Grace, Justice, & Mercy: An Evening with Bryan Stevenson & Rev. Tim Keller

good evening and welcome everyone to grace justice and mercy and evening with Bryan Stevenson and Tim Keller my name is Susan acordes tang and it is my honor to be your emcee this evening I work on staff would Redeemers downtown congregation which meets every Sunday right here in this auditorium and let me say that we are thrilled to have every single one of you with us this evening we have been looking forward to this event for quite some time I want to start off by taking a moment to thank and acknowledge everyone who's been involved first this event is a part of a series hosted by the grace and race ministry of Redeemer we are a group in Redeemer that exists to help promote equality and reconciliation across racial and ethnic lines we do so by providing events like this and spaces for prayer conversation and the sharing of similarities and differences across racial and cultural lines if you want to learn more about the Grace and race ministry please do visit us online at Redeemer comm black slash Grace and race also vital partners in making this night a reality are the center for faith and work which is an organization that explores and investigates the unique power of faith to renew our work and also the hope for new york which is an organization which mobilizes financial and volunteer resources to over 40 nonprofits in the city that serve poor and marginalized populations in new york these organizations are all involved because this topic touches on so many areas of our life our work our faith and our desire to see justice happen in our city and we're hosting this event tonight because we still have a lot to learn we recognize that the church has often been slowed to come to the table to wrestle with and speak about and against injustice we hope that tonight's event will go a small way in helping us to become truth tellers and to speak more truthfully about the reality of these issues I had the honor recently of attending an event sponsored by the equal justice initiative in Bryan Stevenson's organization and it was amazing to hear from the some of the many people that they've served throughout the years from a man that was exonerated after 30 years on death row to a family whose relative was lynched decades ago it was amazing to hear of the equal justice initiatives and Bryan Stevenson's commitments love and perseverance in the face of so many challenges to win their justice I'm so excited for our community to get to learn from them this evening and we're so glad that you're all with us to get us started with tonight we're gonna first hear from the senior pastor a redeemer postman respite Irian Church dr. Timothy Keller and let me introduce him for us originally from Pennsylvania dr. Timothy Keller founded Redeemer Presbyterian Church in 1989 with his wife Cathy and their three young sons today a redeemer has over 6,000 weekly attenders over eight services across three locations in Manhattan he's the author of multiple books and is best known for his New York Times bestselling book the reason for God please join me in welcoming dr. Timothy Keller so our purpose is in the description of this event the purpose is that in an age of mass incarceration and growing racial tension how can a church committed to the flourishing of the whole city engage as ambassadors of reconciliation and justice and because that's our our purpose to address that tonight no matter who you are no matter who you are the issue that Brian Stevenson is going to talk to us about it in detail it's a it's an issue of justice in our country that he's been addressing all of his life anyone here anyone here is going to say this is something we need to do something about but I do want because of our topic tonight I do want to especially speak to Christians tonight I especially want to speak to Christians about not only the resources they have in their faith for doing justice especially racial justice but even they have a responsibility very often in a forum like this I would really rather in a sense talk to everyone and particularly people who don't believe tonight I actually feel it's my responsibility especially to talk to people who believe because of some responsibilities and some resources that they attend to ignore so I'm first going to talk I'm going to give you a kind of an overview of what the Bible says about justice in general and then I'm going to do a little bit of connective tissue between what the Bible says about justice and kind of setting the table for Brian when he comes and talks about the particular issue that he's going to address so here's here's kind of overview what the Bible says about justice in general number one the Bible tells us about the absolute importance of justice the absolutes importance of justice famous passage in Isaiah SiC 58 this is God speaking declare to my people their rebellion and to the descendants of Jacob their sins for day after day they seek me out they seem eager to know my ways as if they were a nation that does what is right and has not first and the commands of its God they asked me for just decisions and they seemed eager for God to come near them why have we fasted they say and you have not seen it why have we humbled ourselves and you have not noticed yet on the day of your fasting you do as you please and exploit all your workers is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen to loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke to set the oppressed free and break every yoke is it not to share your food with the hungry and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter when you see the naked to clothe them and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood unquote now listen carefully God speaking to a group of people who seek me he says that means they go to worship that's what the term means day after day that means they're very faithful in worship they're eager to know my ways that means they are ethical and moral that is they're looking at all the rules or all looking at all what the Bible says and they're trying to live according to it but then God he's talking to people who are religious are very observant they do worship they do fasting the new praying they study their Bible and then he says but your rebellion your rebellious your sinners how so he says because you exploit your workers and because you neglect the oppressed the hungry and the poor and what he's actually doing right here what God is actually saying is if you don't care about the poor and if you are not pouring yourself out to do justice for the poor you may say you have a vital relationship with me but you don't you're just mouthing abstractions so you see the importance for example there's a couple other places in the Bible that for example Isaiah chapter 1 says this when you this is God again speaking when you spread out your hands in prayer I hide my eyes from you even when you offer many prayers I'm not listening seek justice defend the oppressed take up the cause of the fatherless plead the case of the widow you say again he's saying look I don't you say you have a relationship with me but if you're not caring about the poor and the oppressed you have a relationship with me they say well that's the Old Testament well James chapter 2 what good is that if someone claims to have faith but if you see someone without clothes in daily food and one of you says to them go in peace but does nothing for their physical needs what good is that faith if it's not accompanied by action is dead that's exactly the same New Testament version of what I say I was saying is as you say you have faith in me you don't care about those kinds of needs then your faith isn't real it's not there it's not vital it's dead it's extraordinarily strong or first John this again New Testament 1st John chapter 3 verse 17 18 if anyone has material possessions and you sees a brother or sister in need and has no pity on them how can the love of God be in that person dear children let us not love merely with words or speech but with accent with actions and in truth so here's the bottom line here's the first point let me say it as strongly as I can justice and doing justice and caring for the poor according to what the Bible is not just something for a few people that do gooder types and the rest of us are just going on just trying to be good people no it essentially says God is essentially saying if you have a living faith either a real relationship with me then a heart and life dedicated to social justice is the inevitable sign of real faith before moving on let me just say Christians of your professing christian' did you know that that was part of your faith that principle and secondly if you've rejected Christianity did you know that you were rejecting that did you know that was part of it so there's the absolute importance of justice but here maybe most important I'm going to tell you tonight in the Bible the Bible has a very fulsome understanding of justice a very fulsome understanding it has many aspects Michael Sandel teaches at Harvard has a has a course there on justice and actually turned