This reflection ends with a song I recorded in 1978 about the visionary Dr. King: "Mountaintop"
As a white man who grew up in Mississippi and Louisiana in the 1950's and '60's, I want to express to you what Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. meant to me, and correlate my expression with images of some of the people I saw two days ago in that parade in downtown Charlotte. What I am seeing is this:
A prophet who saw what needed to happen, then acted effectively to make in happen.
A man who walked, successfully, a tightrope between violent comrades on one side and non-violent believers on the other.
A builder, who built a bridge of provision and good will between those who have and those who had not.
A drum major for justice
A man who did try, in his life, to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and forge new opportunity for those who had none.
A man who strove to make a way where there was no way
A man whose hope for mankind has outlasted the injustice that put him in an early grave.
A man whose love for mankind has overcome the evil that men do.
An effective Christian antidote to a world infected by people who had perfected the practice of hate.
A reverent Christian response to a world populated by people who had rejected a loving God.
A servant of the Lord,
A man of peace,
A Christian,
a sinner saved by grace.
A visionary.
This is only a small part of Dr. King's legacy.
