I was asked to write this for an insert into the program for the school musical.

The Cotton Patch Gospels and Clarence Jordan

Sometime back in the mid-1970’s I first read Clarence Jordan’s translation of the book of Matthew. Jesus was born in Gainesville, traveled and preached through Georgia and Alabama before being lynched in Atlanta. For someone whose only Bible was a red-letter King James Version, this was revolutionary. Instead of “verily’s” and “thus sayeth’s,” this version had Jesus saying, “don’t be like the religious phonies…,” criticizing church leaders and teachers instead of the Pharisees and Scribes, all the while drawling Southern “ya’lls and “aint’s.”

Clarence Jordan’s Cotton Patch Versions of the New Testament opened new perspectives when published in late 1960’s and though they caused controversy in some circles, for others they were a refreshing way to make the scriptures relevant to troubled times. In the forward to his translation of Luke, Jordan wrote that he hoped to “strip away the fancy language, the artificial piety, and the barriers of time and distance… and put Jesus and his people in the midst of our modern world.” Jordan emphasized the humanity of Jesus, something he believed had been lost in much of the church. “Jesus has been so zealously worshiped,” Jordan said, “his halo so brightly illumined, and his cross so beautifully polished that in the minds of many he no longer exists as a man.” Jordan wanted to counter this tamed down Christ by focusing on a Jesus who ate with “tax revenuers and women with questionable morals.” Jordan challenged people with the simple teachings of Jesus—to treat our neighbor as ourselves, to care for the poor, to bring sight to the blind and liberty to the enslaved.

Clarence Jordan sought to make this radical Jesus relevant to our time in practical ways. The Gospel message was for now, not somewhere off in eternity. To do this Jordan, his wife and another couple moved to rural Georgia in 1942. The goal was to create a community where people of different skin colors could live together as brothers and sisters in Christ. They held interracial Bible Studies—an act which led to their excommunication from the local Southern Baptist congregation they attended.

Efforts to help their neighbors in practical ways resulted in the formation of an interracial faith community, Koinonia Farms.  Because of their views on civil rights, local businesses boycotted Koinonia;  the KKK and others committed numerous acts of vandalism including shootings and bombings.  The violence aimed at Koinonia is reflected in the musical with lines from Matthew:

“Herod had Mabry see to it that on Sunday morning a bomb got tossed into the

nursery of the church where Jesus was supposed to be. Fortunately, Joe had taken

Jesus to Mexico so the plan failed to kill him, But, the explosion did murder fourteen

innocent infants and toddlers. It was a horrible sight that morning.”

Any American who read this thought not just of Jesus, but the four Black girls killed on their way to Sunday School in Birmingham.

In the face of  violence, some Koinonia families moved, but Jordan and others stayed. Through it all they maintained a commitment to nonviolence along with a sense of humor.  When they could not sell their pecans and other products locally because of the boycott, Koinonia began a mail-order business with the slogan, “Help us ship the nuts out of Georgia.”

Like many organizations Koinonia had its ups and downs. Clarence Jordan died in 1969 at the age of 57 but Koinonia and the Cotton Patch Version continue to inspire people to faith and action.

Shortly before Jordan’s death a young businessman, Millard Fuller came to Koinonia looking for a sense of purpose in  life. From that meeting an idea of how to provide housing grew. Eventually Fuller created Habitat for Humanity, an organization which has built thousands of houses around the world. Later, other families formed Jubilee Partners a group which provides numerous services to immigrants and others on the margins of society.

This musical, the Cotton Patch Gospel is one attempt to keep the memory of Jordan, his wife Florence and others from Koinonia alive. It is a legacy worth remembering as we recall the cloud of witnesses who have gone on before.

Marcus Miller