The aftermath of nonviolence is the creation
of the beloved community. The aftermath of
nonviolence is redemption. The aftermath of
nonviolence is reconciliation. The aftermath
of violence are emptiness and bitterness.
This is the thing I’m concerned about. Let
us fight passionately and unrelentingly for
the goals of justice and peace. But let’s
be sure that our hands are clean in this struggle.
Let us never fight with falsehood and violence
and hate and malice, but always fight with
love, so that when the day comes that the
walls of segregation have completely crumbled
in Montgomery, that we will be able to live
with people as their brothers and sisters.
Oh, my friends, our aim must be not to defeat
Mr. Engelhardt, not to defeat Mr. Sellers
and Mr. Gayle and Mr. Parks. Our aim must
be to defeat the evil that’s in them. But
our aim must be to win the friendship of Mr.
Gayle and Mr. Sellers and Mr. Engelhardt.
We must come to the point of seeing that our
ultimate aim is to live with all men as brothers
and sisters under God, and not be their enemies
or anything that goes with that type of relationship.
I’m coming to the conclusion now. Ghana
reminds us that freedom never comes on a silver
platter. It’s never easy. Ghana reminds
us that whenever you break out of Egypt, you
better get ready for stiff backs. You better
get ready for some homes to be bombed. You
better get ready for some churches to be bombed.
You better get ready for a lot of nasty things
to be said about you, because you getting
out of Egypt. And whenever you break aloose
from Egypt, the initial response of the Egyptian
is bitterness. It never comes with ease. It
comes only through the hardness and persistence
of life.
freedom never comes easy.
It comes through hard labor and it comes through
toil. It comes through hours of despair and
disappointment.
And that’s the way it goes. There is no
crown without a cross. I wish we could get
to Easter without going to Good Friday, but
history tells us that we got to go by Good
Friday before we can get to Easter. That’s
the long story of freedom, isn’t it? Before
you get to Canaan you’ve got a Red Sea to
confront. You have a hardened heart of a pharaoh
to confront. You have the prodigious hilltops
of evil in the wilderness to confront. And
even when you get up to the Promised Land,
you have giants in the land. The beautiful
thing about it is that there are a few people
who’ve been over in the land. They have
spied enough to say, “Even though the giants
are there we can possess the land, because
we got the internal fiber to stand up amid
anything that we have to face.”
The road to freedom is a difficult, hard road.
But something else came to my mind. God comes
in the picture even when the Church won’t
take a stand. God has injected a principle
in this universe. God has said that all men
must respect the dignity and worth of all
human personality, “And if you don’t do
that, I will take charge.” It seems this
morning that I can hear God speaking. I can
hear Him speaking throughout the universe,
saying, “‘Be still, and know that I am
God.’ And if you don’t stop, if you
don’t straighten up, if you don’t stop
exploiting people, I’m going to rise up
and break the backbone of your power. And
your power will be no more!”
And I say to you this morning, my friends,
rise up and know that as you struggle for
justice, you do not struggle alone. But God
struggles with you. And He is working every
day. Somehow I can look out, I can look out
across the seas and across the universe, and
cry out, “Mine eyes have seen the glory
of the coming of the Lord. He is trampling
out the vintage where the grapes of wrath
are stored.” Then I think about it because
His truth is marching on, and I can sing another
chorus: “Hallelujah, glory hallelujah! His
truth is marching on.”
Then I can hear Isaiah again, because it has
profound meaning to me, that somehow “every
valley shall be exalted, and every hill shall
be made low; the crooked places shall be made
straight, and the rough places plain; and
the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and
all flesh shall see it together.”
That’s the beauty of this thing: all flesh
shall see it together. Not some from the heights
of Park Street and others from the dungeons
of slum areas. Not some from the pinnacles
of the British Empire and some from the dark
deserts of Africa. Not some from inordinate,
superfluous wealth and others from abject,
deadening poverty. Not some white and not
some black, not some yellow and not some brown,
but all flesh shall see it together. They
shall see it from Montgomery. They shall see
it from New York. They shall see it from Ghana.
They shall see it from China.
For I can look out and see a great number,
as John saw, marching into the great eternity,
because God is working in this world, and
at this hour, and at this moment. And God
grants that we will get on board and start
marching with God because we got orders now
to break down the bondage and the walls of
colonialism, exploitation, and imperialism.
To break them down to the point that no man
will trample over another man, but that all
men will respect the dignity and worth of
all human personality. And then we will be
in Canaan’s freedom land.
Moses might not get to see Canaan, but his
children will see it. He even got to the mountain
top enough to see it and that assured him
that it was coming. But the beauty of the
thing is that there’s always a Joshua to
take up his work and take the children on
in. And it’s there waiting with its milk
and honey, and with all of the bountiful beauty
that God has in store for His children.
Oh, what exceedingly marvelous things God has in store for us. Grant that we will follow Him enough to gain them.
O God, our gracious Heavenly Father, help us to see the insights that come from this new nation.
Help us to follow Thee and all of Thy creative works in this world.
And that somehow we will discover that we are made to live together as brothers.
And that it will come in this generation: the day when all men will recognize the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of man. Amen.
