Where Do We Go From Here? – 01/16/2012
January 16th, 2012Martin Luther King Jr., the famed civil rights leader, is the man we remember and honor today. As I was reading some of King’s writings this weekend, I thought of the ways I honor or do not honor the civil rights leader. I know I often get caught up in my own day-to-day without much focus on my neighbor. I realize as a seminary intern, I have preached about loving your neighbor and about social justice, but my actions don’t always follow. As the saying goes, I have talked the talk, but not walked the walk.
This morning, I invite you to join me in thinking about how we honor King. Does our mouth? What about our actions? Do we celebrate the three-day weekend or do we stop and think about King’s principles? Are we willing to analyze how love and justice have evolved from the 1960s through today? Are we willing to go further to see our own struggles with diversity and even how we might be a part of a system of oppression?
As we think about our answers, let me read to you from King’s “Where Do We Go From Here?” This was his last Southern Christian Leadership Conference presidential address and was delivered in 1967. He says, “Now we’ve got to get this thing right. What is needed is the realization that power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.”
He goes on, “And I say to you, I have also decided to stick to love. For I know that love is ultimately the only answer to mankind’s problems. And I’m going to talk about it everywhere I go. I know it isn’t popular to talk about it in some circles today. I’m not talking about emotional bosh when I talk about love, I’m talking about a strong, demanding love. I must confess, my friends, the road ahead will not always be smooth. There will be still rocky places of frustration and meandering points of bewilderment. There will be inevitable setbacks here and there. There will be those moments when the buoyancy of hope will be transformed into the fatigue of despair. Our dreams will sometimes be shattered and our ethereal hopes blasted. Difficult and painful as it is, we must walk on in the days ahead with an audacious faith in the future. When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds of despair, and when our nights become darker than a thousands midnights, let us remember that there is a creative force in this universe, working to pull down the gigantic mountains of evil, a power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows. Let us realize the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.”
On August 16, 1967, King answered the question, “Where do we go from here?” with words about justice and love knowing all too well it wouldn’t be easy. Today, I wonder how each of us can continue to answer the question “Where do we go from here?” Whether you go down the mountain today or continue the day-to-day of work and play in the Village, I challenge us to ask what stands against love and to seek the power to correct it. I know that I have sinned; I have fallen short, but I’m reminded, today is a new day. I am graced with a clean slate, a fresh start and so are you. I’m reminded that we are loved and called to love “trusting the power that is able to make a way out of no way and transform dark yesterdays into bright tomorrows.”
By,
Sara Cogsil
