“We are lucky to have the legacy of such a man. For those of us who are hesitant to embrace Christ’s suffering, we have an example. For those of us who struggle as part of a young community of Christ to see our place in history, we have encouragement. His vision has endured.“
-Joyce Hollyday
“Clarence Jordan was a strange phenomenon in the history of North American Christianity. Hewn from the massive Baptist denomination, known primarily for its conformity to culture, Clarence stressed the anti-cultural, the Christ-transcending and the Christ-transforming, aspects of the gospel. He was an authentic product of the Bible Belt, of the rural, agrarian heartland, of the people’s church (he got his college degree in agriculture, graduating in the same class as Senator Herman Talmadge at the University of Georgia). Clarence pursued this tradition to its very end, ending at the top with a Ph.D. in the Greek New Testament from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.”
– G. McLeod Bryan
The promise of something wise or something funny or just something good to know danced in this man’s eyes … Clarence Jordan had a streak of magnetism best demonstrated by the contradicting virtues that marked him – he was a gentle man who thundered, a nonviolent man who was known to have stared down a Ku Kluxer or two, a man with much to say who listened patiently, a genuinely humble man who could walk into the home of an affluent person and say: “Nice piece of plunder you have here.” He was a dirt-farming aristocrat, a good ‘ole Georgia country boy with a doctor’s degree, a teacher with manure on his boots, a scholar with working clothes on his mind.
– Dallas Lee, “The Cotton Patch Evidence”
Clarence Jordan was born in Talbotton, Georgia, on July 29, 1912, the seventh of ten children. His family owned both the bank and the general store, giving him the typical upbringing of a male born into privilege in the rural South of that time. Early on, however, he was bothered by what he saw. In Sunday School, he sang with the other children, “Red and yellow, black and white, they are precious in his sight. Jesus loves the little children of the world.” Even as a young boy, he questioned whether the little Black children were truly considered precious in God’s sight. Why, then, were they so ragged, hungry, and dirty? As he grew, Clarence came to the conclusion that it wasn’t God’s doing—it was man’s.
After earning an undergraduate degree in agriculture at the University of Georgia, Clarence headed to the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, where he obtained a Ph.D. He was eager to understand the New Testament more deeply and knew that “the Greek language was the vehicle that could carry him closest to the original intent of the New Testament.”
During his studies, Clarence became captivated by the way of life those early followers of Jesus lived. Acts 2:44-45 and Acts 4:32-33, in particular, captured his imagination. Though he was already serving the materially poor, he came to believe that something deeper was required—that what you did must flow from the way you lived. The Early Church lived a life very different from the one he knew in the 20th-century South.
In 1942, Clarence, his wife, Florence, and another couple, Mabel and Martin England, founded Koinonia Farm. They sought to live out the life modeled by the first Christians and to serve God and God’s people through this new community called Koinonia. Here, it didn’t matter if you were Baptist or Lutheran, Mennonite or Episcopalian, Non-denominational or Catholic, Russian Orthodox or Presbyterian, Methodist or Greek Orthodox, Black or white, or any other race. Faith or no faith—you were welcome to visit. They founded a koinonia where all are welcome.
Clarence also expressed his faith and vision in a unique way through his Cotton Patch Gospels, a translation of the New Testament that reimagined the stories of Jesus and the apostles in a Southern, rural context. With his deep knowledge of Greek and his keen understanding of Southern culture, Clarence translated these ancient texts into a modern vernacular, placing Jesus and his followers in the towns, backroads, and cotton fields of Georgia. His goal was to make the gospel relatable, stirring readers to confront social injustice in their own communities. The Cotton Patch Gospels continue to resonate with readers as a powerful call to live out the teachings of Jesus in everyday life.
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