The Lord Will Make a Way Somehow: We've Come This Far by Faith

A DRUM MAJOR FOR JUST US?

In Black Church, where the President says he used to go when he was younger, a common saying is that "Church folks is a mess." But, at least if you grow up in Black Church, and happen to be that son who has been pretty much selected to be the son who continues the family tradition, you are probably going to hear quite a few sermons about Jesus.

And, you may happen to notice a pretty consistent pattern developing in every sermon in which Jesus is having some discussion with His disciples, which tend to take on the character of those pesky emails of a man named Saul from Tarsus, who decided to stop persecuting Christians and begin spamming a few churches.

And, by today's standards, one might get the conclusion that Jesus was hating on His disciples, and Paul was hating on churches. But one rather famous speech, about which most, like the I Have a Dream, and Mountaintop Speeches, most only remember only one line, Rev. King had discussed a Drum Major Instinct, and had noted that he had wanted to be a drum major for justice. But he actually begins this homily in the synoptic gospel of Mark, in a particular exchange with his top disciples, in which the problematic accounts amongst even the sons of Zebedee during the Transfiguration are pretty glaring even before Jesus decides to get essential and provide some instructions.

And, while going into the observance of the birthday of the Drum Major for Justice, perhaps a good reading of that sermon might be a good idea for making good use of the holiday, for those interested in "extra credit", with the President delivering the sermon in the pulpit of Rev. King's church on his birthday, one might recall Rev. King's last speech, where he did specifically state that when he was in a hospital, after being stabbed with a letter opener, by what he had described twice as "a deranged black woman", he said he had received a letter from the President and the Vice President, as well as a telegram from the Governor, but did not remember what they said.

But the biblical story that had immediately come to mind when I learned that the President had suddenly decided to go down to Atlanta to preach in Rev. King's pulpit, during what he had described, like Dr. Benjamin E. Mays before him, as "the most segregated hour in America", and during not the in-person, vaccinated only, no exceptions earlier service, but at the online virtual service (a little public relations gaffe), was the background reference material in 2 Chronicles, Chapter 26, on that footnoted king in the verses in Isaiah 6, about that greater prophet's calling, and the year in which he had also seen the Lord, but high and lifted up.