35 Then Jesus went to all the towns and villages, teaching in their •synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom, ^s and healing every ^t disease and every sickness. ^u36 When He saw the crowds, He felt compassion for them, because they were weary and worn out, ^v like sheep without a shepherd. ^w 37 Then He said to His disciples, ^x “The harvest is abundant, but the workers are few.  38 Therefore, pray to the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest.” ^[1]

Occasion: Dr. Martin Luther King Celebration Warsaw Indiana 2010

Title: The Power of Compassion

Introduction

Today, we gather together to celebrate the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.. Volumes of books have been written about him. Poems and songs and plays have been penned about him. A holiday has been set aside for him. Countries continued to be inspired by him, and students from the halls of Harvard, to the holed living rooms of home schools have been changed, charged, and challenged in a glories effort to make this world a better palace.

For me, it is as if God placed his life in a bottle; casted it upon the sea and allowed it to land upon the shores of our Life.

In the words of Anthony Hamilton, coming from where I come from—historical living in—New York City, where I was reminded that I was black—all because I where a white shirt to school, and while living in Mississippi with my grandmother—where I was first called a nagger—as a young boy. There is within my context three historical men whose words and deeds God has used to shape my thinking and behavior concerning the issues of race. Each of them; words and deeds floated upon the shore of my life at a critical time racial issues.

1.    Abraham Lincoln: I remember reading his words while in Mississippi at a racial charged moment.

o   “The quickest way to a bigot’s heart is to continue to shine the light in his eyes.”

2.    Dr. W. E. B. Dubois: Words came to me after a two decades of the dark night of my soul.

“Negro Orgen The Dammed”

In 1938, on the 50th anniversary of his graduation from Fisk University, Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois in a speech at Fisk—in a speech he entitled “Saint Orgen The Dammed,” said "What is this life I see? Is the dark damnation of color, real? Or simply mine own imagining? Can it be true that souls wrapped in in black velvet have a destiny different from those swathed in white or yellow silk, when all of these coverings are fruit of the same worm, and threaded by the same hands? Or must I, ignoring all seeming difference, rise to some upper realm where there is no color nor race, sex, wealth nor age, but all men stand equal in the Sun?"

3.    Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.: As a nearly ten year old boy in Mississippi when he was killed, I recall asking my grandmother—as though it was yesterday, “Why did they kill him?” To which she responded, “Because he as Black.”

Nearly ten years before his “I Have A Dream” speech, Dr. King in 1954 said through knowledge and science we have this world into a neighborhood, but because of our moral failure, we have not turned it into a brotherhood.  He later stated, “I want to be the white man's brother, not his brother-in-law”

It is the life of these men—and others in general, but Dr. Kings in particular, that reminds us that we should yearn for a revolution of imagination and compassion. In my mind—for a while, it seemed as though we had lost this revolutionary yearning. Sociology is often seems—to me, that we are more concern about what political party we are connected to rather than this brotherhood we connected to. Even for those of us bible believers, it often appears that we are more concern about what Rush Limbaugh and Shan Hannity has to say, than what the God has to say. On the democratic side we want to talk about compassion void of” the lest of these”—the estimated 46 million aborted babies that occur worldwide. 

(Ill.) A man fell into a pit and couldn't get himself out. A Christian Scientist came along and said, "You only think that you are in a pit." A Pharisee said, "Only bad people fall into a pit." A compassion-less Fundamentalist said, "You deserve your pit." A Charismatic said, "Just confess that you're not in a pit." A Methodist came by and said, "We brought you some food and clothing while you're in the pit." A Presbyterian said, "This was no accident, you know." An Optimist said, "Things could be worse." A pessimist said, "Things will get worse!" Jesus, seeing the man, took him by the hand and lifted him out of the pit.

That is the essence of Christ and of His compassion. That is the spirit we need operating within us.  And while the above mention men and many other have had a dramatic impact on my life; it is however, the God Man—Jesus Christ and the word of God that has been and continue to be the most impactful.

Often when one door closed—if we are not careful, we will stop looking for another door. Helen Keller put it this way,  “When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us.” The mandate from Scripture is that, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthen me.”

Our President remarked during one of his speeches,  “Making your mark on the world is hard. If it were easy, everybody would do it. But it's not. It takes patience, it takes commitment, and it comes with plenty of failure along the way. The real test is not whether you avoid this failure, because you won't. It's whether you let it harden or shame you into inaction, or whether you learn from it; whether you choose to persevere.”

How about you? Will you be harden or shamed into inaction? Will you miss the opportunities that God has for you, because things did not workout like you thought they would in 2009—or even before 2009. A great cloud of people that have never given up surrounds us! Our Lord, for the hope set before Him endured the cross, and we know how that turned out!

Your resurrection awaits you!