The Rev. Heber Brown III served as senior pastor at Pleasant Hope Baptist Church in Baltimore for nearly 15 years. Throughout his ministry career, the Rev. Brown has extended his role as a leader beyond the pulpit, advocating for vulnerable communities across the globe.
In 2015, he founded the Black Church Food Security Network to address the declining health of his congregants and the persistent lack of access to fresh produce in America’s Black communities. The network brings Black farmers and Black Christian congregations together to support one another. It grew so quickly that he now works full time to continue expanding it. In March, he will be honored at Brigham Young University’s Ballard Center’s “Do Good. Better. Conference” as the 2025 social innovator of the year for his “faith-based approach to food insecurity in his community.” Here, he shares what he’s learned with Deseret Magazine. His story has been edited for length and clarity.
The Black Church Food Security Network began with 1,500 square feet of space on the grounds of my home church. One day, I got the idea to start our own garden there. I was somewhat naive as to what that would take, but thankfully, our congregation proved incredibly resourceful. I had studied the Great Migration, during which millions of African Americans moved from the rural South to Northern cities in the early and mid-20th century, but I hadn’t really understood its full consequences until the garden came along. Many members of our congregation, it turned out, had grown up on farmland in the South before their families relocated to Baltimore. They had left the farm, but the farm hadn’t left them.
One woman, whom we call Aunt Maxine, took the lead. Under her guidance, our church garden yielded 1,200 pounds of produce, from broccoli and corn to collard and mustard greens. Later, we added apple and peach trees. We used the bounty in our church kitchen and distributed it to church members and neighbors in need.
Before starting the network, I regularly visited members of my congregation in the hospital. I offered what help I could in the form of prayer and presence, but after a while, I couldn’t help but notice a repetitive cycle. Members of my congregation were ending up in and out of medical facilities, again and again, in part because they lacked access to high-quality food. Whether because of affordability or geography or systemic discrimination, there was a cycle. I founded the Black Church Food Security Network to interrupt that cycle. I knew that if a garden at our average local church could help transform our health and create economic opportunity within our local community, it could happen at other churches, too.
My father — who is coming up on his 40th year in ministry — taught me that ministering, or shepherding a flock, means showing up again and again and again, in whatever way your flock needs you.
What began with that garden in our church has since grown to encompass 230 congregations, each with a tailor-made food justice program. Some of them, like the garden programs, make fresh produce more accessible and affordable to church members. Others focus on investing in Black farmers.
Around two years ago, I met Musa and Micole Hasan, a husband-and-wife duo who’d found each other at Tuskegee University and later became the owners of Bread and Butter Farms. Their farm is a nine-acre sanctuary of sorts, where cabbage, radishes and sweet potatoes thrive.
It was summertime when we met, and it felt like a small miracle, of sorts. For several months I had been having conversations with the leadership team at Atlanta’s Ebenezer Baptist Church about bringing our program to their congregation. This particular church, the very institution once pastored by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and today led by Sen. Raphael Warnock, was determined to bring better options and nutrition to its community. The church’s leadership team decided to invest in a system where church members could purchase produce in advance of the year’s growing season, which would then be delivered over 10 weeks during the harvest. To make it happen, I just needed to find the right farmers. That’s where Musa and Micole came in.
Bread and Butter Farms is in Sparta, Georgia, about an hour and a half south of Atlanta. Musa and Micole started selling at local farmers markets and soon realized they could make a living doing the work they loved most — and they’ve been doing it ever since. By the time I met them, they had their logistics figured out. That made them ideal candidates to pair with Ebenezer Church since its congregants tend to be, relatively speaking, economically well-off. These church members are glad to support folks like Musa and Micole, even at prices slightly above market rate, because they see it as an investment in ensuring access to healthy food. But just as importantly, it’s an opportunity to build up a Black business.
I’m grateful for the work food charities do, and certainly, that work has its place. However, my interest is in building sustainable models.
What we do at the Black Church Food Security Network isn’t just about food and health; it’s also about economic justice for Black farmers who have faced a century of overt and covert discrimination. It’s to set a good example by paying Black farmers for their labor. Many members of the Ebenezer congregation agreed; in the program’s first year at the church, 93 of them signed up.
On the first morning of distribution at Ebenezer Church last August, Musa and Micole arrived early and piled dozens of watermelons in varying shades of green beneath the church’s historic red-brick walls.
More than watermelons, Musa and Micole delivered potatoes, vegetables and greens that church members, who’d placed orders and paid in advance, were able to haul away after Sunday service. Before the distribution, the Rev. Ethel Richards had taken the time to prepare a series of recipe video tutorials for church members, so they could learn to cook nutritious dishes using the same produce they’d just gotten. Just imagine: You show up on a given morning to church and have a great time at your regular service. Then you grab a box of fresh produce on your way out the door while having the chance to meet with the people who grew it and learn where your food really comes from. After, you go home with new recipe tutorials made by someone you know from church. When I talk about using food and church together to promote health and wealth, this is precisely the sort of situation I envision.
These programs are not food charities. I’m grateful for the work food charities do, and certainly, that work has its place. However, my interest is in building sustainable models that connect Black farmers and Black churches in a mutually beneficial cycle, promoting health and wealth for both parties.
Many members of our congregation had grown up on farmland in the South before their families relocated to Baltimore. They had left the farm, but the farm hadn’t left them.
My father — who is coming up on his 40th year in ministry — taught me that ministering, or shepherding a flock, means showing up again and again and again, in whatever way your flock needs you. It means being present even when you don’t have all the answers. It means sharing life with people through the ups and downs and offering a stable, thoughtful, supportive presence through it all. Showing up for people doesn’t just mean meeting their spiritual needs. It also means helping address the social, political and economic issues that impact them. It’s not enough to worry on Sunday morning; responsible shepherding happens Monday through Saturday, too.
I learned this early, as a child, by watching my dad. One time, I remember riding in the back seat as my parents stopped the car at a red light. There, standing on the side of the road, was a man who didn’t have housing. It was cold, and he looked cold. My dad took the gloves off his hands, rolled down his window and gave them to this man. Then the light turned green, and we drove away, while I looked back at this stranger wearing my dad’s gloves. More than any other moment, that one has been my North Star in ministry, including with the network. It isn’t just about preaching in the pulpit, but also about how you live your life day to day. I saw that in my dad, and I thought, “I want to be like him.”
Because of that, we embrace people across lines of race and religion. We partner with many mosques and synagogues. In fact, Musa and Micole are Muslim. Their farm was devastated by Hurricane Helene last September, and their insurance company rejected their claim. After they had grown produce for that church for 10 weeks and helped them to be as healthy as possible, I thought it was only right that when the storm struck their farm, the church could help them rise and rebuild. They didn’t have to go through this alone. They had a community behind them.
It’s moments like that when we recognize that while many things make human beings distinct, food is one thing that reliably brings us together. Sweet potatoes are sweet potatoes, whether you read the Quran or the Bible.
This story appears in the April 2025 issue of Deseret Magazine. Learn more about how to subscribe.