it into a book justise what's the right thing to do and what's fascinating about the book is he says the reason part of the reason why in our country we there's not a lot of consensus over how we should be essentially conducting our society is because we have rival theories of justice and they're not the same there's a theory of justice it's kind of libertarian it's all about equal opportunity only there's an approach to justice that's more what he would call distributive estat talks about redistributing assets and and there's another one that's more what's called virtue ethics which is justices giving people what they deserve but it's intriguing to me as I'm an exigent on a sociologist but when I read that and I see what the Bible says I realize that in most cases almost it's almost like what the Bible says about justice covers it all it's almost like the biblical understanding of justice is actually more comprehensive than any of these other theories let me give you just three aspects are not the only three but here's three aspects one is one aspect of biblical justice is equal treatment for all equal treatment for all Leviticus 24 22 you you've all read Leviticus and you've memorized that I'm sure you are to have the same law for the foreigner as for the native-born this happens over and over yet you do not treat people of a different race differently not all and now one of the reasons for that there's a lot of reasons given and I don't have time to go into them one of the reasons of course is God constantly says you were once immigrants or aliens in Egypt you were once second-class citizens you were once the wrong race in a country and therefore you should just by golden rule never want to treat other people the way you were treated also there's there's plenty of talk of in the in the Bible about the fact that we're all of one blood you know Acts chapter 17 verse 26 says all human beings are of one blood it's also interesting even in that passage I read you Isaiah 58 there's a little there's a there's a stunner in there that most people miss in Isaiah 58 it says when the poor immigrant comes don't turn against your own flesh and blood that was in Isaiah 58 do you remember that don't turn against your own flesh and blood for God to say in at that time all societies were patriarchal blood was the big thing your family your tribe and for God to come and say people of other races basically are your own flesh and blood was a radical thing to say and so the idea of equal treatment is very important by the way another issue is the Bible is death on bribery over and over and over again in the Bible it talks about no bribery like Isaiah 123 your leaders are always accepting gifts and bribes that therefore they do not defend the orphans in court or listen when widows present their cases that's really interesting in other words the widows they're the poor person is there making the case and the judge is just not listening I'm sure Brian Stevens has never seen that ever happen and the reason is no money and the reason why the reason why the Bible is so down on bribery and by the way that I'm sure includes political contributions is because is because the poor can't bribe that's the reason bribery bribery so bad so first of all equal treatment here's the second aspect of justice the second aspect of justice is special concern for those without power you see a lot of Americans say equal treatment absolutely but then the Bible this is fascinating here's what I mean by the full cygnus then the Bible goes on and actually says this proverbs 31 verse 8 and 9 speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves for the rights of all who are destitute speak up and judge fairly defend the rights of the poor and the needy it doesn't say speak up for the rights of the rich which means it's that here the Bible is not calling for equal treatment because the rich don't need you to speak up for them or Zechariah 7 9 and 10 administer true justice show mercy and compassion to one another do not oppress the widow or the fatherless the immigrant or the poor as this is extraordinarily this is extraordinary again let me let me sometimes it's hard because we we've gotten so many of our ideas about justice and fairness and equality from the Bible that sometimes you read it and you say oh what's the big deal let me remind you of something in proverbs 14 31 God says if you insult the poor you insult me proverbs 19 17 says if you give to the poor you give to me which means God is identifying with the poor he doesn't identify with the rich he identifies to the poor he says when you treat the poor that's why you're treating me this way do you know how revolutionary this was in all other ancient cultures got the gods were always identified with the people at the top it was understood that the reason that people at the top were at the top was because the gods had put them there and therefore the people at the top talked about what the God's will was and the people it to oppose the people at the top was to oppose the gods because if you oppose the people at the top in the end the guys that put them there it made perfect sense right and this is the reason why for example in the Old Testament in Bible in second Kings there's a story about naman who was a Syrian general and he heard he had leprosy and he heard that there was a God in Israel who could heal so he comes to Israel to get his healing from God and he goes right to the king and he brings all this money and he brings a letter recommendation from his king and he says not give me my give me my miracle because he expected that the God of the Bible was exactly like all other gods in the world at that time and that is basically they identify he figured the God of the Bible identify with the people at the top and if you remember maybe you don't the king of Israel tore his clothes and says I'm sorry our God doesn't work that way our God he doesn't say this but here's what the Bible says our God identifies with the people at the bottom it's a completely different vision a completely different vision of God totally different and therefore there is a real sense of a just here's what here's no way to put it if somebody asks me can I introduce you ok they sigh say sure you can introduce me and they say well how should I introduce you and basically I would say I'm the pastor of Redeemer Presbyterian Church husband of Kathy the father of David Michael and Jonathan and that because those are the main things I do so if if you're gone if I'm going to introduce myself I want to tell you what one of the main things I'm doing in life how does God introduce himself over and over again hmm here's one Psalm 68 4 he's a father to the fatherless a defender of the widow's look you have a God in the Bible who introduces himself as the you know a father for the fatherless a husband for the widows that's one of the main things he does in life evidently in the world is he identifies with the people at the bottom and here's the third thing yeah third aspect of justice you're not doing justice unless you do equal treatment you're not doing justice if you only do equal treatment because you have to find the people who actually need power and you have to distribute some of your power to them they need wealth and you distribute some of your wealth to them you do not treat everybody the same you go to the people who you speak up for those who can't speak up for themselves but that leads to the third thing which is radical generosity in the Bible's understanding of justice radical generosity is part of justice or let me put it in a nutshell if you are not radically generous with your time with your goods with your possessions with your money with your power you're not just being stingy you're being unjust that's how the Bible looks at it so for example most Americans say I would be happy to do charity I've made all this money and I've loved doing charity but it's not it's totally voluntary I don't I don't owe this money to the poor I do this out of the goodness of my heart that's not actually how the Bible looks at it so for example in job chapter 29 and 39 31 go look at that you know job is suffering and at a certain point in the middle of the book he starts talking about why he doesn't deserve to suffer so he basically gives us an example of the kind of life that it that he knows God wants and here's one of the things he says he says if I kept all my bread for myself if I did not share it with those who had none if I made wealth my security I would be judged for this sin and here's the reason why I can just give you two examples right now in this city there are young people growing up in in communities and schools and families where they're hardly going to be able to read and write by the time they're like 14 or 15 and they're going to be just shut out of the economy and they're just going to be shut out of normal social normal society and the liberalism says well that's because of systemic racism and conservative sites because the breakdown of the family but nobody says it's the kids fault nobody says that the four-year-old says we need to move to a better school district nobody