Where Truth is Marching On
On Monday, we celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King’s birthday. You might sleep late that day. You might shop. You might hit the road to Dallas, Tyler, or Longview. Whatever you do that day, take a moment to thank God for the road Dr. King took 51 years ago from Selma, Alabama to Montgomery, Alabama. It was only a 50-mile stretch of Highway 80, but it may have been the most important stretch of road in our lifetime because on that road, Dr. King got America back on the road. It would inspire him to craft his “I have a Dream” vision for America.
America had gotten off its founding fathers ‘constitutional path of “one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all.” Instead, a blind American had drifted off that road into a ditch of segregation of justice for some.
Dr. Martin Luther King could not stand by and watch America derail herself from her original moral high road of liberty, so he and truth marched on in protest to Bloody Sunday, March 7, 1965, when more than 500 demonstrators were tear-gassed, clubbed and trampled by horses by police as they protested for the right to vote. Dr. King with 8,000 others would later march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge from the county seat to the State capitol to say: America, open your eyes and get back on your high road. During a five-day period, a preacher was beat to death; a mother of 4 was stabbed. Dr. King ignored the road signs on Highway 80 between Selma and Montgomery that read: Dangerous curves ahead. He and truth marched across the Edmund Pettus Bridge.
Lest we think in 2022, that racial blindness cannot derail us today, consider the signs: the systematic dismantling of voting rights. Dr. King warned us that moderation is as dangerous as right-wing extremism wearing pointed hats:
"I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizens Councilor or the Ku Klux Klanner but the White moderate who is more devoted to 'order' than to justice."
Dr. Martin Luther King, A Letter from a Birmingham Jail
If we are not careful, we can find ourselves back to 1960’s, when some Americans were left on the side of the road, in a ditch of disenfranchisement, whiles other Americans rode the freeway of freedom toward the American dream of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Derailment is not just national issue. You can get off the right road personally: COVID weariness, opioid addiction, mental health. The truth is, we all can get side tracked. The question is on this MLK Day: How do we get back on the high road to that dream—the dream of hope.
God’s word offers some roadside assistant. Lest we forget, Dr. King was Reverend King. God’s word was his map of the “civil rights” movement. And it’s our map today. I believe Martin would take you to Mark 10:46-52. There he would show you a blind man who found himself by the side of the road just like America and maybe you are today. This blind man would give you three simple directions to get back on the road.When the world’s road signs say in 2022 on MLK day: Dangerous Road Ahead, a blind man with a dream man says: “Listen. Rise. Follow.”
First, listen for a word from the Lord to get back on the high road. The blind man’s ears helped him get back on the road. Look at verses 46-48.
…as they came from Jericho, a bind beggar named Bartimaeus, the Son of Timaeus was sitting, by the road. When he heard that it was Jesus the Nazarene, he began to cry out and say, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!"
Blind Bartimaeus eyes didn’t work, but his ears did. There is a lesson in that: don’t focus on what’s not working. Use what is. Bartimaeus heard Jesus, the Son of David, was coming—the promised Messiah. Perhaps he had heard about how this Jesus gave sanity to a haunted man in Garasenes. Perhaps he had heard about how this Jesus healed a hurting woman with an issue of blood. Maybe blind Bartimaeus heard about how Jesus raised a hopeless girl given up for dead. Perhaps he thought: if this is the same Jesus, He helped them, he could help me”.
We don’t know why he was blind. Maybe he was blind because he was unclean having a Greek name but a Jewish heritage. In that day that was enough to be a second-class citizen. Whatever the case, he was left on the side of the road with no vision and no provision. Anybody here like that: no vision, no provision. It’s a bad place to be.
Dr. Martin Luther King saw the American negro in that place: on the side of the road. No vision and no provision. We lead in poverty, twice the national rate. We lead in the drop-out rate, and lead in prison enrollment. In 2022, the numbers would say that Black America has found itself beside the road.
America had lost sight of their promissory note of life, liberty and the pursuit of freedom for all Americans. Instead, Americans wrote black America a post-dated check yet to be cleared according to Kings’ “I have A Dream speech.” King’s dream was a recasting of a grand vision for swiping provision. Bartimaeus had his vision for provision when he cried out:
Jesus, the Son of David, have mercy on me.”
