MLK JR Rewind...the positive.

Ever since I returned from St. Louis and the Christian Community Development Association's conference, I have been pushing for practical ways to move our church and my life towards "reconciliation" which is one of the 3 "R"'s of the CCDA's path towards community development. So this year, we did a few new things on the MLK weekend.

I will list these not to pat us on the back, but to show and stimulate others to look for ways to put the gospel into action. The very gospel that according to Eph 2:14 says: "He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall." Our gospel should literally manifest this spiritual truth among our relationships and in our communities. A breaking down of the walls that divide us. An emerging "peace" where there was previously: indifference, hostility, misunderstanding, hate, unforgiveness, bitterness, racism, discrimination and all forms of injustice. People should be able to see the "Kingdom of God" among us...a kingdom where: "There is neither Jew nor greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus." (Gal. 3:28).

So like a good christian...I made a T-shirt, because I was a believer in the 80's and all of us from that era know, that T-shirts communicate truth better than anything...right? LOL! I couldn't find one in Spokane, so I had friend of mine who owns a novelty store downtown, make me one. He did a fantastic job.
Then I preached a message Sunday morning on the gentile woman who pushed through all the closed doors, the rejection and being called a "dog" in order to get her miracle. And correlated that with the struggle of MLK and others to press through all the barriers that seem to confront us in the work of justice.

We then took up an offering for the construction of the national MLK JR memorial in Washington DC. (www.mlkmemorial.org).

After the service we invited our congregation to attend Mt. Zion Holiness Church's service which is a predominately black church that is 3 blocks down the street. Robert Jackson (pictured above) is pastor of that church and I meet with him weekly in our Monday neighborhood prayer group. We had 22 people from our church attend. Then on Monday, I attended the Spokane MLK JR rally and walk, downtown. You can see a short video of the event and see me walking walking in the crowd in this video:MLK JR Rally
(If you can't see the link, just roll you mouse over the link, its there)

For the most part it was a great weekend. I do have some more thoughts though on the challenge of moving beyond mere words to really working for justice in our cities, our neighborhoods, relationships and most importantly in our churches. But I will post that later.