I Betrayed Myself When I Joined an Evangelical Church
Today, I choose joy - Joy is an Act of Resistance!
After relocating to another state I thought I needed something different.
Shorter services. A fresher experience. A version of church that felt lighter, trendier, easier to digest.
When I found what I thought was a non-denominational church, I believed I had found it. The music was polished. The branding was sleek. The sermons were motivational. It felt like church for people who didn’t want "too much church." I thought I had made the right move.
But the truth was, I had unknowingly walked into an evangelical, Hillsong-adjacent space.
And without even realizing it, I started shrinking parts of myself to fit in.
The faith they offered was packaged — professional smiles, curated slow playlists, surface-level diversity. The messages sounded good but rarely dug deep. My questions about history, injustice, culture — about my Blackness — stayed unanswered, or worse, politely ignored.
I didn’t see it at first. I thought maybe I was the problem. Maybe I needed to be less sensitive, less loud, less... me.
Yesterday, everything broke open.
Sunday, I visited a Black Baptist church. Union Temple Baptist Church in Washington, DC.
When I tell you — the moment the praise/worship team started singing, something inside me woke up. The worship leader set the tone and the it was as if a fire erupted. The freedom and joy was undeniable.
By the time the preacher graced the platform we were good and ready. I already knew the message would be awesome because Kristian A. Smith is a sho’nuff preacher. He’s not only the leader of the Faith Community, but I’m proud to say he’s MY pastor.
The preaching wasn’t altered for mass appeal; it was powerful because it came from a place of real life — the kind of life our people have survived for generations.
There was so much culture there. So much history in every hand clap, every "Amen," every stomp of the foot. I didn’t realize how starved I had been until I sat in a place where I didn’t have to explain myself or tone myself down.
On the wall, Jesus — not a blonde-haired, blue-eyed stranger — but a dark-skinned man, the way He really was. I saw our ancestors too, the great cloud of witnesses. Their faces framed with love and reverence, not hidden, not erased. Marred by the struggle, but joyful at the same time.
In that evangelical church, I was trying to fit into a space that wasn’t built with me in mind.
Yesterday, in that Black Baptist church, I remembered: my faith isn’t supposed to erase who I am. It’s supposed to carry me, heal me, honor me.
I betrayed myself, thinking I needed to assimilate.
Never again.
Yesterday I felt God meet me where I truly am — Black, beautiful, bruised, bold — and called it very good.
Blacklisted Saint