The doors of the church are open. Good morning Saints.
It is the 22nd day of Black History Month. We’re 22 days into the one month where we remember what America tries to erase. Amen?! Twenty-two days into honoring fugitives… rebels …organizers … agitators … and midwives of freedom.
And this week, Saints, we lost a giant. We lost a voice that refused to whisper when justice demanded a shout. We lost Rev. Jesse Jackson who was a drum major for dignity who taught a generation how to stand up straight in a crooked nation.
If you’re grateful to still be here in the number because somebody before you refused to bow, give the lord a praise this morning.
Now turn to your neighbor and say, “Neighbor… I am, somebody.” Turn to your other neighbor and say it again, like you mean it: “Neighbor… I am, somebody.”
Don’t whisper it. Don’t apologize for it. Say it with your whole chest. “I AM SOMEBODY!”
Church, how did that feel in your body to say those words? Did your shoulders lift just a little? Did your spine straighten up? Did something unclench in your jaw? Did your breath deepen? Did you feel a surge of self-love?
Or did it feel awkward? Did it feel like you were braggin’? Like you were smellin’ ya’ self, as the elders used to say? Did it feel like, who do you think you are? Did it feel like you were about to be corrected? Put in your place? Taken down a peg.
Because some of us have been trained not to say those words out loud. Ohhh, y’all ain’t ready to hear me preach this morning before another snowstorm hits.
Beloved children of the sun, we have been trained to shrink. Trained to defer. Trained to dim our light so nobody feels threatened. Trained to call ourselves “just.” Just a teacher, just a mother, just from the South, just from the hood, just tryin’ to make it.
But the Word says something different about who we are. In Psalm 139, the psalmist declares: “I praise You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.”
Did Y’all hear that?
Fearfully and wonderfully made. Not accidentally made. Not barely made. Not conditionally made. Not temporarily made. Not provisionally made. Not politically made. Not economically made. Not half-ass made. Fearfully and wonderfully made.
That scripture does not say “I will be wonderful once I get money.” It does not say “I will be worthy once they approve me.” It does not say, “I will matter once I’m invited into their rooms.” It does not say, “I will have dignity once I soften myself to make them comfortable.” It does not say, “I will be whole once the system stops doubting me.” And it surely does not say, “I will be somebody once their gaze validates my humanity.”
It says you are fearfully and wonderfully made. It says you are already crafted with intention.
Somebody say Amen!
And over in Genesis 1:27, it says we are made in the image of god. Now y’all know I’m an unapologetic atheist who preaches from a Black Liberation theology framework. So what does that mean for me to be made in the image of god?
For me, “god” is not some bearded white man sittin’ on a cloud in the sky. God is the name people have given to ultimate worth. To the breath that animates life. To the moral law that says human beings are not disposable.
So to be made in the image of god means you carry inherent dignity. You carry consciousness. Creativity. The capacity to love. The capacity to resist injustice. It means no state, no empire, no ideology gets to downgrade your value.
You are not sacred because heaven stamped you. You are sacred because you are human. And that, Saints, is enough.
Now let me ask you something . . . If you are made in the image of god, then WHO trained you to talk about yourself like you are disposable?
If you are made in the image of god, then WHO convinced you that humility meant humiliation? If you are made in the image of god, then WHO taught you that saying “I am somebody” was arrogance?
Because Empire benefits when you forget who you are. Pharaoh benefits when Hebrew children forget they belong to a covenant. Rome benefits when the poor forget they carry divine breath. Babylon benefits when exiles forget their songs and hang their harps on the willow trees. Herod benefits when parents are too terrorized to believe their babies matter.
White supremacist America exhales when Black children stop seeing their skin as miracle and start seeing it as mistake. When Latino children forget their language is music and not a menace.
When Asian children forget their heritage is ancient brilliance and not perpetual foreignness. When Indigenous children forget they are the first stewards of this land and not relics of the past. When white children forget they are exploited by the same system that feeds them resentment.
Because once you forget you are sacred, you will accept crumbs. Once you forget that you are somebody, you will negotiate with your own dignity. Once you forget who you are, you will defend the very systems that diminish you.
