Living the dream?

I watched people cleaning up trash from the edges of the Potomac River today and smiled to think that the trashed-up place where I had stood moments before would perhaps be clean by day's end.  I also thought to myself, how is this about King Jr.'s legacy?  It was the judgmental in me...because there is always something redeeming about people "altruistically" giving of themselves for a worthwhile cause (okay, yes, our righteousness is as filthy rags...and without love we are all clanging cymbals, but still...). 

But, there is also a very specific vision toward which Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was leading people.  
It has to do with reconciliation between people more so by far than reconciliation of earth with people.  Class: Can we celebrate and fix the earth on Earth Day and work on directly serving people on MLK Jr day? Right, Earth Day is every day and MLK Jr. day is once a year.  Don't worry, I love my 3-day weekends too.



King's vision wasn't for just the black and white issue.  It was bigger than that.  Unfortunately, it is not yet realized. no matter that there is a black president in office in a country that half a century before could only have dreamed of such a thing. 

I think of the other day, when within a matter of minutes (God, that was a lonely hour) in a place that had once felt pretty safe to me,  I heard two statements and witnessed a gesture that made clear to me that there will always be this gap here on this earth in this country determined by what a person looks like.  It is a problem in other countries as well, from albinos getting murdered in Africa, to whitening creams, deportation of people for bogus reasons in S.E.Asia.   This is only peanuts.  There are bigger problems...our social networking tools belie that we westerners are more interested in entertainment and our friends' relationship status than in the devastation in Haiti or what happened in the Philippines not that many months ago.  

This ugliness is still there, even among people who are supposed to be brothers and sisters because they are counted as children of God and bride of Christ.... It's sad.  I usually don't talk much about the race card because I am often in a unique place in my 'social' and 'faith' circles with regard to race and it's probably uncomfortable for both of us to be in this dialogue.  I think sometimes people tip-toe around it with me, and sometimes they are just careful to guard their mouths....and sometimes they just forget that I look like I do and say and do things that they probably wouldn't if they realized a black person was amongst them.   I've forgiven, but I still wince, and I see that there is a barrier there between us, along with the rest. 

I really place my hope in there being none of this wickedness in heaven -- in eternity...where I hope to see you all not with these eyes but through true eyes of love...where we are all one in Christ and where the hand doesn't hate the foot, and the big toe doesn't feel worthless because the pinky can do different things.