Jesus was his vision. There is much in his confession: Jesus, Son of David. It is the full of the promise of a deliverer for him and for you if you hear the word of God.
Hear the word of God that contains the promises of God to you.
• Hear “you are fearfully and wonderfully made”.
• Hear “you are a new creature; old things are passed away”.
• Hear “that you are his workmanship created to do good things
• Hear “that you have been blessed with every heavenly blessing.”
If you want to get back on the road, hear what the word of God says about you.
Next, cast off old stinking thinking, and rise to your feet to get back on the high road of dreams. We see that in verses 49-50. Despite blind Bartimaeus lack of sight, he jumped up and came to Jesus. The text says in verse 50 something very important:
“he cast aside his cloak, jumped up and came to Jesus.”
When he cast off his coat, he was demonstrating to the world that he was no longer going to trust that coat to provide for him. You see, beggars used their coats to collect the small coins that people, out of disgust, threw at them. It was a beggar’s hard hustle, but not anymore for Bartimaeus. He said with that act of casting aside the coat: “I will trust in the Lord”. I don’t have to beg any more.
Cast aside your trust in the world’s game and move to a higher place. Dr. King had to move from Selma to Montgomery if America was ever going to move back to her ideals. Selma was the seat of segregation in Dallas County, Alabama. Montgomery was the capital of the state of segregation. To go from Selma to Montgomery you had to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Police were waiting. George Wallace was waiting. Dogs and fire hoses were waiting. But so was the right to vote. If you want what is at the end of the road, you have to move and cross, with the bridge of faith, over that river of doubt. You cannot stay where you are and also get where you want to go.
You might have to say good bye to some stinking thinking that says “I can’t”. You might have to burn some bridges of personal habits that’s keeping you from your destiny.
If you want to get on the road, on your feet, first hear God. Second, you need to cast off your old ways and rise up.
And finally follow your divine destiny to serve. The blind man’s faith was fully realized when his faith found direction. He heard Jesus. He responded to Jesus. But he became whole when he followed Jesus. Look at verses 51-52.
Jesus asked the man, “What do you want.? I want my sight again.
You see it is not enough to have faith in God; that God can do it, but you’ve got to believe that he can do it for you. The blind man went from: “Have mercy on me” to “What’s in it for me.” I want to see. And see, he did. (What do you want from Jesus?) Jesus responded:
Go your way. Your faith has made you well.
Then the text says, he began following him on the road. That road is the road of service.
Mk. 10:45 "For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.
That is the real victory in the story of blind Bartimaeus. The man who was “by the road” is now on the greatest road there is: following and serving Jesus. The next step is to ask Him: “Where to Lord, which road? Where are we going next?
God wanted Dr. King on Highway 80 in Alabama, between Selma and Montgomery. And God wants you on your highway that leads you to your dream. Don’t be blinded by the Enemy who wants you on the side of the road, side-tracked by stuff that does not count.
What matters is God wants you on the King’s highway following a Messiah whose inheritance is more than pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters of beggars, but a future full of fulfillment and personal satisfaction and dreams that come true. Make your way, his way. Service is the path:.
“Everybody can be great, because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.” Dr. Martin Luther King
There once was a blind man who lived on the side of the road as opportunity passed him by. But one day he heard Jesus. He rose up casing aside his beggarly ways. He opened his eyes and followed his destiny. He heard, rose and followed his faith.
Dr. Martin Luther King followed that road of faith…from Selma to Montgomery. When America was blind and off the path of its ideals of equality, King marched and preached and the Jericho walls of segregation came down in Selma and Montgomery. The Voting Rights Act was signed not long after he marched.
If you want to get back on the road to being that place where dreams come true, you need to hear, rise and follow. How long will it take? I hear God say, “Not long”. Just open your eyes and see what Martin Luther King sang when he and Truth marched across the Edmund Pettus Bridge.
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;
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword;
His truth is marching on.
Glory! Glory! Hallelujah! Glory! Glory! Hallelujah!
Glory! Glory! Hallel
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