsake “the assembling of ourselves together” especially as we “see the day [of the Advent] approaching” (Heb. 10:25, KJV).
For the “Morning Train” to roll effectively through this unfriendly world we have got to be coupled together. It is not “the fast train.” It is not “the ultraconservative train.” It is not the “liberal train.” It is not “the high-rolling train.” It is not “the party train.” It is “the everybody train,” the train for everyone who has been born of the Spirit of God.
This is the “Morning Train,” and it’s bound for glory. Thank God for the sagacity and spiritual awareness of these slaves of yesteryear. Wisely, they warned us not to wait for the evening train.
“The evening train may be too late!”
“Get right, church,” they admonished in song, and “let’s go home!” For “in the morning, we shall see the glory of the Lord.”
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*Unless otherwise indicated, Bible texts in this article are from the New King James Version. Copyright ” 1979, 1980, 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
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1William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act V, scene ii, lines 142, 143.
2See Harvey Cox, The Future of Faith (New York, N.Y.: HarperOne, 2009), p. 35.
3Ellen G. White, The Acts of the Apostles, p. 51.
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Alvin Kibble is a vice president of the North American Division of Seventh-day Adventists in Silver Spring, MD. This article was published February 18, 2010.
