Quickly on the heels of Christmas and New Year's, our nation celebrates another holiday: the birth of Martin Luther King, Jr. Being in Atlanta, the city of his birth and the self-professed "city too busy to hate", Glenn celebrates this holiday each year with a Sunday worship service focused on justice & peace and an MLK Day service project.
This Sunday, January 14, we are honored to welcome Rev. Brian Tillman to 11:00 a.m. worship to deliver the sermon. Rev. Tillman is an Associate Pastor at Ben Hill UMC and the Chair of the Commission on Religion and Race for the North Georgia Conference. Glenn, a predominately white congregation, and Ben Hill, a predominately black congregation, have fostered a relationship in the past year that centers upon race relations in America. Small groups from both churches have gathered for honest dialogue and genuine listening, and are traveling together to Alabama this Spring on a Civil Rights Heritage Tour. Lay leader Carol Allums offers this on the background of the relationship: "These conversations with Ben Hill grew, in part, out of questioning what Glenn’s response should be to racial injustice. Our afternoons spent with members of Ben Hill confirmed that the white church has to play a role in creating a justice-filled world for all peoples. To live out our belief that we are all children of God, the church needs to participate in the work needed to undo the effect of centuries of unequal treatment and laws. These discussions with Ben Hill may be just a small step towards that end, but they are a step."
“Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.”
In recent years, MLK Day has come to be known as A Day On (rather than a day off) and folks across the nation engage in acts of service in memory and honor of King's life and legacy. King, both a pastor and activist, equated a life of faith with persistently working on behalf of the oppressed and sought to lead a life that reflected God's care for the marginalized. In that spirit, Glenn will head over to Branan Towers, a senior living facility in East Atlanta on Monday, January 15, to enjoy fellowship, crafts, and refreshments with the residents. All are welcome to join.
“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.”
