Juanita
Bynum 1959–Till
date.
Choir members, I found
this story online about the artiste that wrote the song we will be ministering
next 2 Sundays and I would love us to go
through it.
In a time when sexuality permeates the culture, there is a
woman who encourages women to find closure for previous relationships, live
chaste, and be the kind of people they hope to attract. Using her own mistakes
as a basis for her sermons, prophetess Juanita Bynum has dedicated herself to
reaching others with a message from God,
a message that offers healing and encouragement through suggesting celibacy for
singles. Treading on territory where few women have ventured, Bynum has allowed
herself to be God’s vessel,
telling her colorful story to the masses, in hopes of saving souls from
following the same dark paths she once walked.
As a child in Chicago
with her parents, Katherine and Thomas, and siblings Janice, Kathy, Regina, and
Thomas, Bynum embraced the church as a distinct part of her life. The family
were members of St. Luke Church of God in Christ, where the father was an
elder. According to Ministries Today, Bynum was an outgoing child. Her
charisma became apparent to those outside her immediate realm, when she landed
a starring role in her middle school’s
production of My Fair Lady. Her performance grabbed the attention of
television show agents who wanted to cast her in programs similar to Julia,
starring Diahann Carroll. Bynum’s mother,
however, declined the offers. “I used to
make her stop playing outside and come in the house and just sit still,” she told Ministries
Today. “I wanted my daughter to
listen to the voice of God,” she
added.
Though she later admitted in Ministries Today, “Every time I got on my
knees I kept hearing [God] say, ‘Before I
knew you, I formed you in your mother’s womb to be a prophet to
the nations,’” she struggled in her youth
to obey instructions from God. Still, Bynum had hopes of being a servant. She
attended Saints Academy of the Church of God in Christ (COGIC) high school in
Lexington, Mississippi and graduated second in her class.
Soon after her graduation, Bynum, still a teenager, began preaching at churches
and revivals. Eventually, she traveled to Port Huron, Michigan,
to minister for pastor William T. Nichols and his wife, and ended up on an
unanticipated journey that changed the course of her life.
Choices Led to Hardship
At the age of 21 Bynum married, despite the warnings of her
loved ones. “Everybody told me he wasn’t right, but I was screamin’, I’m in love. I can change
him,” she told Essence.
As Bynum later found out, she could not change her husband, and she had married
him for all the wrong reasons.
A virgin until her marriage, Bynum admitted in Essence,
“I married for sex—and what the man looked
like.” Her husband left her in
1983 and divorced her in 1985. The pain of the failed relationship landed her
in an institution, battling anorexia nervosa, and questioning her life’s turn of events. She lost
sight of God’s path, and eventually
sought refuge and healing in empty sexual affairs. In addition to her emotional
state, her financial state crumbled. She was forced to go on welfare to
survive.
At a Glance…
Born Juanita Bynum on January 16, 1959; divorced, 1985. Education:
Saints Academy of the Church of God in Christ (COGIC) high school in Lexington,
Mississippi. Religion; raised COGIC.
Career: Author. Recorded videos
include: No More Sheets; Are You Planted for the Kingdom (also available
on CD); I’m Too Fat
For the Yoke (also available on CD); Limp of the Lord;
Now That’s
Dominion; The Refiner’s Fire;
My Delivery; The Spirit of Isaac; The Umpire of my Soul; Tied to the Altar. Wrote: No
More Sheets; Don’t Get off
the Train. Speaker. Engagements include T.D. Jakes’ Singles Conference (”No More Sheets” message), 1997; T.D. Jakes’ “Woman, Thou Art Loused!” conference, 1998; Women’s Weapons of Power
Conference, 2001.
Address: c/o Juanita Bynum
Ministries, 415 North Crawford St., Waycross, GA, 31510.
Struggled to Rebuild Her
Life
In 1990 Bynum returned to Chicago, became a hairdresser, and
managed to leave government aid behind. Her next steps led her to New
York as a flight attendant for Pan American Airways, a job she held
until the company went out of business in 1991. Bynum told Essence that
friends believed the fate of Pan Am was God’s way of telling her that
she was supposed to be a preacher. “I knew
God was saying that this was my destiny, but I didn’t want to hear it.”
In New York, Bynum joined a new church and began ministering
again. In 1996 she met a man who would prove to be a key figure in her
transformation into a renowned prophetess. Though he knew nothing of her story,
Pentecostal evangelist Bishop T.D. Jakes invited her to the singles’ conference in Dallas—a step that, according to Essence,
was the result of his obedience to God’s instruction.
