This week we celebrated Martin Luther King Jr. Day. King. Throughout the 1970s, there were numerous movements to keep King’s dream alive by commemorating his life through a national holiday. In 1979, Congress voted on the holiday proposal, but it failed to pass by five votes. However, in 1983, President Ronald Reagan signed the bill into law, officially designating the third Monday of January as Martin Luther King Jr. Day. It’s on this day that we remember and celebrate the life and work of King; we remember the dream that he had. As he famously said, “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”
In many ways, King’s dream was a reflection of God’s vision for his church. In Ephesians 3, Paul wrote, “This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” (Eph. 3:6) In Christ, Jews and Gentiles are part of the same body; they’re part of the same family. The dividing wall standing between ethnicities throughout history has been demolished in Jesus Christ (Eph. 2:14). This new community in the church finds its unity not in the shared blood of their ethnicity, but in the shed blood of their Savior.
However, dividing along ethnic and racial lines can often be easier than uniting around Jesus. It was Martin Luther King Jr. who boldly observed, “It is appalling that the most segregated hour of Christian America is eleven o’clock on Sunday morning.” Dr. King was highlighting the racial divisions within the American church during a time when segregation and racism were deeply entrenched in society.
As we had the chance to stop and celebrate MLK Day this week, it’s a good reminder for us that the church Jesus created is one where “there is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female” (Gal. 3:28). It’s also worth remembering that one day, we’ll join the anthem of heaven where there is “a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb.” (Rev. 7:9). Oh for that day!
Today, take a moment and remind yourself of God’s design for his church and then ask him for opportunities to more fully live into that design.
Pastor Ryan Paulson