In the interim, I spent a week in prayer at the Norbertine Center. I recently read Tavis Smiley and Cornel West’s book, “The Rich and the Rest of Us” that paints a stark picture of poverty in the United States. I spent two weeks observing and tweeting the events of the United Methodist Church’s General Conference.
Appropriately enough, last night I read Martin Luther King
Jr’s sermon, “Unfulilled Dreams”.
In this sermon Dr King talks about the temples that people
build that are not completed in their lifetimes: David’s heart to build the
temple in Jerusalem, Wilson’s desire for a League of Nations, the Apostle Paul’s
yearning to bring the gospel to Spain. None of these happened within those
leaders lifetimes.
After General Conference, many of us yearn to build the
temple of a church where all people are treated with dignity, respect, and
sacred worth.
Amongst this burning desire, King’s words are hard to hear.
When it comes to matters of offering basic human compassion, I am not a patient man. Not as patient as King. In this sermon, given a month before his assassination, King says you may not get there in your own lifetime. For King, it does not matter who completes the temple, the things that matters are the direction you are headed, having your heart right, and having faith.
As we travel the road that leads toward the direction of mercy and
justice, may our hearts stay true and our faith in God remain strong.
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