In a year when we are suffering all the effects of a world full of people striving to be first, to have the most, to be the biggest and most powerful, it’s wonderful to stop for a moment and reflect on the words of a person who was admired—and reviled—by millions, who was recognized wherever he went, who wielded great power—yet who died without great wealth.
Once a year, we celebrate the life and work of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., a man who fought for peace, justice, and a better America. Some people remember him as a rabble-rouser or trouble-maker, but the marches, boycotts, and other public actions he led were not arbitrary, and, so far as it was in his power, were not disorderly. He believed that those who broke a particular law because it was unjust nonetheless showed great respect for law by allowing themselves to suffer the consequences of breaking the law. Unlike some of today’s activists, who hack or burn or steal or vandalize and then slip away into the night, King went to jail thirty times in his lifetime. He was willing to stake his body on the fight for justice—and to do always respond to violence and hatred with peace and love.
There’s a story that back during the 1960s, when the Civil Rights movement was on the march, MLK attended a meeting that became focused on Robert Kennedy, then Attorney General. As I wrote about him in another book coming out this year, RFK was “a political hatchet man when he served in the administration of his brother John, arrogant and aggressive, and by all accounts, the last person you would have expected to become a champion of the poor, the dispossessed, the marginalized.”
Everyone present was complaining about Bobby Kennedy, calling him names, naming him as an obstruction to what they were doing. MLK wouldn’t hear it.
“We’re going to pray for him,” he said, and I’m sure they did. But even in this case—in a private meeting, where the person being discussed wasn’t present and couldn’t be offended, MLK chose generosity and a spirit-filled response. Even when he was publicly called down by a number of prominent Southern clergymen—all of them white, of course—for his actions in Birmingham, Alabama, he responded to them gently but forcefully. In King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” a response to their public letter, we see a man speaking his mind in love, generously, but without losing his sense of moral rightness.
He never insults them, never assumes that they are evil. He simply makes his case, persuasively, with erudition, appealing to shared values and authority: the Bible; figures from world and American history; theologians and philosophers.
And when he closes his letter he says—and I have always believed it was sincerely—that he hopes to greet them soon, not as people on separate sides of the racial divide, but as simple Christians trying to do God’s will.
It would have been easy for him to get big-headed, to want more. Today, we read about well-known preachers who own mansions and private jets, who buy up TV stations and amusement parks. And he was certainly a big deal.
Man of the Year. Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.
But at the end of his life, in his best-known and little-known speeches and sermons, we see him looking back. Taking stock. And deciding that a life of service—particularly of Christian service—is all he could ever ask for.
In his last Sunday sermon at his own Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, King spoke about the impulse we Americans often have to be first, biggest, best. He called this drive “The Drum-Major Instinct,” after the guy leading the marching band, and said people have it, churches have it, nations have it, and if it’s not applied to the right purposes, it can be incredibly destructive.
The past eight years have seen the drum-major instinct run amok in politics, real estate, the financial system, foreign affairs.
But King, in words that were played at his funeral, which followed just weeks later, told people how he hoped they would remember him:
I’d like for somebody to mention on that day that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to give his life serving others. I’d like for somebody to say that day, that Martin Luther King, Jr., tried to love somebody. I want you to say that day, that I tried to be right on the war question. I want you to be able to say that day, that I did try my best to feed the hungry. And I want you to be able to say that day, that I did try, in my life, to clothe those who were naked. I want you to say, on that day, that I did try, in my life, to visit those who were in prison. I want you to say that I tried to love and serve humanity.
Yes, if you want to say that I was a drum major, say that I was a drum major for justice; say that I was a drum major for peace; I was a drum major for righteousness. And all of the other shallow things will not matter.
Martin Luther King, Jr., was more important—in the eyes of the world, in the eyes of the Church—than I will ever be. But in his humility and wisdom he saw that all of the other shallow things—the Nobel Peace Prize—were less important than doing what was right, living as he believed God demanded, and sacrificing everything—including his life—for those who needed.
King once said that we needed to develop a dangerous unselfishness, and he not only called for it, he modeled it.
Now, as we again flounder in dangerous and troubled waters, his words can be the lifeline that we need as we try to pull ourselves out—and to pull others.
This year, we celebrate Martin Luther King with renewed hope, renewed purpose, renewed passion. The things he fought—and died—for have begun to come true.
But there is much left for us; there is always much left for us.
May we too develop a dangerous unselfishness in the days to come, and may we finally learn that a faithful life lived in service to God and each other is the only life worth leaving behind.
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