MLK

Martin Luther King, Jr. was killed five days after I was born, and most of us in the emerging church have lived our entire lives in an American church that was shaped in part by him.  He was, in my estimation, one of the great churchmen -- to use an old and sexist term, but it seems fitting -- right up there with Augustine, Bonhoeffer, Luther, Calvin, and Jonathan Edwards.  His concern for the church is not brought to the fore as much as it should be, for on many occasions he made it clear that the church was his first concern.

One of the places where that is shown is in his Letter from the Birmingham Jail in which he defends his presence in Birmingham.  Eight clergymen had published an open letter in Birmingham, noting their disapproval of racism, but exhorting Negoes to obey the racist laws until new laws could be duly passed.

King wrote a forceful and eloquent letter on the margins of newspaper and the remnants of a legal pad.  Two of the most forceful paragraphs sound a clarion call to the church:

I am in Birmingham because injustice is here. Just as the prophets of the eighth century B.C. left their villages and carried their "thus saith the Lord" far beyond the boundaries of their home towns, and just as the Apostle Paul left his village of Tarsus and carried the gospel of Jesus Christ to the far corners of the Greco-Roman world, so am I. compelled to carry the gospel of freedom beyond my own home town. Like Paul, I must constantly respond to the Macedonian call for aid.

Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham.  Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.  We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea.  Anyone who lives inside the United States can never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.

We've done a lot of cogitating, and now it's time for us in the emerging church to do a bit more agitating.  In the face of incredible danger, King was an exemplar of Christian courage, and we would all -- emerging and non -- do well to heed his example and pray that a little of his courage rubs off on us.

By Tony Jones

Comments

[J.R.]

Great post, Tony. thanks.
I asked my wife how many white people in America truly know the impact that he has had not just on American history, but also upon humanity. Her response: not many. In fact, (I hate to admit this) but I just read the famous "I Have a Dream" speech all the way through for the very first time. Powerful and gripping.

Now I'll go and read Letter from a Birmingham Jail now all the way through, too.

Thanks, Tony.
J.R.

[Troy]

Tony, good word.

This reminds me of a closing salutation on a friend's email, "courage and beauty." His use of these two words together got me to thinking. How often do we translate the courage of Martin and other Civil rights leaders into unimaginative methods? How often does our admiration put us back into writer's block as we try to become the next MLK or put on the next Woodstock or be the next Reformation.

Yesterday a local station here in Atlanta aired speeches and sermons by MLK interspersed with songs from the same period. Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, and Ray Charles testifying with the same courage as Martin through their own artistic media. As I was in the car listening to this there were rows of moms driving their strollers into Decatur to "march" for MLK day. Yes, agiation is a neccessary topic to keep in front of us, lets just do it with the tools we have in front of us. We need more imagination and less replication.

Peace, Beauty, and Courage,
Troy