I felt so stupid, when I was first saved. There is a common knowledge of so many things in African American Christianity, I found it confounding. Some things are explained that seem to be common knowledge to me and other things are unspoken. Hidden verses and understandings of certain scriptures were common knowledge to a 2 year old in church. I would say, what is he talking about. I wrote so many questions on paper in the sermons. What did he mean by that? Why was he talking about that? As everybody knows was like a small taste of chocolate on somebody's finger...I would run home to find out who is David? What is a Philistine? These terms were bantered about and I had no clue.
I found that sometimes this can be good and sometimes this can be bad, because, if we are left to our own understanding we can make up something that is untrue from something being taught in truth. Little children do this all the time. The sentiment seemed to be that, when they know Jesus, He will make all things plain to them. I kept saying to myself, I gave my heart to Him and I still don't know. I would suffuse myself in the scriptures looking for the answers and some of those answers were more in the cultural heritage common to them than in the scriptures. As, I had always prided myself an astute African American woman with knowledge of the cultural mores, I felt all the more inept at not being able to ascertain to this gnosticish Christian knowledgable experience. Stuff, like the spelling and grammar of sentences were secondary, which were taught to me as primary and yet the understanding seemed to illude my senses completely. I doubted my knowledge of God and felt somewhat demeaned at the fact that no one explained these truths, everyone espoused to me. Sunday School helped.
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