Standing at the Intersection of Prayer Path, Dream Drive, and Hope Highway....

This year's Presidential inauguration was so momentous that it will likely take decades for the magnitude of it to be fully realized. In January 2013, we simultaneously celebrated:

• The historic second inauguration of Barak Obama, America's first African-American President;
• The national holiday in honor of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. -- who dreamed of such a day;
• The 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, which set America's captives and captors on course for freedom.

Regardless of our party affiliation, we who were blessed to be in the land of the living on Monday, January 21, 2013 may simply have been too close to history--up close and personal with it--to realize that it is indeed history we are living. We know that history has been made in our midst, but I wonder if we really know the history we have witnessed.  

Decades from now when school children read about this event and marvel at the incredible convergence of dates, we will be able to tell them that we didn't have to read about it--we were there. Prayerfully, we won't have to tell them that we were there seething like sore losers or fanning the divisive flames of hatred.

Hopefully, we will be able to tell our children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren that we stood in a prodigious place in time...A place that countless African slaves fervently prayed for in the midst of whips on their backs and shackles on their feet....A place that was the substance of dreams so impossible they could only be viewed from the pinnacle of the mountaintop--a view that had been obstinately obscured by nooses, police dogs,water hoses and other tools of torture...One day, we will be able say that we stood proudly along a highway of hope where we could see just beyond the horizon an America finally living up to her characterization as the "land of the free and the home of the brave."

Here, at the intersection of Prayer Path, Dream Drive and Hope Highway we are ushering in an era in which the God of our weary years and God of our silent tears has answered the prayers of those who had to follow unmarked underground paths to freedom. Here, we see how the hand of God inspired men to have visions and dream dreams that drove our entire country forward and away from backward thinking.  Here, we can more fully appreciate that the stony road we trod was actually a highway to Heaven, paved by the One who promised us a future and a hope.


This Associated Press photograph seems to capture the essence of the three distinct eras of President Lincoln, Dr. King and President Obama.  The heavy, fringed ruby red curtain is reminiscent of the Lincoln era.  The shot of the crowds in the distance almost appears to be in black and white as if it were taken on the day of the March on Washington.

And, while we yet stand at this divinely directed intersection, let us not be content to simply stand here.  Let us run and not be weary...let us walk and not faint...let us march on 'til victory is won!

Congratulations President Barak Obama.  Congratulations America!

BNcouraged!

Rev. Karen