Martin Luther King - But if Not - Full Sermon

https://www.blacklivesmatter-now.com


A sermon given by Martin Luther King Jr at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta on November 5 1967 The title But if Not comes from Daniel chapter 3 verse 18 in the story of Shadrach Meshach and Abed-nego Audio is from the Internet Archive a http 3A 2F 2Fwww archive org 2Fdetails 2FMlkButIfNot a Picture is from the Library of Congress via wikipedia a http 3A 2F 2Fen wikipedia org 2Fwiki 2FFile 3AMartin Luther King Jr NYWTS jpg a Full transcription available on my blog a http 3A 2F 2Fnotoriousbiggins blogspot com 2F2010 2F01 2Fbut-if-not-sermon-by-martin-luther-king html a One great quote I want to say to you this morning my friends that somewhere along the way you should discover something that's so dear so precious to you that is so eternally worthful that you will never give it up You ought to discover some principle you ought to have some great faith that grips you so much that you will never give it up Somehow you go on and say I know that the God that I worship is able to deliver me but if not I'm going on anyhow I'm going to stand up for it anyway What does this mean It means in the final analysis you do right not to avoid hell If you're doing right merely to keep from going to something that traditional theology has called hell then you aren't doing right If you do right merely to go to a condition that theologians have called heaven you aren't doing right If you are doing right to avoid pain and to achieve happiness and pleasure then you aren't doing right Ultimately you must do right because it's right to do right And you got to say But if not You must love ultimately because it's lovely to love You must be just because it's right to be just You must be honest because it's right to be honest This is what this text is saying more than anything else And finally you must do it because it has gripped you so much that you are willing to die for it if necessary And I say to you this morning that if you have never found something so dear and so precious to you that you will die for it then you aren't fit to live You may be 38 years old as I happen to be and one day some great opportunity stands before you and calls upon you to stand up for some great principle some great issue some great cause--and you refuse to do it because you are afraid you refuse to do it because you want to live longer you're afraid that you will lose your job or you're afraid that you will be criticized or that you will lose your popularity or you're afraid that somebody will stab you or shoot at you or bomb your house and so you refuse to take the stand Well you may go on and live until you are 90 but you're just as dead at 38 as you would be at 90 And the cessation of breathing in your life is but the belated announcement of an earlier death of the spirit You died when you refused to stand up for right you died when you refused to stand up for truth you died when you refused to stand up for justice

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