An important reminder from Martin Luther King, Jr., that we need for today …

It’s Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, which means social media platforms are flowing with profound and eloquent quotes once spoken or written by the man we honor today.

It would be hard to pick one of the quotes as a favorite, because so many are powerful in their challenge to us, stirring us to examine our own lives and what we’re doing with them in light of what we should be doing with them.

But one sentence written in one of MLK’s books jumped out at me this afternoon because it’s something we’re in great need of being reminded of. The sentence is found in his book, “Strength to Love,” which was originally published in 1963. The title of the book, alone, reminds us of a sober truth: it takes strength to love. To hate, disdain, devalue, ignore, or otherwise mistreat someone doesn’t take strength, or courage, or character. But to deny self and truly love someone requires strength from God. MLK described having the strength to love as requiring this:

“We must combine the toughness of the serpent and the softness of the dove, a tough mind and a tender heart.”

These words echo those of Jesus in Matthew 10:16, and they’re especially fitting for the times we live in because we so often don’t combine a tough mind with a tender heart, but today we commonly reverse that and combine a tough heart with tender mind.

We are a hard-hearted, easily offended bunch in the twenty-first century. MLK’s words remind us of how we so greatly need to instead be people who are properly tough-minded as well as tender-hearted.

We’re a lot like the ancient people of Israel as described by the prophet Hosea. Israel had wandered from the path of righteousness that God called them to, and instead made new paths of idolatry which they thought they could travel with impunity.

They couldn’t.

God would not tolerate the wandering onto unauthorized paths of sin by the people:

“The hearts of the people are fickle; they are guilty and must be punished. The Lord will break down their altars and smash their sacred pillars,” Hosea 10:2.

The people had wandered so far for so long, their hearts had been trampled to a hardness as they kept wandering from God out onto the paths of sin. Hosea had a warning for them:

“I said, ‘Plant the good seeds of righteousness, and you will harvest a crop of love. Plow up the hard ground of your hearts, for now is the time to seek the Lord, that he may come and shower righteousness upon you,” Hosea 10:12.

How much like those ancient Israelites are we?

We are just as hard-hearted, and certainly we’re tender-minded. To turn that around to be people who are tough-minded and tender-hearted, we’ll have to follow Hosea’s exhortation to Israel: Plow up the hard ground of our hearts, plant the good seeds of righteousness, and seek the Lord, that He may come and shower righteousness upon us.

Something to ponder on Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.

Scotty