Remembering the Rev. Martin Luther King

In 1960, I attending church when Dr. King was preaching in Washington, D.C. Dr. King was thirty then and a visiting preacher from Atlanta. These visits did not attract Washington’s journalists but the large AME Church was full. My friend Will Moore and I were seated by ushers up at very front of the church. We were the only church goers not dressed in our Sunday best. We had no Sunday best so we stood out, but each time we visited, we were warmly welcomed. I had not been to a church service previously and it was my first social experience as ‘white’ minority.

Dr.King smiled a lot, was warm with everyone, relaxed and at home as a preacher. It was his vocation and it was clearly his calling. Once he warmed up, his voice become louder and stronger and remained warm. He gave us a biblical lesson, lost on me, within the context of a theology I could only dimly grasp. Somehow, his academic training did not obscure his moral and ethical message and his very strong commitment to Christ.

My friend Will and I attended Dr. King’s preaching multiple times that year. I was eighteen and not taking notes nor keeping a calendar. My best guess now is that we heard Dr. King six or eight times in 1960 and 1961. We sat very close to the pulpit, and after each sermon and conclusion of the service, we were invited to go up on the dais and join the line waiting to have a word with Dr. King. At each meeting, Dr. King shook my hand and invited me into a brief conversation. I no longer recall what we talked about but I do recall his handshake: An electric quality, a strongly charged love, passed into my body. I retain his gift. It changed my life.

Have you seen the film of his “I Have A Dream Speech” to the March On Washington? To me, that speech is a dramatic example of a spiritual teacher talking love to power. To be in Dr. King’s physical presence was to experience an emanation of love so strong that it could fill up a space as large as the March On Washington.