Where God Became Present in the Civil Rights Movement
(Posted January 16, 2025)
Perhaps it’s a result of living through a time when news and information bombard us at every moment, but most of today’s adults have lived through times of great change, history happening before our eyes in every moment. Because we’re used to it, we may not even notice in these events when the nearness between God and ourselves drew even closer.
Last Sunday I began our series on “Thin Places” – those times when God draws near and the Spirit shines through the clouds of human unknowing.
The Thin Place of Awe and Challenge
This week coincides, ironically, with both our national recognition of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the Civil Rights movement, and another history-making moment: the second inauguration for a President of the United States. Especially in an era where prejudice has emerged with a vengeance amid our national dialogue, you just know that God is going to use these occasions to shine through. It may be a moment of awe; it may be a moment of challenge to us as followers of Jesus.
But there will be a thin place, or several, nevertheless.
Martin Luther King Junior’s Thin Place
I think one of my favorite thin places at the dawn of the Civil Rights movement was Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. himself. Martin was extremely aware that he was “Junior.” His father, affectionately known as Daddy King by the people who adored Rev. King senior’s powerful preaching, made an impossible goal for Martin to even approach his greatness. If the truth be known, Martin never wanted to be a pastor. He yearned to be an academic, teaching.
And that was when God thrust him into the spotlight through a Thin Place.
Two days after the Spirit lent courage to a tired black seamstress not to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus and she was arrested, Rev. King (junior) was asked to address a mass meeting of the Black community at the Hoyt Street Baptist Church. At first his delivery was dry. He looked out at the tired crowd, and his words acknowledged their fatigue. He said, “We, the disinherited of this land, we who have been oppressed so long, are tired of going through the long night of captivity. And now we are reaching out for the daybreak of freedom and justice and equality.”
The crowd erupted. Martin knew in that moment -- that thin place -- his words needed to reflect the heart of the people. It was the beginning of the road toward unmasking prejudice in this country.
Sunday’s Music Interprets Thin Places
This Sunday we will listen to Nancy Wildman’s musical interpretation of Thin Places and people of courage, and touch upon how often God has drawn close to us in decades past, and in this present one. Please join us at 10 a.m.