A 30-foot statue of Martin Luther King, Jr. now stands in Washington D.C. as a memorial to the man and his dream of a united America. The inscription on the memorial which shows Dr. King standing with arms folded as if projected in 3D from the side of a mountain says, "Out of the mountain of despair, a stone of hope."
The inscription was extracted from Dr. King's "I have a dream speech," which was delivered on the Washington Mall in the summer of 1963.
In that speech he mentioned "Stone Mountain of Georgia." Stone Mountain, to those who remember it, was a symbol of racism and the old South. In 1915, the Second Ku Klux Klan was reborn on Stone Mountain. A permanent memorial to the confederacy was carved in the side of a Stone Mountain by the famed sculptor Gutzon Borglum.
When King spoke about Stone Mountain in 1963, it had become a symbol of racism, segregation, and hatred. It represented everything that brought despair to the poor, Blacks, Asians, Hispanics, Immigrants, and all of groups that were the target of America's hatred. When Blacks saw Stone Mountain, it brought them hard memories of despair and stirred ill feelings.
After Dr. King's death, something started to happen in Georgia as it did across the land. The State of Georgia now runs Stone Mountain. The figures of the Confederate Leaders are still carved into the side of the mountain and thousands of people come to see it every year. However, now they don't come only to see the symbols of racism carved in the mountain as they once did, many come to see the light show every night. During that light show the images of racism are flashed on the side of the mountain under giant lights, but the show ends with an image of Martin Luther King superimposed over the Confederacy. As the music plays and the flags wave, the cold stone of the mountain seems to shout, "out of the mountain of despair, comes a stone of hope."
In our despair, Christ brings us hope, too. It is our hope that trouble won't last always. That hope helps us to endure each struggling day.