D.J. Dangerfield used a story to illustrate the need for forgiveness as part of Monday night’s Dr. Martin Luther King Day services. SPENCER AMBLER opened the services at the Ward Chapel A.M.E., followed by an opening statement from Iola Mayor Joel Wicoff.
The story has Dangerfield standing in line at a concession stand during a baseball game when a fight broke out. One of the men in the fight was bloody and badly injured. Dangerfield came to him and asked if he should call the police.
The man looked at him with a blank stare, and replied, “No, call an ambulance.”
“What was I thinking this,” Dangerfield asked the audience at the Ward Chapel A.M.E. “We have a tendency to issue citations, instead of issuing care.”
As associate pastor at First Baptist Church, Chanute, Dangerfield said his goal is to get “underneath the civil rights movement,” and to talk about its higher meaning.
He compared the struggle of Dr. King to that of Genesis 50 in the Bible, when Joseph’s brothers feared they would be punished for the wrongs they had done him.
“This is what you are to say to Joseph: I ask you to forgive your brothers the sins and the wrongs they committed in treating you so badly. Now please forgive the sins of the servants of the God of your father.” When their message came to him, Joseph wept.
Dangerfield said the civil rights movement was larger than that of black or white, but has Biblical fundamentals straight from God of higher ideals.
“If anybody could sing the blues, Joseph would have had some hits,” Dangerfield said. In fact, Joseph himself was sold into slavery by his brothers.
He said Joseph’s behavior was that of forgiveness, which is one of the most important lessons people can learn. Dangerfield said people of his generation do not know what Dr. King had to struggle through and how much he had to endure — and forgive.
“Forgiveness has become a bad word, I don’t hear any leaders saying the word forgive,” he said. “I’m interested in the people who lived through it (the Civil Rights movement) and still have the grace to forgive.”
He closed his sermon with a word of encouragement and a challenge. If anyone is looking for a light or a change in the world, he said, look no further than inside yourself — each and every person can be the change they want to see in the world.
“Don’t go in the room looking for the light. You are the light,” Dangerfield said. “Lord, I’m thankful for the future Martin Luther Kings that are being raised up.”
The Rev. Paul Miller, First Assembly of God Church, delivered a prayer. Special selections were performed by Patricia Pulley, Naomi Clounch and Lloyd Houk.
Getting ‘beneath’ the civil rights movement