says the kids fault which means if a child is born with white skin in my family they have about a three thousand times better chance of having a good socio-economic life than somebody born a number of other places right in this own city which what does that mean it means the world's goods are not equitably distributed now if you have it and here's where Christians really have got to see your theology really puts some pressure on you I understand when a secular person says I have worked hard for this money and it's my money and don't you tell me that I have to share it with others I don't frankly within the worldview that makes sense but if you're a Christian you know you're created by God the reason you weren't born on a mountain in Tibet in the 13th century which by the way if you had been and you worked very hard you wouldn't have much sho means the fact that you were born here with the opportunities you have here and you say I works for all this you only work for this because God gave the opportunities God gave you the talents God had you born here and not on a mountain in the thirteenth century Christians know that essentially everything they have is a gift and if they have the assets that so many other people don't have assets they much more assets that are given to you and other people don't have it if you don't share it you're not being stingy you're being unjust and here's the last thing to say the Bible says justice is absolutely necessary it is not a kind of option for Christians secondly it's very fulsome it consists of not only does it consist of equal treatment but also speaking up for those who are can't speak up for themselves redistributing your power to others and being radically generous but here's the last thing up to now I don't know how you're feeling about this but up to now I've done nothing but use guilt on you right and some of you say well your Minister this is your job right they pay you to do this don't think I said well no because honestly if your motivation isn't right you know what you're going to you're going to say I need to do more and it'll last a good you know five days and you'll go back to the way you were know in the Bible the Bible says and actually in a sense I I looked at it there with you in James chapter two and in first John in the New Testament it basically says if you say you have faith in Jesus Christ but then you don't care about the marginalized and the poor you actually don't have real faith in Jesus you might say I have faith in Jesus but it hasn't hit your heart why would that be here's why you know how I said that in Proverbs it says if you if you oppress the poor you press the Lord if you give to the poor you give to the Lord God identifies with the poor but Christians know how far he went with that identification when the Son of God was born when God came into this world he didn't come in as an aristocrat he was born in a feed trough he was born in a manger you know the crisps the Christmas hymn seek not in courts or palaces nor royal curtains draw but search the stable find your God extended on the straw he didn't come to courts and palaces there were no royal curtains to draw he was born in the feed trough when his parents had him circumcised they gave two pigeons as the offering which was the offering for the poorest of the poor and as he as he lived as you know he essentially wandered he said foxes have holes birds have nests the son of man has nowhere to lay his head when he died he had no possessions other than his garment which they cast lots for and he didn't just come poor he was also oppressed his trial was a miscarriage of justice in all sorts of ways he knew it was like to stand up to power and be killed for it now if you just see that as an example if you just see God is Jesus Christ as an example here is a brave person here's a person who stood up to you know stood up to to power here's a person who experienced an example that's really not going to move you here's what you need here's what Christians know Christians know he's not just an example of having become poor and oppressed he saved us by being willing to be poor and oppressed he went to the cross he died for our sins that's the Christian understanding he experienced what he didn't deserve that's injustice but as otherwise we would have been lost that's the Christian gospel which means when I see if I understand that this is why James is saying if you grasp that by faith and you see a poor person you couldn't possibly feel superior to that person you're looking at a mirror and if you see someone maybe who is poor but maybe they did do some things that were stupid and wrong well so did you and if the only way to help that person is to make a sacrifice while you've been your saved through a sacrifice we were bankrupt we were spiritually bankrupt and only by the costly infinite costly grace of Jesus Christ and generosity of Jesus Christ are we saved that utterly transforms the heart utterly transforms at your understanding of how you should go out into the world and do justice it gives you an impetus that's not guilt but love and gratitude and that will last now I think you're going to see I hope what I did was set the set the table Brian now doesn't have to make all of those little connections because you will between what he's doing and the situations that he is addressing and what the Bible says Christians ought to also be seeing and addressing and doing something about but right now I'm going to turn that over to Brian and he's going to come up next right Thank You Tim now I'm going to introduce our next speaker Brian Stevenson is the founder and executive director of the equal justice initiative in Montgomery Alabama mr. Stevenson is a wildly acade acclaimed public interest lawyer was spent who's spent his year working on behalf of the poor the incarcerated and the condemned under his leadership eji has one major legal challenges legal challenges eliminating excessive and unfair sentencing exonerating innocent death row prisoners confronting abuse of the incarcerated and the mentally ill and asking and aiding children prosecuted as adults mr. Stevenson has argued several cases in the United States Supreme Court and recently won a historic ruling that mandatory life without parole sentences for all children 17 or younger are unconstitutional mr. Stevenson and his staff have won reversals relief or release for over 115 wrongly condemned prisoners on death row mr. Stevenson has initiated major new anti-poverty and anti-discrimination efforts that challenge the legacy of racial inequality in America including major projects to educate communities about slavery lynching and racial segregation finally mr. Stevenson also knows a lot about New York he has been a professor New York University School of Law for the past 18 years please join me in welcoming Bryan Stevenson thank you thank you thank you it is such an honor to be here I'm so thrilled to be with you here tonight I'm really excited to be in this space I'm really energized by dr. Keller's sermon and the way he has set a context for the conversation I want to have tonight I want to talk about what does it require for us to do justice love mercy and walk humbly with God that's a scripture prophet Micah talks about you know what do we have to do to be pleasing to God should we offer all of these great things we have to do these big and extraordinary things and with the what the Prophet says is no you just have to do justice you have to love mercy and you have to walk humbly with God and in many ways this need to do justice this need to change the world is something that feel really keenly and so I want to talk tonight about what I think we need to do to change the world and by changing the world do justice and love mercy there's a real need for it we're a very different country today than we were 50 years ago in 1972 there were 300 thousand people in jails in prisons in America today there are 2.3 million people in jails and prisons the United States now has the highest rate of incarceration in the world we have 6 million people on probation or parole there are 70 million Americans with criminal arrests which means that when they try to get a job or trying to get a loan they're disfavored we've done some terrible things to women in our society the percentage of women going to prison has increased 640 percent over the last 20 years and 70 percent of these women are single parents with minor children which means that when they go to jails and prisons their children are displaced there are these collateral consequences last year the president came to Selma Alabama to my state of Alabama he came to Selma to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act in that historic march from Selma to Montgomery and members of Congress came and thousands of people came and they crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge to celebrate that historic March and very few of the real is that today in Alabama 30% of the black male population has permanently lost the right to vote as a result of a criminal conviction half the people we have in jails and prisons suffer from mental illness 20% are