RecomMONDAYtions ~ MLK Day 2024 Edition

Martin Luther King, Jr. leads a civil rights march in Montgomery, AL (March 21, 1965)

Recommended Viewing & Listening on MLK Day

 MLK and the Mountaintop
On April 3, 1968, Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered a speech at the Mason Temple in Memphis, TN. The speech ended with these words;

Well, I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn’t matter with me now. Because I’ve been to the mountaintop. And I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land. And I’m happy, tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

The next day, MLK was shot and killed.

I share two videos with you on this Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

First, an excerpt from King’s “Mountaintop” speech.

Then, Kyshona Armstrong (with Mary Bragg) singing, “Up to the Mountain (MLK Song).” Patty Griffin wrote the song and released it in 2006 as a tribute to King. The title and lyrics evoke the Mountaintop speech.

Armstrong and Bragg were 30 minutes outside Birmingham, AL on MLK day 2016 when they decided to drive to The 16th Street Baptist Church in that city. The church was a place where civil rights leaders organized protest marches and where, in 1963, a bomb killed four girls. Armstrong and Bragg sang “Up to the Mountain” outside the church.

Words to Ponder

“I remember in Birmingham, Alabama, when we were in that majestic struggle there we would move out of the 16th Street Baptist Church day after day; by the hundreds we would move out. And Bull Connor would tell them to send the dogs forth and they did come; but we just went before the dogs singing, ‘Ain’t gonna let nobody turn me round.’ Bull Connor next would say, ‘Turn the fire hoses on.’ And as I said to you the other night, Bull Connor didn’t know history. He knew a kind of physics that somehow didn’t relate to the transphysics that we knew about. And that was the fact that there was a certain kind of fire that no water could put out.”

– Martin Luther King, Jr, from his “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speech
April 3, 1968