“As the worm is transformed into a butterfly in the chrysalis, so is the enemy transformed by our prayers. So also are we changed into a new form, a liberated form closer to God.”
Charles C. Walker, “Prayer of a Righteous Man,” speech Circa 1954.
“The quality of our prayer is affected by what we do. Do we invoke blessing or greed? Can we pray that evil befalls another? Jesus said if you have anything against your brother, go to him and talk it over. Action and prayer are interrelated.”
Charles C. Walker, “Prayer of a Righteous Man,” notes for a speech, circa 1954.
“If you have weapons, take them home; if you do not have them, please do not seek to get them. We cannot solve this problem through retaliatory violence. We must meet violence with nonviolence. Remember the words of Jesus: ‘He who lives by the sword will perish by the sword.’ We must love our white brothers, no matter what they do to us.… We must meet hate with love.”
Martin Luther, King, Jr., Stride Toward Freedom (New York: Ballantine Books, 1958), 111.
“Each man [and woman] is unique. This is confirmed by facts of biological diversity. Nature has taken great pains to make each person unique. ” Charles C. Walker, “Prayer of a Righteous Man,” notes for a speech, circa 1954.
We all lose things, right? How much time do we waste looking for misplaced items? Hours! So, I found out long ago to pray to Jesus to help find lost things. This played out interestingly, as I traveled home last month from Philadelphia.
At the airport, I showed my driver’s license to security and held it securely under my thumb, along with my boarding pass. After the long walk to the gate, I stopped and set my things down on a nearby seat, so I could put the license away in my wallet.
But it was gone! I looked around and under the seat. I asked at the gate desk and the lady knew nothing, except that I still could still make my connecting flight from my layover in Atlanta to South Bend, Indiana.
With a half hour before boarding time, I determined to find that license. I backtracked my steps to security, where they checked everywhere, to no avail. They did give me numbers for Lost and Found to call later, if it did not turn up.
Heading back to the gate, I started to pray, “Jesus, help me find it! Make it appear. Make it appear to me where I can see it!”
Stepping back into the gate area, I was still praying. Suddenly a huge shaft of light glinted at just the right angle to shine onto a small card on the floor under the seats! Like a beam off the facet of a jewel, it particularly lit up something that looked like a picture in the corner!
I ran over and stuck my head down into the space between the seat and the back. “There it is!” I yelled. “I’ve been looking for this!” I started throwing down my bags so I could crawl under, when a little boy wriggled his way to it and handed it to me.
“Praise God!” I exclaimed unabashedly and people around me smiled, as I carefully put away the errant license and made ready to board.
But the story does not end there. Because of especially bad storms and lightning in Philly, we sat on the tarmac two hours and I missed my connection in Atlanta. The airline then put me up overnight in a hotel off the grounds. Having left the airport, how could I have made the flight next morning without my driver’s license to get through security?
Additionally, with the weather that dark and stormy, how did a gigantic shaft of light stream through the large window to reveal the whereabouts of my license? I feel even more strongly now in the power of prayer for the little things in life. They show the presence of God as clearly as the big ones.
[T]raining is one of the anchor points in the nonviolent movement. It is both a tool for and child of organization. It is a morale factor. It is one of the more concrete elements in a field which has in it many ambiguities and uncertainties.
Charles Walker, AFSC memo to Ted Robinson, May 1, 1968.