And Empire smiles when that happens. All it has to do is wait. Wait for brilliance to question itself. Wait for boldness to quiet down. Wait for holy fire to dim into compliance.
But the Word keeps on whispering, shouting, and declaring: You are not what they labeled you. You are not what they budgeted for you. You are not what they predicted about you.
You ARE somebody!
In Luke 4, Jesus stands up and reads: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me… He has sent me to proclaim good news to the poor… freedom for the captives…”
Tell me Saints, why would the poor need good news unless they had been told they were bad news? Why would captives need proclamation unless they had been told they were nothing?
Why would the hungry need blessing unless they had been blamed for their hunger? Why would the meek need reassurance unless they had been trampled into silence? Why would the brokenhearted need healing unless someone first broke them?
Why would the oppressed need freedom unless somebody convinced them bondage was their natural condition? Why would the rejected need cornerstone language unless they had been called disposable?
Why would this nation’s children need to chant “I am somebody” unless America had already told them they were nobody?
Somebody say, You betta Preach Rev. Dr. Staceypants.
Saints, when you said “I am somebody,” you were not being prideful. You were aligning yourself with scripture. You were agreeing with heaven. And maybe the reason it feels unfamiliar in your mouth is because too many systems worked overtime to make you doubt what god already declared.
Now, I want Y’all to imagine being a little child. And maybe some of you actually were. Imagine it’s the 1970s. Or the 1980s. Schools in America were freshly “integrated” but still hostile. Neighborhoods were over-policed. Welfare offices were crowded. News anchors were talking about crime and poverty like they are talking about YOU, your mama and them.
Imagine you are small. Maybe you are poor. Maybe your mama is on assistance. Maybe your daddy can’t find work. Maybe your teacher has already decided what you will never be.
And into that America, still scarred by slavery, wounded by segregation, choked by redlining, and disciplining children into silence, steps a handsome Black preacher with an Afro, mentored by Dr. King, looking straight into the camera and telling children to say: “I am somebody. I may be poor. I may be on welfare. I may be small. I may look different. But I’m somebody.”
Saints, that was not a cute Sesame Street children’s moment. That was defiance. That was scripture. That was Black Liberation Theology before some seminaries even had language for it.
Because when a marginalized child in America says, “I am somebody,” they are echoing Psalm 8:4–5: “What is man that thou art mindful of him? … For thou hast made him a little lower than the angels, and crowned him with glory and honor.”
They are standing in Genesis 1:27: “So god created humankind in his own image.” Not in Pharaoh’s image. Not in plantation hierarchy. In the image of god.
They are declaring Psalm 139:14 over their own bodies: “I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.”
When Rev. Jesse Jackson looked at children who had been told they were nothing, told they were disposable, told they were criminal before adolescence, and said, “You are somebody,” he was preaching Luke 4:18: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach good news to the poor… to set at liberty them that are bruised.”
He was rebuking the lie of Egypt. He was rejecting Deuteronomy 28 curses that America tried to staple onto Black skin. He was channeling Isaiah 61:1: “He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives.”
Beloved children of the sun, to tell a poor benighted child “You are somebody” in a nation structured to tell them they are nobody is not just affirmation. It is insurrection!
It is Acts 17:28: “For in him we live and move and have our being.” Not in the White House. Not in Wall Street. Not in systems that rank and sort and discard. Not in IQ tests. Not in SATS. Not in racist pedagogy.
It is Romans 8:31: “If god be for us, who can be against us?”
That Black preacher with an Afro wasn’t just performing positivity. He was dismantling a theology of inferiority.
A theology of inferiority that said you are disposable. That said poverty is proof of your failure instead of evidence of structural theft. That said your skin is a curse instead of covenant. That said your neighborhood determines your worth. That said your anger at injustice is ungodly. That said you must shrink, soften, smile, and soothe in order to survive.
But when Rev. Jesse Jackson looked over the children and said, “I am somebody,” church that was exorcism.
Because Black Liberation Theology teaches us that god does not side with the powerful to make them comfortable. God sides with the oppressed to make them free. Exodus 3:7 tells us: “I have surely seen the affliction of my people… and I have heard their cry.”
