Wisdom flowing from Grace Experienced

"One should walk through doors that are open

rather than bemoan those that are closed."  J. Deotis Roberts

When first I met him, J. Deotis Roberts was visiting the Divinity School where I was a student decades ago. On the last occasion I spoke with him, he was among those attending the New Baptist Covenant meeting in Atlanta, Georgia, in 2008. Between those dates, I learned much about him from his friend, and one of my mentors, the outstanding Caribbean church historian and ecumenist, Dr. Horace Russell. 

In Atlanta, Roberts gave me a copy of his autobiography, The Seasons of Life: By Grace with Gratitude - a Memoir (Charp Communications, 2007). Recently, I reread this book, which I highly recommend. The book shows the advantage of having servants of God who understand the synergy that needs to exist between church and academia for faithful ministry to be fulfilled.

Dr. J. Deotis Roberts is a well known and respected philosopher and theologian.  He wrote The Seasons of Life to share many of the events that shaped his personal life and witness. Roberts offers a glimpse into his family life - his marriage to Elizabeth, the impact of the death of their only son, Deotis, Jr., and the excitement surrounding a family gathering in connection with his 70^th birthday.

Roberts's theological output is phenomenal and, as David Goatley has said in his Foreword to The Seasons of Life, Roberts's "numerous theological books and articles are the fruit of the labor of an African American philosopher, theologian, and Christian minister who intentionally engages in the hard work of dialogue and reconciliation with local, national, and global implication and application." 

There is much to learn from Roberts's story about the virtue of courage. We begin to see Roberts's courage amidst challenges he faced growing up as a black man in the American South, 1927-1950. In a manner reminiscent of Emmanuel McCall's book, When all God's Children get Together: A Memoir of Baptists and Race, (Mercer, 2007) Roberts tells of appearing at a church to teach a Sunday School class and being greeted by a member who took him to the broom closet to wait for the person who had invited him to speak.  After a disappointing experience at a seminary that left him devastated, Roberts says: "It took much prayer and great determination to continue." Of his experience in the US state of Georgia, he states: "Blacks were treated as children at best and as non-persons (or animals) at worse." Roberts encountered paternalism and racism in the church.

Roberts's story also teaches the importance of perseverance. In the period 1951-1970, he says he felt unfulfilled and not fully challenged. His family faced serious financial challenges after coming to serve in Washington D. C. - a not uncommon experience! Despite the potential cost to him personally, Roberts persisted as an outspoken advocate for racial justice. He was not one to give up easily; he fought for what he believed in.

When first I met him, his confessional background was not mentioned - perhaps, for good reason in that place at that time! Yet, Baptists would lose much if they never gained familiarity with what this significant scholar has had to say, for example, about the place of reconciliation in Christian living. I do not think that enough is known within the Baptist family about this Baptist thinker who says that he has experienced grace as Divine Aid.

We would reap much benefit from the life of one who, born in the home of a Baptist pastor and his wife, never forsook his calling as a disciple of Christ and, despite setbacks, never turned away from his vocation to bear witness to the reconciliation available by God through Christ Jesus.

May many emerging leaders in our Baptist and other churches, read and benefit from the sifted wisdom that Roberts communicates to all who read his autobiography.

 Back to top