acutely mentally ill the statistic that keeps me up late at night is one from the Bureau of Justice the Bureau of Justice now predicts that one in three black male babies born in this country is expected to go to jail or prison during his lifetime one in three it wasn't true in the 19th century it wasn't true in the 20th century it's become true in the 21st century the statistic for Latino boys is one in six so I think there's this urgent need for us to change the world there is this urgent need to do justice and I could talk about the problems all night but I didn't come to talk about the problems I want to talk about the solutions I want to talk about what I think we can do to create more justice the first thing I am persuaded we have to do is I am persuaded that if you want to do justice if you want to love mercy you've got to get proximate to the places and the people where injustice is made no you cannot stay in safe places you cannot stay in comfortable places I believe we are called to get proximate to the places in our community where there's poverty and suffering and abuse and neglect many of us have been taught our whole lives that if there are parts of our town our community where the schools aren't very good where there's violence where there's drug addiction where there's despair where there's neglect or abuse you should stay as far away from those places as possible I'm here tonight to tell you the opposite I actually think to do justice you got to get closer to the schools where kids are struggling you got to get closer to the parts of our community where there's poverty and abuse and violence and neglect and despair and in proximity I am persuaded we can find power I think there's power in proximity you don't have to have all the answers in the solutions but you've got to be willing to get closer to the places where there's inequality we've got policymakers and politicians trying to solve problem from a distance when you try to solve a problem from a distance your solutions don't work because you miss the details of the problems the nuances of the problems I believe you've got to get I'm the product of someone's choice to get proximate I grew up in the rural South in a community where black children couldn't go to the public schools I started my education in a colored school when I was a little boy we couldn't go to the public school in my County there were no high schools for black children and my dad was a teenager and then one day the lawyers came into our community and they insisted that that County respond to Brown versus Board of Education they made them open up the public schools and because of that I got to go to high school and I am not confused about how I got here I got here because people were willing to get proximate to poor black kids like me and I got to go to high school I graduated from high school and I got to go to college went to Eastern University in Pennsylvania great school yes thank you beautiful campus when I got to college I couldn't I'd never seen a world like that I was very active in music I was very active in sports I was a philosophy major and about my second year in college I woke up one morning and I realized something I realized I really like college and I made a decision I decided that I was going to spend the rest of my life in college and I called my mom up said mom have made a decision I decided to spend the rest of my life in college my mom said I didn't go to college but I don't think they're going to let you do that I said mom they will they will and I was a senior still majoring in philosophy because I was a philosophy major I thought I was supposed to go out on the hillside and think these deep thoughts and I was out there one day thinking my so-called deep thoughts and somebody came up to me and said you are senior and you are a philosophy major what are you going to do when you graduate from college and I heard this is a very hostile question because I realized nobody was going to pay me to philosophize and so I frantically started trying to figure out how do I stay in school and because nobody in my family had gone to school I didn't know what everybody in this room I'm sure already knows I didn't know that in this country if you want to do graduate work in history or English of political science to get admitted to graduate school you actually have to know something about history English or political science that was pretty intimidating to me so I kept looking and kept looking and to be honest that's how I found Law School it was very clear to me you don't need to know anything to go to law school so I signed up for that and a few months later I found myself sitting in a classroom at Harvard Law School and I was deeply disillusioned because they weren't talking about the things that motivated I went to law school because I was concerned about racial inequality I was concerned about poverty I was concerned about social injustice and it didn't seem like anybody was talking about race or poverty or injustice I left the law school after my first year to go to the School of Government at Harvard I decided to pursue a degree in public policy and I woke up after I had been there a couple of months one day and I was looking in the mirror and I thought to myself wow I'm even more miserable here than I was at the law school they were teaching us to maximize benefits and minimize costs but it didn't seem to matter whose benefits got maximized and whose cost got minimized I went back to the law school and then I was about to do this thing I pray none of you ever do I was about to do this thing where I was trying to persuade myself to accept a career as a lawyer that I knew was not going to be affirming that I knew was not going to be energizing that I knew was not what I was called to and then I got proximate I took a course that required me to spend time with a human rights organization in Georgia and I went down and I met these lawyers providing legal services to people on death row and it was a community of people there and I was energized by what I saw and I'd been there a week and one of the lawyers that we need you to go to death row and meet someone we haven't had time to meet just would just we just need you to go down and explain to him that he's not at risk of execution any time in the next year I drove down there the next day and I was very nervous because I was persuaded that this man wouldn't want to just see a law student I tried to rehearse exactly what I was going to say and I went into the prison they took me to the cell I was pacing back and forth really nervous really anxious and finally they opened the door and there stood the first condemned prisoner I'd ever seen and what struck me about him was how burdened with chains he was he had handcuffs on his wrists hit a chain around his waist he had shackles on his ankles and I stood there while they Unchained him and I got so nervous that by the time he walked inside I'd forgotten what I was supposed to say and I just said I'm so sorry I'm just a law student I don't know anything about the death penalty I don't know anything about Civil Procedure I don't know anything about Criminal Procedure I don't know anything about appellate procedure oh but they sent me down here to tell you that you're not at risk of that confucian anytime in the next year and as soon as I said that the man said wait wait wait say that again I said you're not at risk of execution any time in the next year and the man said wait wait say that again I said you're not at risk of execution any time in the next year and that's when this man grabbed my hand he said thank you thank you thank you he said you're the first person I've met who's not a death row prisoner or death row guard in the two years I've been on death row he said I've been talking to my wife and my kids at night but I haven't let them come and visit because I was afraid I'd have an execution date and I didn't want them to have to deal with that he said now because of you I'm going to see my wife I'm going to see my kids thank you thank you thank you and I couldn't believe how even in my ignorance how just being proximate could be transformative in the life of someone else but all of a sudden it kicked in and we started talking this man in me and it turned out we were exactly the same age we had the same birth date same month same day same year he started asking me questions about my life I asked him questions about his life and we fell into this conversation and one hour turned into two hours and two hours turned into three hours I'd only scheduled to be there an hour and the guards were getting angry waiting outside the room and finally after three hours they couldn't take it any longer so they came bursting into the room and they were frustrated and they couldn't do anything to me so they took it out on this man they threw him against the wall and it began putting the chains on him very roughly I tried to get them to be gentler but they ignored me they put the handcuffs on his wrists so tightly I could see him grimacing with pain they wrapped the chain around his waist so tightly I said please it's not his fault it's my