It is said that as Martin Luther King was giving his famous speech that Mahalia Jackson shouted to him from the podium
“tell them about the dream Martin.” If you watch his famous speech, the first 12 minutes were excellent. The words were marvelously written and with great skill they were delivered. Yet when he hears Mahalia Jackson shout “tell them about the dream Martin,” he slides the speech over and begins to speak extemporaneously (without his notes) He begins to tell the crowd about his dream. The speech becomes noticeably less political and takes the tone of an impassioned sermon, as one caught up in the Spirit, the words go from tremendous to lofty and soaring. The sentiment becomes one of unity. That black people and white people would one day sit down with one another, that black children would one day be judged, not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. That was his dream, and even although he returns to the speech with the magnificent phrase of “let freedom ring,’ it will be forever known as the “I have a dream,” speech.

When we go of script and allow God to move in us brothers and sisters, the Spirit of God begins to rise up in us. When it is He alone who speaks and we are but carried along in the updrafts of His presence or by the waters of His current then we truly begin to speak life into a dying world. When Peter began to speak at Pentecost and the power of God began to rise up in him and the deluge of the Holy Spirit began to fall down and engulf the hearts of the hearers. then, and only then, they cried out “what must we do to be saved?” This is how the world is moved, this is how the world is turned upside down, by the Spirit of the Living God flowing through us, unencumbered by our own efforts.

Oh that we would step aside. Oh that we would lay down what we know and lift up who we know. If we begin to simply tell the world about the Jesus that we know, if we begin to lift up the risen Christ, then The Spirit of God would rend the heavens and come down, down upon the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. He would flow down from the mighty mountains of New York. He would rise up to the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania. He would melt the snow-capped Rockies of Colorado.The freedom wrought for us at Calvary would ring out from the curvaceous slopes of California. And from atop Stone mountain of Georgia and Lookout mountain of Tennessee glory would rain down and flood the land.