Life Story Became Testimony
to Singles
Jakes’
obedience turned out to be the stepping stone for Bynum’s explosive break into
national popularity, when two years after attending the singles’ conference, Bynum’s role changed from
attendee to keynote speaker. In 1998 she delivered a message titled “No More Sheets” to 17,000 people, the
majority women, and brought the crowd to their feet with praise and
deliverance.
“No More Sheets” proved to be a testimony
of Bynum’s sexual deviation and her
process of purification. She reached out to the crowd with brutal honesty,
honing in on the concept that “single” is not synonymous with
unmarried; instead “single” refers to those who are
free from the remnants of past relationships. “In order for God to bring
somebody else in your life, there’s got to
be room for that person in your life. You’re not single yet,” she told the crowd. “You’re still attached.”
Wrapped in sheets, Bynum explained that each sheet
represented a past relationship and only God could peel those layers away in
order to make people truly single—ready to
receive their ordained mates. She shared a story of poverty that placed her in
roach-infested projects, using McDonald’s napkins as toilet paper.
Bynum told the crowd that by allowing her to struggle, God was reconditioning her
to release her dependence on men and embrace her dependence on Him. It was a
sacrifice that she made in order to be blessed.
Bynum told Essence that when she was on stage, her
message had a life of its own. “It wasn’t me—it was God.” By the end of the video,
the camera captured thousands in a moment of spiritual awakening, chanting, “No More Sheets! No More
Sheets!”
Bynum’s
endeavors have taken her across the country to deliver her untraditional
message to the masses at numerous venues including Jakes’ 1998 “Woman, Thou Art Loosed!” conference. With her
popularity came the conception of Morning Glory Ministries, a venue that allows
people to find out exactly where Bynum will be delivering messages and to
obtain information about the prophetess. Videotapes like the now famous, “No More Sheets,” and other tapings like “I’m Too Fat for the Yoke” and “The Limp of the Lord,” as well as books including
Don’t Get Off
The Train, which was written about her experiences in
Port Huron, are available for purchase through the ministry. Her lessons are
also available through her ministry’s
television program, Morning Glory, which according to Ministries
Today, was airing on 15 television stations throughout the country in 1999.
Despite the great success Bynum has found in ministry, her
fulfillment comes from one-on-one contact with people. “I really love people,” she was quoted as saying
in Ministries Today. “My
biggest joy is the individual contact I have with them.” In fact, when she isn’t traveling, she runs a
bible institution training ministry at her church, New Greater Bethel
Ministries in Hempstead, New York.
Bynum is constantly reminded of the rough days from which
strength arose, and told Essence that the memories are still a great
part of her existence. “If I close
my eyes right now, I can see myself in the snow, wearing a black $2 coat and
tennis shoes with no socks, waiting to get my $76 in food stamps. I can see
myself in the hospital after my nervous breakdown, crying and throwing myself
against the walls of the padded cell they put me in. When I remember the
process it took to get myself from there to where I am today—and then I see a sister
with no hope—I’m driven to get to that
sister. I believe that the pain in each of our pasts gives us an opportunity to
help others. If I honestly tell somebody what has happened to me, then maybe
that person will be transformed.”
From the pages of her electronic guestbook on
www.nosheets.com, it appears that her mission to help others make a
transformation is working. One message was just one of many that speaks to
miraculous change. It read, “Sister
Bynum, I want to thank God for you. I just read No More Sheets and I can’t begin to tell you it has
changed my life. I thought I knew, but am now aware that I knew nothing.
Everything is so clear to me now. I can’t explain how your book has
changed me… If it weren’t for you and your message,
I would still be lost… I can
proudly say no more sheets for me and I love you so much for what you have given
me.”
While Bynum has touched the hearts and souls of many, she is
still cognizant of life’s little
lessons. In fact she found one in her dog, Corky. According to her website,
www.nosheets.com, Bynum purchased the red-pepper poodle at a time when her heart
was heavy. “The Lord explained to me
that the dog was feeling what I was feeling, which was rejection. He said the
poodle is thinking: What’s the use
in going to the window and barking? She’s not going to choose me
anyway,” she was quoted as saying.
Bynum did choose Corky. Something as small as reaching out to
this dog quite possibly brought healing to both Bynum and Corky. Those who
truly believe in God’s wonders
have testified that He works in mysterious ways. An example of his mystery,
Bynum is on fire for the Lord, and she intends to do His work until the flame
is extinguished.
