A Fighter Retires

More than 10,000 gathered at the New Birth Missionary Baptist church in Georgia today to say goodbye to Coretta Scott King.  Our country will miss her.

President Bush said it well.

Coretta Scott King not only secured her husband's legacy, she built her own.  Having loved a leader, she become a leader.

It's hard to imagine becoming a widow so young in life.  No one could have blamed Mrs. Martin Luther King for using her husband's assasination as an excuse to step away from a global spotlight and seek obscurity with her kids.  Many would have understood it.  Some would have praised it.  But she didn't.  And although her presence may not have been as large as Dr. King's, her courage certainly compared.  Her continued presence was a 40 year reminder of a man who's life was gone but who's legacy was not. 

Only three Americans have had a national holiday named in their honor; George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Martin Luther King Jr.  It was largely the work of Coretta Scott King that brought about the third one.

It's hard for many of us my age to appreciate the fight that Martin Luther King had on his hands.  His fight came on the heels of over 4 centuries of ignorance and hate directed from white Europeans, and later white Americans toward Africans. 

Today I spent some time reading Basil Davidson's book The African Slave Trade.  If you haven't read much history about the slave trade, you should.  It is one of the worst crimes in human history.  In the introduction, Davidson tells the story of an Englishman named Walsh.  In 1859 Walsh set sail from Brazil in a British ship called the North Star.  They chased down a slave ship in the South Atlantic and Walsh boarded the ship.  The human cargo onboard the slave ship consisted of 505 African slaves.  The crew of the ship had already thrown 55 Africans overboard during their 17 days at sea.  Slave ship owners would actually write those deaths off as business expenses. 

Walsh later described what he saw on that slave ship.

[These slaves] were all enclosed under grated hatchways, between decks.  The space was so low that they sat between each others' legs, and stowed so close together, that there was no possibility of lying down, or at all changing their position, by night or by day.  As they belonged to, and were shipped on account of different individuals, they were all branded like sheep, with the owners' marks of different forms.  These were impressed under their breasts, or on their arms, and, as the mate informed me with perfect indifference, burnt with a red hot iron...

Walsh also found out that most of the slaves onboard had no more than one square foot of sitting space.  They couldn't even stand up.

Reading these stories makes me very uncomfortable.  I'm thankful today for couples like Martin Luther and Coretta Scott King for channeling their discomfort into courage to fight for change.

Incidentally, I believe this is a fight that pastors ought to join.  We're not fighting slavery.  But we should continue to fight the residue of racism.  While our country has made great strides, we have more of them to make.  Church is still one of the most segregated experiences of the week.  Here in Metro Detroit the presence of racism still exists.  We still approach people with caution and suspicion because of the color of their skin.  Do your muscles ever tighten in the grocery store when someone with a different skin color walks into an aisle behind you?

I don't understand pastors who choose not to speak out against prejudice and racism.  Racism is not a character flaw.  It is sin.  And it is also a roadblock to real ministry.  It is impossible for us to love someone if we view them with suspicion.

Jesus fought this fight.  In John 4 he walked down a street that his kind (Jews) didn't travel.  He talked with a woman even though her kind (Samaritans) were wrongly considered inferior.  He drank from her cup.  He asked questions about her past.  He left her with a lasting impression of love.  None of that could have happened if he would have approached her cautiously, suspicious of her Samaritan roots. 

There are some fights that are worth fighting, just like there are some fighters who are worth honoring. 

Mr. and Mrs. Martin Luther King are two of them. 

Comments

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Nice Blog :)

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[Tiffany]

great thoughts...

[Jeff]

Hey, Pastor, great thoughts. Racism is most definitely a sin. As I am one half of an interracial marriage, I have felt the sting of racism. Even from family members who felt it wrong that we even got married. Thankfully, attitudes have changed now.

I saw a DVD from the Brooklyn Tabernacle recently. I saw a church and choir made up of every tribe, tongue and nation. It was glorious to see, but yet, it is the most segregated hour.

Lord, help us to realize that in Christ, we are all truly one.

Thanks for sharing this today, brother!

[jr]

Wow, Brad, that was well said! Hear! Hear!

[Rick Womack]

absolutely on target...thanks for pulling no punches...