Grace to a Slave-Owner's Descendant

Today I had the privilege of offering the opening prayer for a worship service commemorating Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day in our community. It was a humbling honor for many reasons, but I'm thinking of one reason in particular.

My late paternal grandfather pursued the genealogy of our somewhat obscure English family. He would track down those bearing the last name "Posegate" and find out where they fit in the family tree. Once, while thumbing through the St. Louis, Missouri phonebook, he found a listing for someone with our last name whom my grandfather did not know. He located the individual and drove to south St. Louis to meet him and find out about him. Upon ringing the doorbell my grandfather found himself face to face with an African-American gentleman. (To that point, as far as we knew, all Posegates were Caucasian.) Most people in my family found this to be ironic and somewhat amusing. My grandfather was not known to be a particularly open-minded and tolerant man, and he was not prepared for this branch of our family tree.

Young as I was when I heard all this, I knew enough about our nation's history to know what this meant - someone in our ancestry had once owned slaves. That's always bothered me. Today I took the opportunity to confess this and seek forgiveness for this at the King Day gathering. I am truly sorry for what my people did to the ancestors of many in today's crowd. Their blood is on my hands. My only hope is the grace of God in Jesus the Christ.

However, the fact that the descendant of slave owners would have the opportunity to participate in this important observance, at this historic time in our nation's journey, is a testimony to the in- breaking Kingdom of God. It is a tribute to the vision and dream for which Dr. King lived and died. It is a proclamation that all things are possible with our God. It asserts the truthfulness of one of Dr. King's most fervent beliefs - as the oppressed are made free, so then true liberty also comes to the oppressor.

I'll see you around the next bend in the river.