Sasha's Essay

Here's an essay I wrote on Sojourner Truth for my online English class:

Sojourner Truth: A Servant of God


Sojourner Truth or Isabelle Van Wagener, an American abolitionist displayed strength, faith and perseverance throughout her trials as a slave, her walk with God and her attempts to stop slavery. Until she died, Truth did as God told her to do, worked hard and fought to end the captivity of her people. She was born in 1797 to James and Betsey Van Wagener, both slaves to a man named Baumfree. Truth and a man named Tom were forced to wed and together had five children. However, Truth escaped with their youngest child, leaving her husband and four other children behind. After escaping, her real experiences and adventures began. God kept her in his mind and always provided her with supplies, protection and shelter.

Born into slavery, Truth worked diligently and hard throughout her 25 years of hardship and cruelty. Truth, six feet tall and very strong, worked harder than most male slaves on the plantation whether inside scrubbing floors or outside planting corn. Eager to learn mentally, Truth listened to her masters and their friends as they spoke English and quickly learned how to communicate in a language besides Dutch. Taught at a young age to obey and do as she was told, she worked until she dropped from exhaustion. Even when wounded or overly tired, Truth did her work effectively and efficiently until her freedom. “Despite the way the wound bled and hurt, Belle never missed a day’s work” (36). A slave or person who, forced to work each day and threatened with beatings or whippings, could develop a bad attitude towards their “master”, but Truth was a good example of a servant of God. She always had a good attitude about her work, did it well and thanked God for what he had given her.

Truth had faith in God throughout her life, but like all of us, had struggles in her walk with the Lord. She accepted Jesus as her Lord and Savior as a young girl, and knew she could go to him in times of trouble. While getting whipped or beaten, Truth would pray aloud in Dutch the Lord’s Prayer. Most would hate their master in her position, but Truth prayed for him to seek the Lord’s love and to realize his sins. Some slaves could not understand how she could still praise God after the beatings until they saw how God’s strength was poured into her, enabling her to work as hard as she did. As an adult however, the Devil wickedly deceived Truth into believing a false preacher had the powers of God. God revealed himself to her after many years through the preacher’s conviction and death. He knew that she would need Him and would seek Him later in life, and He waited until she was ready to come back “home” to Him.

Throughout her free life, Truth persevered in her attempts to stop slavery by her speeches on slavery and women’s rights, and stepping up to prove a white person wrong. First, she freed all of children from slavery. Winning the case of the freedom of her son, Truth became the first black woman who had ever won a case. She found a lawyer who would support her and proved that her son’s master forced him to lie. “Master Gedney told me to say I didn’t know you. He said that if I didn’t say what he wanted, then I would get the worst whipping I’ve ever had” (48). Even though some rallied against her, she continued to speak publicly all across the country about her experience as a slave. Many, moved by her story, joined the abolitionist groups in hopes to end slavery. Truth also spoke on the importance of women in the world and how women, like men, have rights that are equal to men.

Because of her bravery, along with the help of others, Truth influenced and supported the ending of slavery. Along her journey, she met people like Abraham Lincoln and his wife, Ulysses S. Grant and Harriet Tubman who also supported the ending of slavery. She stepped out of her rights as an African American and made people think about the evil in slavery. Telling others the stories of the lives of slaves and the cruelty involved in it helped more and more people join the abolitionist groups. At that time, her and others perseverance made the ending of slavery one step closer. Most importantly, however, Truth had faith in the Lord during her ordeals and hardships.

Coming soon: pictures!