When those children repeated, “I am somebody,” they were not just boosting self-esteem. They were rejecting Pharaoh’s census. They were rejecting America’s statistics. They were rejecting every policy that tried to reduce them to “less than.”
Saints, that was covenant. That was a generation being armed with revelation. And revelation is dangerous to Empire. Because once a child believes they are somebody, you cannot convince them to hug Pharaoh for scraps.
Once a child knows they are fearfully and wonderfully made and made in god’s image, they stop asking for permission to exist. Because the opposite of “I am somebody” is not humility. The opposite of “I am somebody” is bondage.
Somebody say Amen.
White supremacist America is insulted by the sound of those voices. By the sound of children claiming worth. Because it knows in its bones that those voices recall a truth that Empire has spent centuries trying to bury.
It is insulted by laughter that refuses fear. It is offended by joy that refuses shame. It is threatened by affirmation that refuses erasure. It is irritated when children sing themselves into existence. Because the essence of white supremacy is narrative control. It wants power to determine who belongs, who counts, and who can be seen as fully human.
That’s why the Trump administration is busy dismantling public education and public media. They cut federal support for public broadcasting that has carried beloved children’s programming like Sesame Street where Rev. Jackson told children to say “I am somebody.” They keep attackingshared cultural spaces where children learn language, empathy, and collective belonging.
They don’t wanna see media content showing kids of different backgrounds working and learning together. This nation recoils at marginalized children loving themselves and each other.
Because if marginalized children believe they are somebody, then they are harder to dismiss. Harder to manage. Harder to criminalize. Harder to consign to poverty. Harder to divide along lines of race and class. A white supremacist nation is offended by self-worth spoken aloud because self-worth spoken aloud is the antidote to domination.
Under this administration, offices that protect children’s welfare, education, health, and safety have been gutted. Programs that help families keep electricity on so babies don’t die in heat or cold have been cut. Preschool programs that feed and teach children face collapse. Child support enforcement systems have been hollowed out.
America has declared war on children. And when a nation declares war on children, it is declaring war on the future. It is declaring war on possibility. War on imagination. War on breath that hasn’t even had time to fully fill its lungs.
But here is what Rev. Jesse Jackson understood . . . You can slash budgets. You can gut programs. You can close offices. You can dismantle safety nets. But if a child still believes, “I AM SOMEBODY,” you have not won!
If a child still believes, “I AM SOMEBODY,” louder than the statistics, you have not won! If a child still believes, “I AM SOMEBODY,” in a classroom that doubts them, you have not won!
If a child still believes, “I AM SOMEBODY,” in a neighborhood over-policed and under-resourced, you have not won! If a child still believes, “I AM SOMEBODY,” when the news calls them a problem, you have not won!
If a child still believes, “I AM SOMEBODY,” when policy treats them as expendable, you have not won! If a child still believes, “I AM SOMEBODY,” in the face of a nation that profits from their doubt, you have not won!
Because the most powerful territory Empire ever tries to occupy is not land. It is the mind. It is the spirit. It is the internal narrative of a child.
That is why Rev. Jesse Jackson didn’t start with policy. He started with proclamation. He didn’t begin with legislation. He began with language. “I may be poor… but I am somebody. I may be on welfare… but I am somebody. I may be small… but I am somebody. I may look different… but I am somebody.”
Rev. Jesse Jackson was fortifying children from the inside. He was building a wall around their dignity before the world could breach it. Empire trembles at that sound of children’s voices because truth spoken by the most vulnerable is the beginning of liberation.
Let us pray.
God of Harriet.
God of the midwives.
God who heard the cry in Egypt and still hears the cry in America.
Strip us of plantation thinking. Burn out every lie that says we are less than. Break every craving for validation from unjust power and the racist gaze. Strengthen our spines where we have grown soft. Guard our memory where it is being manipulated. Protect our children from internalizing inferiority.
Teach us to love without laundering harm. Teach us to honor our elders without worshiping proximity. Teach us to confront Empire without becoming it. Make us bold enough to say, “I am somebody.” And holy enough to live like we believe it.
In the name of the atheist’s god that animates breath and who sides with the oppressed, let the church say Amen, Amen, and Amen.
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