fault don't take it out on him but they ignored me and then they put the shackles on his ankles so tight you could see him struggling I was really stressed by this in this condemned man looked at me and said Brian don't worry about this you just come back and then they started shoving this man toward the door he almost fell down he kept his balance and he kept pushing him so roughly and they got him in front of the door and then I watched this man do something he planted his feet and the next time when they shoved him he didn't move and then this man turned to me and he looked at me he said Brian don't worry about this you just come back and then that man did something I've never forgotten I stood there and I watch Tim closed his eyes throw his head back and then he started to sing and he started singing this hymn he started singing I'm pressing on the upward way new heights I'm gaining every day still praying as I'm all word bound and then he said Lord plant my feet on higher ground everybody stopped the guards recovered they started pushing him down the hall where you could hear the chains clanging but you could hear this man singing about higher ground and I will tell you hearing that man's song changed me all of a sudden I knew I wanted to help condemn people get to higher ground but more than that I knew that my journey to higher ground was tied to his journey I realized that if he doesn't get there I can't get there and in an instant my interest in law was radicalized I went back to Harvard Law School you couldn't get me out of the Law School Library I needed to know everything about substantive due process and procedural due process and Civil Procedure and appellate procedure I needed to know it all because now I wanted to help condemn people get to higher ground I tell you that because there's power in proximity you don't have to have all the solutions when you go into poor neighborhoods you don't have to have solutions when you go into jails and prisons you don't have to know everything there is to know when you're working with the formerly incarcerated you don't have to know how to deal with all the nuances of drug addiction and despair and violence but I urge you to recognize that if you choose to get proximate you will find a power that allows you to do justice there is power in proximity second thing I don't think we can do what we're trying to do we can't change the world we can't do justice but just getting proximate the second thing I'm persuaded we have to do is that we've got to change narratives you see the problems that we're talking about in this country and across the world are the results of policy decisions and political things but underneath those problems there are narratives and we've got to change some of those narratives we have mass incarceration in this country we have excessive punishment because we chose to deal with drug addiction and drug dependency as a crime issue instead of a health issue we could have said that drug addiction and drug dependency that's a health problem and let's use our health infrastructure to address that problem we did that for alcoholism we don't regard alcoholism as a crime we we regard that as a disease we used a health model if we know someone who's alcoholic and we see them going into a bar we don't think oh let's call the police we think let's try to intervene but for drug addiction and drug dependency we said they're criminals and we've put hundreds of thousands of people in jails in prisons it is the primary reason we have these huge race disparities but there was a narrative that caused us to see that as a crime rather than a health crisis and that narrative was rooted in what I call the politics of fear and anger our politicians have been preaching to us be afraid and be angry for decades and I will tell you that when you make decisions rooted in fear and anger you will tolerate oppression you will tolerate inequality you will tolerate injustice and I believe we are called to reject fear and anger and we got to change that narrative I've seen it happen to children my clients have gotten younger and younger and younger there were some people warring around the country thirty years ago arguing that some children aren't children they began to argue that there are some kids in our society that may look like kids and may talk like kids but they said these aren't really kids they said these are super predators and they use this word to demonize a generation of children mostly black and brown kids and every state in the country lowered the minimum age for trying children as adults you did it here in the state of New York there's a campaign going on right now to raise the age in response to this hysteria created by this super predator myth and today we have thousands of kids serving decades of adult incarceration I've represented nine and ten-year-old children facing decades of imprisoning we have thirteen and fourteen year old children in this country who've been condemned to die in prison with life imprisonment without parole sentences and there's a narrative that created this hysteria and we got to change the narrative a few years ago I was working on a case involving a fourteen-year-old boy who lived in a household where his mother was repeatedly the target of a lot of domestic violence this boy's mother had a boyfriend and when this man would come home he would sometimes get violent if he'd been drinking and one day he'd been drinking and he came into the house he didn't say anything he just called the boy's mother into the kitchen and he walked up to her and he punched her in the face she fell she hit her head as she fell and she was on the floor bleeding and unconscious her son came running into the kitchen to try to help his mom he to stop the bleeding he tried to get her to wake up but no matter what he did she wouldn't respond and after ten minutes this child thought his mom was dead she wasn't dead but he thought his mom was dead the little boy got up and he walked into the bedroom where the man had fallen asleep and he walked over to the dresser drawer where he knew this man kept his handgun and this little boy grabbed that gun and he walked over to where the man was sleeping and he pointed the gun at the man's head the man was snoring and when the man stops snoring this little boy panicked and tragically pulled the trigger and shot this man in the head the man was killed almost instantly this little boy was very small for his age he was under five feet tall he weighed less than 100 pounds he'd never been in trouble before he was the kind of kid that might have been tried as a juvenile but for the fact that the man that he shot and killed his mother's boyfriend well that man was a deputy sheriff and because it was a deputy sheriff the prosecutor insisted that this child be tried as an adult and the judge certified him to stand trial as an adult and they immediately placed him in the adult jail he'd been there three days before his grandmother got me involved in the case I went to the jail to meet this little boy he walked in this little tiny kid terrified he sat down and I started asking him questions but no matter what I asked him he wouldn't say anything he just sat there and I finally put my pen down I said look I can't help if you don't talk to me you got to talk to me little boy wouldn't say anything he just kept staring at the wall I got up and I walked around the table I pulled my chair close to my said come on you got to talk to me I can't help you if you don't talk to me and a little boy wouldn't say anything he just kept staring couldn't figure out what to do i sat there and I just couldn't figure out what to do and at some point I just leaned on him I don't even know why but I leaned on him and when I leaned on him he leaned back and when he leaned back I put my arm around him and I said come on you got to talk to me I can't help you if you don't talk to me and that's when this little boy started to cry and through his tears began talking to me not about what happened with the man not about what happened with his mom but he started talking to me about what had happened at the jail he told me on the first night several men had hurt him he told me on the next night he'd been raped by several people he told me on the night before I had gotten there so many people had hurt him he couldn't remember how many there had been and then this little boy cried hysterically for almost an hour I finally got him calmed I said look I'm going to get you out of here you stay right here I'm going to get you out of here and I never will forget trying to leave that jail and that little boy grabbing my arm saying please please please don't go I said no it's okay it's all right I'm gonna get you out of here you stay right here and I left that jail and the question I had in my mind when I left that jail is who is responsible for this and the answer is we are we are we've allowed a narrative to emerge in this country that some children aren't children we've allowed this distance to be created from the most vulnerable children in our society and we have thrown away the abused children we have thrown away the vulnerable