fCb4

If you know me, you know I am a pretty big fan of Martin Luther King Jr. but I choose not to attend this year’s MLK March. Let me explain why:

I’ve been the Pastor of Jacob’s Well Church in East Central Spokane since our team planted it in June, 2006. One of the reasons our family moved into the EC neighborhood was to be part of one of the most racially diverse parts of our city. Our Worship life and mission work with our neighborhood and with refugees as well as our participation and organizational presence at the East Central Community Center is rooted in the belief that our faith is meant to express the multiracial dynamic of the Kingdom of God. God is Lord of the Nations and is building a church made up of people from every nation, tribe and tongue (Revelations 5:9).

I believe this world needs to see people living, worshipping and working together in the spirit and truth of the Gospel. A gospel that claims in Galatians 3:28 that there is: “No longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus.”

My time living and pastoring in this neighborhood has tested that belief. Moving into the neighborhood and working with refugees has exposed me to the reality of racial prejudice, in ways I never experienced living and working in Suburban Spokane. The most surprising realization about racism that I’ve come to understand, is that it’s rooted in black, white, red and yellow human hearts. It a weed of ugliness that is growing in homes, institutions, churches of all color, class and creed. I could recount deeply troubling examples of blatant racism in our neighborhood and among the churches, people and businesses of this city but stories are just stories to most people, until you experience them yourself. 

I realized one day after attending the MLK rallies, hearing the speeches, marching in the streets and hearing the sermons preached and the songs sung…that something more than words and displays of hope (sincere as they are) are needed if we are truly going to move beyond celebrating a ‘Dream’ and moving forward with a ‘Vision’ to fulfil that dream.

After having a local black pastor preach at our church and I was not offered the reciprocal privilege to speak in his black church because the pastor’s congregation wouldn’t feel comfortable with a ‘White Man’ preaching in the pulpit…I knew we had a long way to go past pontificating about a man and his message and actually embodying the gospel truth of love. 

As a little means of inspiration this last MLK day, I read ‘The Letter from a Birmingham Jail’ again, watched ‘The Help’ and on that Sunday, I preached on the gospel’s call for One church with no walls dividing her (Eph 2:14). I also contacted a fellow Black minister and met with another white pastor in the neighborhood and discussed a plan to pursue meaningful racial unity this coming year. So that by next MLK Day, we can celebrate something that has been happening through out the year, not gather to hope something will take place. I am not naive enough to believe that the challenges ahead won’t test the commitment to move the ball farther down the field in this matter but I just can’t pretend to be something on a Holiday weekend that isn’t a reality the rest of the year.

All of these small steps and the conviction behind them, were reinforced when I noticed that in almost all the pictures from the MLK JR March, all I could see in the crowd were White people. That’s awesome but where was the Black Community? Please don’t tell me that just because Spokane is primarily White that there wasn’t enough Black people to truly be representing the Black Community at the March.

The inequality of presence is something that I am really curious to hear an explanation from my black brothers and sisters. Are they tired of a big show but not real meaningful movement in the neighborhoods and churches too?

What do you think we can practically do this year to make MLK’s Dream more of a reality in our homes, churches, neighborhoods and city?