The Man, The Mission, The Time
by
Dr. Gale A. Ragan-Reid (January 20, 2014)
“And he said, This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: He will take your sons, and appoint them for himself, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and some shall run before his chariots. And he will appoint him captains over thousands, and captains over fifties; and will set them to ear his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to make his instruments of war, and instruments of his chariots. And he will take your daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers. And he will take your fields, and your oliveyards, even the best of them, and give them to his servants. And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his officers, and to his servants. And he will take your menservants, and your maidservants, and your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work. He will take the tenth of your sheep: and ye shall be his servants. And ye shall cry out in that day because of your king which ye shall have chosen you; and the LORD will not hear you in that day” (I Samuel 8:11-18, King James Version [Israel desireth a king]).
Greetings in the Holy Name of Jesus,
My brothers and my sisters, Happy Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Day, I pray you are in health and wealth. In the time of Martin Luther King, oppressed people greatly suffered disparagement and injustice especially in the diaspora of the deep south; some called it the deep dirty south. It was not so much that there was not enough for everyone in the deep south to abundantly live life, it was just that there were oppressors that felt they deserved more of the abundantly lived life than those they oppressed not by birthright or inheritance although many of those practiced not always as they preached but because of the wicked system they created on the local level and the state level made such a mess of living an abundant life the only relief was sought through the federal level. This time in the history of the United States of America grieved the citizens to despair but they found hope in leadership when they spoke out against oppression in their neighborhood church meetings. Now, Martin Luther King, Jr. was a product of the rumblings of leadership in his family's church in Atlanta, Georgia. This led him to join hands with other leaders to eventually say, “Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, I am free at last” but the women still felt oppressed yet they stood next to their man.
Freedom for the oppressed women did not arrive at the same time the oppressed men felt liberated, for the women whose men did not champion freedom for them the door was still closed and the glass ceiling prevalent as they fought on their own to achieve the American dream. I say felt liberated because true liberation, freedom is as much a heartfelt matter and thought process as oppression corrupted the heart and perverted the mind until it was not easy to experience freedom as a received freedom but only as you felt the freedom in your day-to-day experiences (Sullivan, 2006). According to Ruth (2:23), she created a life for herself and mother-in-law Naomi, since the death of her husband gleaning the barley harvest and wheat harvest of her mother-in-law's, next kin Boaz (2:20; Bassler, 2007). This is why many folks not only in the deep south but especially in the deep south still felt lost, without the saving grace of Jesus, their hearts conflicted with darkness rejected that which Jesus gave them to receive; they felt less the freedom of grace in their day-to-day experiences and more the black dominance that came out of the white dominance. In this regard, the oppressed men in the time of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s efforts until his death stepped into mainstream America via the music industry and the sports arenas and found themselves surrounded by the powers of ruler ship or icons that controlled them in those industries.
In the time of Martin Luther King, Jr. the black churches were the predominant industry of African-Americans, slave descendants, it was all they had to generate wealth in their neighborhoods even today, for in 1995 religious organizations in the United States received $60 billion, significantly enough to
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care for the people, which was 44 percent of all charitable giving for that year yet the corruption in the churches similar to the church in Corinth in the Holy Bible created a void in the neighborhood of lack instead of their cup flowing over (I & II Corinthians; Blanchard, 2007; Chafetz, Ebaugh, & Pipes, 2006; Sullivan, 2006). Martin's fervor in speech placed him in the center of fighting for the civil rights of what some people called a forgotten people without economic power, deprived of the true fruits of their labor, lost in the world without God and the saving grace of Jesus who God sent to them (Cavalcanti, Parente, & Zhao, 2007). Martin Luther King, Jr.'s travels included Camilla, Georgia, the town of my ancestors and where I currently live, although I am 10 miles to the east in a rural unincorporated farming area called Greenough, Camilla, Georgia. Recently, I found that in 1962, Martin Luther King, Jr. came to the jail in Camilla to free 66 of the protestors who marched in the Civil Rights Movement with him in Albany, Georgia. According to the news article, “MLK observance held on Marine Base” by Dave Miller (WALB.com, January 14, 2014), the anecdotal details of the incarceration of the 66 girls during a week in July 1962 is depicted in a book of a personal story “Beneath the Bars of Justice” by Sandra Webb. At the time of the arrest in Camilla, I was six years old and my mother and father lived only summer times in Greenough, Camilla, Georgia.