children we've thrown away the kids that are struggling with trauma and neglect we have thrown away the kids that join these gangs and I'm here to tell you that if we want to do just as we got to change the narrative I believe God calls us to recognize that all children are children we are all God's children and we cannot throw away any member of this community we've got to understand that doing justice means claiming the children that other people throw away I mean claiming those who are rejected by others we've got to change the narrative I actually think we have to change the narrative about race in America so I don't think we're free in this country I don't I think we're burdened by our history of racial inequality we live in a space with pollution created by our history of inequality there's like a SMAW all around us and we've been breathing it in we don't even talk about it and we are not free it doesn't take very much to create tension and distrust and we will not get free until we change the narrative there are things we have to talk about that we haven't talked about we are a post genocidal society in this country there was a genocide here before white settlers came there were native people on this continent millions of indigenous Native Americans and they were slaughtered by the millions by famine and disease and war we haven't talked about the things you're supposed to talk about to recover from a genocide and that genocide made us tolerant of this idea that we can victimize some people if they're different and that narrative of racial difference is what gave rise to centuries of slavery and the legacy of slavery is like a shadow all over this country and I don't think the great evil of American slavery was involuntary servitude of forced labor I believe the great evil of American slavery was the narrative of racial difference that we created to legitimated the great evil of American slavery was the ideology of white supremacy that we made up to justify enslaving other people we said that these black people are different they've got these deficits and these qualities and these attributes and we can enslave them because they are different and that narrative of racial difference that was the great evil of American slavery and if I read the Thirteenth Amendment it doesn't talk about the ideology of white supremacy doesn't talk about narratives of racial difference it only talks about involuntary servitude and forced labor and that's why I believe that slavery didn't end in 1865 it just evolved it turned into decades of terrorism and lynching and violence we suffered through terrorism in this country we pulled black people out of their homes and we hang them and we mutilated them and we burn them alive and we created this era of Terror and older people of color understand it they come up to me sometime to say mr. Stevenson I get angry when I hear someone on TV talking about how we're dealing with domestic terrorism for the first time in our nation's history after 9/11 they said we grew up with terrorism we had we're being bombed and lynched and menaced every day of our lives so sometimes say mr. Stevenson you make them stop saying that because it's a source of provocation and they're right this country the demographics of this country was shaped by racial terror many of the black people the black Americans that are in New York City the black people in Cleveland and Chicago and Detroit in Los Angeles in Oakland and Boston and Minneapolis did not go to those communities as immigrants ooking new economic opportunities they came to these communities as refugees and exhales from terrorism in the American South and we haven't done the things you're supposed to do to help a refugee community recover and that challenge still hangs over us and then we get into the civil rights movement and I'm going to get in trouble here for Rio I'm just going to warn you because I think we're too celebratory when we talk about civil rights in this country I mean it's appropriate that we talk about civil rights but I don't think that we're doing it the right we were too celebratory I hear people talking about the civil rights movement and it sounds like a three-day carnival on day one Rosa Parks didn't give up her seat on a bus on day two dr. King led a march on Washington and on day three we changed all the laws and racism was over and it would be great if that to our history but that's not our history our history is that for decades in this country we beat and burdened and excluded people of color we did terrible things we told black people you're not good enough to vote just because you're black we said the people of color you can't go to school with the rest of us because you're a person of color my parents were humiliated every day of their lives every time they saw those signs that said white and colored they weren't directions they were assaults and we haven't done the things you're supposed to do to help someone recover from assault we was we should have committed to a process of truth and reconciliation in the 1960s but we didn't do it and now there is a presumption of dangerousness and guilt that follows black and brown people in this country it is a burden that they have to carry we have to carry and it weighs on us and it becomes exhausting and there is this need to change the narrative I have to tell people color my students cars it doesn't matter how many a good grade you get it doesn't matter how many degrees you get it may not even matter how much wealth you accumulate there will still be times in places where you're presumed dangerous and guilty I was in a courtroom not too long ago getting ready for a hearing I was sitting a defense counsels table I had my suit and tie on it was there early first time in this courtroom and the judge walked in and they saw me sitting there and he said hey hey hey hey hey you get back out there in the hallway and you wait until your lawyer gets you I don't want any defendant sitting in my courtroom without their lawyer I stood up I said I'm sorry Your Honor I didn't introduce myself my name is Bryan Stevenson I am the lawyer and the judge started laughing and the prosecutor started laughing and I made myself lacs I didn't want to disadvantage my client client came in a young white kid I was representing we we did the hearing but later I was thinking what is it that when this judge saw a middle-aged black man sitting of a suit and tie at defense counsel's table didn't even occur to him that that's Louie what that is is this narrative of racial difference we've got to change the narrative in South Africa there was a recognition that they could not recover from apartheid without truth and reconciliation and Rwanda they will tell you that they cannot recover from the genocide without truth and reconciliation go to Germany if you go to Berlin Germany you can't go 100 metres without finding a marker or a stone that's been placed next to the home of a Jewish family that was abducted during the Holocaust the Germans want you to go to Auschwitz in Birken BAU and reflect soberly on the legacy of the Holocaust in this country we do the opposite we don't talk about slavery we don't talk about lynching we don't talk about segregation you start talking about race and people get nervous you start talking about racial justice and we're looking for exits and we cannot do justice we cannot change the world until we change this narrative of racial difference I am committed to a project we are putting markers and every lynching site in America I want to mark the spaces in New York City where the slave trade was active I want to mark the spaces in this country where we should be reminded of this burden that we have got to lift if we want to create more justice but it's not enough to change the narrative the third thing I'm persuaded we have to do is that I am persuaded that we've got to stay hopeful and for people of faith let me just say this a lot of times it seems odd that somebody would come in a faith setting and talk about the need to be hopeful but I really do believe that for a lot of us it is easier to be faithful than to be hopeful and sometimes we get locked into the habits of faith at the same time we are hopeless about what we can do and I am here to say that you've got to be hopeful you cannot do justice you cannot love mercy unless you are hopeful about what you can do in the world hopelessness is the enemy of justice injustice prevails where hopelessness persists and if you are not hopeful you are part of the problem you cannot represent God in his glory you cannot be that witness your power resonates in your hopefulness hope is what will get you to stand up when other people say sit in hope is what will get you to speak when other people say be quiet you've got to be hopeful and I can't you got to figure out the things that threaten your hopelessness your hopefulness and you've got to protect yourself them I can't tell you what makes you hopeless I'll tell you a little bit about what makes me hopeless I live in Montgomery Alabama it's probably the worst place in America for me to be living because to be honest the thing that challenges my hope