Palm Sunday in Atlanta

Ebenezeer Baptist Church where Martin Luther king Senior was the minister, and his son was a member of the congregation, now worships in a new larger building (right) across the street from its former building, now a national historic site (which we visited yesterday).

We were there for the Palm Service of this mainly black congregation with a good sprinkling of white people. The building was filled for this, the second service of the day.

Before the service at Ebenezeer

The service was an interesting blend of the formal and informal with a printed order of service, an organ voluntary at the beginning, lively praise songs from the large choir, and a traditional hymn 'All hail the power of Jesus name.'

In this context it was particularly poignant to sing:

Let every tongue and every tribe
responsive to his call,
to him all majesty ascribe,
and crown him Lord of all.

An interesting aspect of the service was that most of the songs were sung by the choir alone.The congregation clapped and swayed to the music during the choir items, but there were relatively few songs where the congregation joined in the singing (just two or three).

Many free church have dispensed with public reading of the Scriptures and intercessory prayer in their services, but that wasn't the case here. The Pastor read three passages of Scripture before he preached, and in his Pastoral Prayer earlier in the service he prayed for specific needs of the congregation, for the city, the state, and the nation as a whole. 'Stop by Lord at Pennsylvania Avenue; Stop by at number 1600 (the White House); there's a man sitting then at a desk. Stop by and tell him that his desk is not a throne. Stop by and tell him You are on the throne. Show him your way'

Before the service at Ebenezeer we visited the fire hall (of fire station) at the MLKJ historic site. We were shown around by Leonard (left) who volunteers there. Here the young Martin Luther king Junior and the other young boys in the neighbourhood loved to visit and talk with firemen who let them  clamber over the fire engine (pictured), although the firemen told the boys they could never be firemen themselves because they were black.

It wasn't until the mid 60s that Atlanta had its first  black firemen.

Atlanta

It was now time to leave the city of Atlanta (above) and head for the Georgian coast and the city of Savannah, 248 miles away. There is a fourteen lane highway leading out of Atlanta. It was packed with fast moving traffic (where was everyone going on a Sunday afternoon?) and the fact that traffic could enter and leave the carriageway on both the left and the right, shall we say,  greatly added to the excitement of the experience.