While watching the snow come down yesterday, I reread King’s famous Letter from Birmingham Jail. It can be found at click here. Written in 1963 on scraps of paper smuggled out from a jail cell, the letter is a stirring account of what King was intending to accomplish through negotiation and non-violent protest. He was writing not to the general public, but to a group of eight moderate white clergymen who criticized the march and other demonstrations that King had led.
Here are a few parts of his letter:
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly. You deplore the demonstrations that are presently taking place in Birmingham. But I am sorry that your statement did not express a similar concern for the conditions that brought the demonstrations into being.”
“…I must honestly reiterate that I have been disappointed with the church. I do not say that as one of those negative critics who can always find something wrong with the church. I say it as a minister of the gospel who loves the church, who was nurtured in its bosom, who has been sustained by its Spiritual blessings, and who will remain true to it as long as the cord of life shall lengthen.”
“…The contemporary church is so often a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. It is so often the arch supporter of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church’s often vocal sanction of things as they are.”
“If the church of today does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authentic ring, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century. I meet young people every day whose disappointment with the church has risen to outright disgust. I hope the church as a whole will meet the challenge of this decisive hour.”
Those words from 60 years ago still ring true today. Whenever the church choses to wrap itself in the flag or follow the popular trends of the day, it will have lost its identity and witness. Long ago, the Apostle Paul warned “Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of the mind, so that you may discern what is the will of God—what is good and acceptable and perfect.” (Romans 12:2)
Grace and peace,
Pastor Steve