In 1962, summer time, I am sure we were there vacationing at our family's estate in Greenough, Camilla, Georgia but everyone kept the news of the Civil Rights Movement quietly away from the listening ears of the children as my parents always discussed situations and events behind closed doors.
The mission of African-Americans; Civil Rights: Nonviolent Social Change became the mission of solely Martin Luther King, Jr. to stand for a people in need of change. In 1968, Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated on April 4. He was the second person to die on that day, the first person was my grandfather, Romie Calhoun, both men died the day before my birthday and I was sad, indeed. The Civil Rights Movement still lives in the hearts of every man, woman, and child in the United States of America, in one way or another, passed down from generation to generation as the struggles of a people who once were thought of as the forgotten people moved forward to accept life in the United States of America, descendants of slaves, rooted in a new land. I was 12 years old when Martin Luther King, Jr. died and six years passed since the 66 girls held in the Camilla, Georgia jail were arrested summer time, July 1962.
I think because the news of the Civil Rights Movement kept away from my young impressionable ears allowed me to hold no thoughts one way or the other even though I lived right there where every thing happened, I grew up with a white godmother, who was from Georgia and who came every year to spend time with me, in Miami, Florida. She visited my home, my school, my community and took me to social events even to the movies and restaurants. I grew to love my godmother however, I think maybe I wondered why I was the only black person in the restaurants and all the black people who cooked in the kitchen kept looking---peeping out, looking at me. I did not have a clue that my godmother corrected the deep south in Miami, Florida for what they did to the college students at the lunch counter, in the library, and all the other places that might as well said “Blacks Out” instead of “Whites Only” and “Coloreds Only” signs. I realized my parents and my white godmother did participate in the Civil Rights Movement in every way that they could in a peaceful manner and God spared them from arrest. I thank God for that and I bless them in their grave for standing up.
I think my teachers quizzically wondered why my white godmother came every year and visited with them, asked them questions about my progress, and held a genuine love and interest in my growth and development, physically and mentally. I did not know why. I just knew she must love me to come every year from Georgia to Florida to see about me. She bought me school clothes and my mother bought me school clothes, so I grew up with two sets of school clothes every year. My mom hired a seamstress and bought cloth to sew dresses and slips, my godmother loved to shop at Sears and Roebucks.
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My mother bought me oxford shoes and my godmother bought me penny loafers. I know the dream of Martin Luther King, Jr. lived in my life and I pray the love of God through Jesus lets the dream of Martin live in the lives of every American. I do think you must let go and let God order your steps and speak to your mind to touch your heart, visit your true feelings, planting the truth, Jesus Christ inside of you in order for you to open up to truly receive all God's children as your brothers and sisters, holding no place for rancor and disdain, living in the eternal peace of Jesus. Let it be felt in your heart that it is hard for you to hate instead of it is hard for you to love. May the love and peace of Jesus be with you, always.
May God rest the soul of Martin Luther King, Jr. on this blessed day of his celebration, in the Name of Jesus. Amen.
References
Bassler, Jouette. (2007). The Letters to Timothy and Titus. The Catholic Biblical Quarterly 69, no. 3
(July):598-599.
Blanchard, T. (2007). Conservative protestant congregations and racial residential segregation:
Evaluating the closed community thesis in metropolitan and nonmetropolitan counties. American
Sociological Review, 72(3), 416-433. Retrieved June 7, 2007, from Proquest database.
Cavalcanti, T., Parente, S., & Zhao, R. (2007). Religion macroeconomics: a quantitative analysis of
Weber's thesis. Economic Theory, 32, 105-123. Retrieved June 5, 2007, from Proquest database.
Chafetz, J., Ebaugh, H., & Pipes, P. (2006). Where's the faith in faith-based organizations? Measures
and correlates of religiosity in faith-based social service coalitions. Social Forces, 84, 2259-2272.
Retrieved June 11, 2007, from Proquest database.
Holy Bible. (n.d.). The Holy Bible (self-pronouncing ed.). New York, NY: The World Publishing
Company.
Miller, D. (2014, January 14). MLK observance held on Marine Base. WALB.COM (2014). Retrieved
January 20, 2014, from WALB.com.
Sullivan, S. (2006). The work-faith connection for low-income mothers. Sociology of Religion, 67(1),
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