Martin Luther King Week: Sermon #2



Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial, Lei Yixin 

Today's sermon from Martin Luther King, Jr., entitled the "The Drum Major Instinct", was delivered  Sunday, February 4, 1968 at Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia. Though he was no longer a head pastor like his days at Dexter Ave. Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama (giving the thrust of his ministerial efforts to leading the national Civil Rights Movement) you can still see Rev. King's pastoral care in the construction and delivery of this message. Like the great religious orators of his era, King painstakingly typed out his sermons word for word on an old Angela Lansbury style typewriter  Even with being a "manuscript preacher", Dr. King delivered with a mixture of robust grandiosity, punctuated with intimate familiar charm that cannot be achieved while gazing at a script. This combination of meticulous preparation of dynamic delivery are the marks of a minister who not only cared about his message but also for his flock. This ladies and gentlemen is the grand art of homiletics. But what would homiletics be without sound hermeneutics? Good and Godly art must possess both style and substance (the style must carry the substance and the substance sanctifies the style). Which brings us to the content of his message. This is where the pastoral heart shows through. And bigger than that, this is where a true disciple's heart shows through. For the center of King's message about "The Drum Major Instinct" is taking the Gospel of Jesus Christ seriously. And if we take Jesus (the humble, peacemaking, sacrificing, servant of God) seriously, then we too must be humble, peacemaking, sacrificing, servants of God. Jesus believed that we can only achieve greatness when we chose to be the least for the sake of God and others.  


The Drum Major Instinct from Sweet Speeches on Vimeo.