dynamic is I really do not like it when people start talking about the good old days of the 40s and the 50s I don't like it when we try to romanticize our history I don't like it when people talk talk about make America great again I don't like it when we start framing things and this is stored away in my state of Alabama you know Confederate Memorial Day as a state holiday in Alabama Jefferson Davis's birthday is a state holiday in Alabama we don't even have Martin Luther King Day it's Martin Luther King / Robert Ely day our two largest high schools are robert e lee high and jefferson davis high and i will tell you that it challenges me when we do that kind of thinking and i have to position myself in a more hopeful way I've got to make sure I am standing and interacting with people who I know are rooted in these narratives in a hopeful way I want to be really clear about something I am talking about racial justice in this country I want to confront these problems not because I'm interested in punishment part of the reason why we don't like talking about our history of racial inequality is that we're such a punitive society we're afraid that we own up to these problems there's going to be some vast great punishment and as people of faith we've got to stand up and say no there is actually this path toward redemption only when we acknowledge our sins we can't cheat there's something better on the other side of acknowledgment than punishment and that's called liberation the reason why I want to kind of live hopefully I want to grasp the hands of those people who are saying some really hateful things and say I have this hope that we can do better than create these divisions is because hope is necessary at the great privilege when I was a young lawyer of meeting Rosa Parks she was an amazing person and when I moved to Montgomery there was an older woman by the name of Johnny Carr who was the architect of the Montgomery bus boycott and she called me up and she said Brian I understand you a young lawyer just moved to Montgomery I said yes I am she said well I'm the architect of the Montgomery bus boycott and I said what's so nice to meet you see so well now because you're a lawyer I'm going to call you up sometimes and I'm going to ask you to go some places and talk and then she said sometimes I'm going to ask you to go some places and listen and she said when I call you up and ask you to do something you're going to say yes ma'am I said yes ma'am and she would call me up in send me places and one day she called me she said Bryan Rosa Parks has come into town and we're going to get together at Virginia Duras house a white woman whose husband Clifford Dirt represented dr. King we're just going to talk she said do you want to come over and listen I said yes miss Carr I really doing every now and then she'd say Bryan what does the word listen me and I'd have to explain to her that I knew I wasn't supposed to talk and I went over there and I met miss parks and I sat next and they were in their 70s and 80s and the amazing thing was that they weren't talking about what they had done they were talking about what they were going to do there was a hopefulness that they had all inside of them and I just sat there so inspired for two hours and after a couple of hours miss parks turned to me she said no Bryan tell me what the equal justice initiative is tell me what you're trying to do I looked at Miss Carr to see if I had permission to speak and she nodded and I turn to miss parks and I gave her my whole rapper said we're trying to do something about the death penalty we're trying to do something about excessive punishment we're trying to do something about racial inequality we're trying to do something to help the poor trying to do something about children prosecuted as adults but trying to do something to help people who are mentally ill trying to do something about these conditions of confinement I gave her my whole rap and when I finished she looked at me she said mmm she said that's going to make you tired tired tired and that's when Miss Carr leaned forward and she put her finger in my face she said that's why you got to be brave brave brave it takes courage to be hopeful but when we are hopeful we find the strength to do the things that allow us to change the world forth and finally I don't think we can do justice I don't think we can love mercy I don't think we can change the world by just being proximate just changing narratives just being hopeful the fourth thing we have to do and this is a hard one is I am persuaded that we've got to be willing to do uncomfortable things there is no path forward until we are willing to do uncomfortable things I've looked for examples where oppression was overcome where inequality was overcome word justice prevailed when nobody had to do anything uncomfortable and I can't find any examples of that in order for us to make progress we're going to have to be willing to position ourselves in uncomfortable places and it's hard because we're human and humans are programmed to seek comfort we like comfort I like coming I'm not preaching against comfort I gave a talk down in Mississippi the people met me at the airport and they came up to me said Oh mr. Stevenson we know all about you we've read your book we know what kind of lawyer you are we know what kind of work you do and we have to tell you that we're having our conference at the luxurious Double Tree Hotel and we decided that you wouldn't want to stay at the luxurious Double Tree Hotel so we've asked one of the farmers to put you up at the barn I said what is wrong with you I said of course I want to stay at the luxurious Double Tree Hotel I like those chocolate chip cookies just like everybody else that's not what I'm what I'm talking about that sometimes you have to position yourself in uncomfortable places and you've got to be a witness I represent people on death row we've had some wonderful moments we've had some great victories but we've also had some difficult dark days a few years ago we had a just a kind of a hole a lot of executions every other month somebody was facing execution and there is no right to counsel for people on death row in this country one of the challenges that we have in America is that we've got a criminal justice system that treats you better if you're rich and guilty than if you're poor and innocent wealth not culpability shapes outcomes and this man was facing execution my young lawyers were getting so beat down I said you know what you all take a break I've been doing this longer I'll take the next case and I quickly learned that this man who was scheduled to be executed in 30 days suffered from intellectual disability he was mentally and we got a court decision that says you cannot execute people with intellectual disability so I went to the court and said this man suffers from this disability you cannot execute him but the court said too late said no it's not too late we haven't executed and we can stop this but the court said too late and the appeals court said too late in the state court said too late and a federal court said too late and finally it was the day of the execution and I still had not been able to get a stay and I was waiting to hear from the United States Supreme Court what they would do and about an hour before the execution where I was getting more frantic and pacing in my office the phone rang and I picked up the phone and it was the clerk of court and the clerk told me that our stay motion asking for a stay of execution had been distributed to the court and considered by the judges and then she said I want you to know that your motion has been adjudicated and the court has decided to deny your motion for a stay was devastating I picked up the phone to call this man on the row and I gave him this heartbreaking new and he began to cry and then he began to sob and in the midst of his tears he said to me so mr. Stevenson is something I really have to say to you before you hang up please let me say what I have to say and then this man tried to say something to me but in addition to having an intellectual disability he had another challenge he also when he got really nervous when he got anxious he had a very severe speech impediment and he would begin to sputter stutter terribly when he was really overwhelmed and after telling me that he had something really important to say to me he tried to say what he had to say but he couldn't get his words out he started to stutter very very badly he kept trying to talk he kept trying to talk but he couldn't get a single word out and the harder this man tried to talk the more he was ripping my heart apart I was sitting there standing there holding the phone and tears were running down my face and he kept trying and he kept trying I could hear the guards trying to rush him which just made it worse and he kept trying and all of a sudden I just realized that this was so painful painfully uncomfortable and my mind drifted a little bit and I remembered how when I was about 9 or 10 my mother took me to church one Sunday and I was with my brother talking to my friends and I remembered how on that Sunday morning