Even though the federal holiday is not celebrated until Monday, today is actually the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr. We know him as a great leader of civil rights in this country, a minister who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. He was the catalyst for change, long-overdue. But in actuality, he was a reluctant prophet.
The entry for The Writer’s Almanac today says, “He was chosen to lead a boycott of segregated buses in Montgomery, Alabama, when he was only 26. He didn't set out to become civil rights activist; he said later that if he'd known what the job would entail, he might have turned it down. He wasn't even sure he wanted to become a preacher; as a teenager, the way people shouted and stomped in his Baptist church sometimes embarrassed him. But during the boycott, after he was assaulted and arrested and his house was bombed, he experienced what amounted to a religious conversion. He said later that he realized that the movement had far greater force than his own doubts, and that he had to act like a charismatic figurehead even if he didn't feel like one.”
And what if he had decided to have taken an easier path, one that was safe and comfortable and lucrative. What if he had told God, “I don’t feel like it. Find someone else.” It makes me wonder how many others had a opportunity to spearhead justice and righteousness, but chose a path of least resistance or greater acclaim. It makes me wonder how many times we do that on a daily basis. Just because…”I don’t feel like it?”.
Let us not lay our plans before the LORD, but follow Him into His plans for us. Not to ask Him to come into our day, but to follow Him into His. For this to happen, to have the mindset to do this, God must be at the core of who you are. Not, as Bryan Loritts says, “with a little Jesus sprinkled on top. “ It comes not from personal ambition, but from a life-changing relationship with Him. We are culturally programmed to assess change on a yearly basis, but God calls us to be daily transformed, degree by degree.
He who finds his life will lose it,
and he who loses his life
for My sake
will find it.
Matthew 10.39
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