there was a little skinny kid I'd never seen before at church and this little boy wasn't saying anything I remembered how I asked that little boy a question and the little boy tried to answer my question but I remembered how he also had a very severe speech impediment and when he tried to answer my question he couldn't get his words out either he stuttered terribly and then I remembered that I did something really shameful I did something really ignorant I remembered that I laughed at that little boy and my mother saw me laughing at this child and she gave me this look I had never seen before and she came over and grabbed me by the arm and she pulled me aside and she said to me she said Brian don't you ever laugh at somebody because they can't get their words out right don't you ever do that and even at nine I was a little lawyer I said well mom I didn't know I didn't think I didn't know it and she said no no you know better than that and then my mother looked at me she said now you go back over there and tell that little boy you're sorry I said okay mom and I took a step and then my mom grabbed me by the arm she said wait after you tell that little boy you're sorry I want you to hug that little boy kind of rolled my eyes and I said okay mom and I took a step and then she grabbed me by the arm again she said wait after you hugged that little boy I want you to tell that little boy you love him I said mom I can't go over there and do that she gave me that look again so I said okay okay and on the night of this execution I remembered going over to this little boy and walking up to him and saying look man you know well you know I'm sorry and then I remembered sort of lunging at him and giving him my little boy version of a man hug and then I remember trying to say to that child as insincerely as I possibly could I said look you know well I don't know I don't know well yeah I love you and what I'd forgotten was how that little boy hugged me back and then whispered flawlessly in my ear he said I love you too and I was thinking about that while this man was trying to get his words out and finally the man got his words out and what he said to me with mr. Stevenson I want to thank you for fighting for me he said I want to thank you for representing me and the last thing that man said was mr. Stevenson I love you for trying to save my life he hung up the phone they pulled him away they strapped him to a gurney and they executed him I hung up the phone and I put it down I said I can't do this anymore it's too hard too hard too hard too hard I was just devastated I kept thinking about how broken he was and the question I had in my mind is why do we want to kill all the broken people what is it about us in this country that when we see brokenness we want to crush it we want to throw it away we want to step on it why do we want to kill all the broken people and then I realized something I realize that I represent the broken all of my clients are broken people they've been broken by poverty and disability and racism and neglect and all of these disorders in our society and then I realized I work in a broken system the people who have power are not willing to get proximate they're not willing to get out of this narrative of fear and anger they're not hopeful they are unwilling to uncomfortable things I said I don't have anything more to do with this and that's what I began to have that conversation when you think about when you're going to do something different and all of a sudden I remembered that scripture dr. Keller gave us these scriptures and I remembered that scripture where Paul was writing to the church in Corinth about all his many burdens and I remembered what the scripture says about God's grace being sufficient and that his power is made perfect in weakness and all of a sudden I heard that scripture in a way I'd never heard it before and I thought about that scripture that says when I am weak then I am strong and just like that it became clear to me why I do what I do and I realized something I'd never realized before and what I realized is that I don't do what I do because it's about justice I don't do what I do because I've been trained to do it I don't do what I do because if I don't do it no one will I don't do what I do because it's important I don't do what I do because somebody has to do it I realize that night something I'd never realized before and what I realize is that I do what I do because I'm broken too and the truth is if you get proximate if you change and there it is if you stay hopeful if you do uncomfortable things it will break you but the better truth the glorious truth that is is that in broken as we are filled with grace and mercy there is this love that fills all of those broken spaces that strengthens us it is in brokenness that we can find the pathway to Mercy it is in brokenness that we understand compassion it is the broken that can teach us the way justice works I am persuaded of some really simple things addley that we are all more than the worst thing we've ever done I think that for every human being I think if someone tells a lie they're not just a liar I think if someone takes something they're not just a thief I think even if you kill someone you're not just a killer and we are called to understand the other things people are before we judge I am also persuaded that in this country the opposite of poverty is not wealth we talk too much about money in America I believe that the opposite of poverty isn't wealth I believe the opposite of poverty is justice and when we commit to justice that's how we change the world and finally I believe that when I come to New York City when I come to Redeemer when I come to settings like this I'm so energized by the faithful and the hard-working and the motivated and those who are willing to do these things but I have to tell you that we cannot judge our commitment to doing justice we cannot judge our character our commitment to the rule of law by looking at how we treat the rich and the powerful and the privileged as dr. Keller told us we have to judge how we're doing as people of faith by looking at how we treat the poor the incarcerated and the condemned there is a different metric system for those of us who want to change the world for those of us who want to do justice I'll end with this I was giving a talk in a church and an older man came into the back of the church he was sitting in a wheelchair older black man and the whole time I was talking was staring at me with this very kind of parsh almost stern look on his face I couldn't figure out why he was looking at me so hard and I got through my talk people came up they were very nice and appropriate but this older black man sitting in that wheelchair kept staring at me and when everybody else left he got a young kid to wheel him to the front of the church and he came down that aisle of that church with his stern almost angry look on his face and when he got in front of me he put his hand up and he said do you know what you're doing and I just stood there and then he asked me again he said do you know what you're doing I step back I mumbled something I don't even remember what I said did he ask me one more time he said do you know what you're doing and then he looked at me I'm going to tell you what you're doing and this older man looked at me he said you're beating the drum for justice you keep beating the drum for justice and I was so moved I was so I was also really relieved because I just didn't know then he grabbed me by my jacket and he pulled me into his wheelchair c'mere c'mere c'mere I'm going to show you something this older man turned his head he said you see this cut I have here on the right ear underneath my right ear he says I got that cut in Greene County Alabama in 1963 trying to register people to vote he turned his head he said you see the scar I have down here at the bottom of my neck he said I got that scar in Philadelphia Mississippi in 1964 trying to register people to vote he turned his head he said you see this dark spot he said that's my bruise I got my bruise in Birmingham Alabama 1965 trying to register people to vote he said I'm going to tell you something young man he said people look at me they think I'm some old man sitting in a wheelchair covered with cuts and bruises and scars he said but I'm going to tell you something he said these aren't my cuts these aren't my bruises these aren't my scars he said these are my medals of Honor we honor that call to justice when we choose to get proximate and we choose to change these nurses when we stay hopeful when we do uncomfortable things we lift up something powerful restorative transformative and I'm excited that you would invite me to Redeemer that you would invite me to be a part of this conversation and I am grateful to all of you for your choice to delight to get proximate to change narratives to be hopeful and yes to do uncomfortable things I wish God's blessings on all of you thank you

Channel: Center for Faith & Work

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Id: MyBfOX5OHRQ

Length: 70min 53sec (4253 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 03 2016