I’ve been thinking a lot about “meaning” lately. What it is to live a life of meaning. What it is to live a life with purpose and intention. Life is short…but art is long. Love is long. Our expressions of what we’re passionate about can live long past our own existence.

These expressions are what I refer to as HeArtwork. And I am coming to believe more and more that the expression and creation of these is what gives life meaning. It’s what makes life worth living.

For some HeArtwork can come out visually…drawings, paintings, sculpture. And for others, the essence of their HeArtwork is in the spoken, sung, or written word.

Whatever form it takes, we can’t help but be moved by it. It speaks a truth… some unique and seldom-discussed perspective that had been lying in the shadows. Unspoken, but felt. HeArtwork brings light to the shadows, and speaks truths that need heard.

Martin Luther King Jr might not be who we think of when someone talks about an Outlaw Artist. We think of our eccentric artists and rebellious rockstars. But MLK was a HeArtwork artist…and an outlaw through that expression.

Martin knew the power of words. His father was a preacher, and he used his words (and his pain) powerfully.

Martin Sr. was a man that grew up witnessing many traumatic events, growing up in the segregated south. He experienced the ultimate horrors of racism, seeing the lynching of a black man at a young age. His home life was also traumatic, marred with domestic violence and turmoil. He found sanctuary in church, and later went on to become a minister himself.

Martin Luther King Jr. saw his father speak words that would move whole groups of people, filling them with the word of God. He also listened to him speak truths of injustice and the cruelties of racism. His father did not avoid the hard issues. He faced them with a brutal but compassionate honesty. This example would forever shape the trajectory of Martin Jr.’s own life.

Martin Luther King Jr. would become a minister like his father. What started with congregations at church would later grow into an entire social-political movement. He spoke against injustices of segregation and discrimination. He spoke against the inequality of a system that benefitted the few over the many. He decried the horrors of war, and spoke impassionedly about the power of peace.

He also implored his audience to not become bitter by these injustices. He preached a message of love, even for those that had hate in their hearts. This message was not always well received. Martin received violent aggression from a system reluctant to change…he was decried as a radical, a rebel-rouser, and a “terrorist”. He was beaten, arrested and slandered across many news sources. Yet he persisted.

He also received backlash from the movement itself. Many thought he was “too soft” to lead a movement they believed required a more forceful approach. He was villainized by those that believed he worked too closely with those same people that oppressed them. But despite the pressure from both sides of the political spectrum, Martin spoke what he believed to be right and true. He walked a delicate balance between these two dichotomies, never fully satisfying either side in his lifetime.

Yet he persisted.

Martin knew words had power. He knew the violence that words could create. How the right-wrong words put together could inspire anger and hate. He knew that groups of people could be moved to cause terrible harm to each other based on the power of words.

Words could also create legal barriers, preventing equality of treatment for entire groups with the swipe of a pen.

The paradox of powerful things is their power to do good AND harm. It’s all how you wield it.

And MLK chose to wield his words in the way that felt most honest to him. He refused to censor himself, and decried a system of injustice that kept his brothers and sisters at a constant disadvantage. Meanwhile, he also refused to demonize the people who participated in these injustices, always maintaining his belief in Christ-like love for all. Even those that would speak hate, and mean harm.

MLK lived his life with purpose. Every word he used, he used in power— the power of truth, justice, and Christ-like love. And the power of those words has resonated for generations. It has changed the way we live our lives, and see each other. Despite the risks of speaking out, he knew the risks of remaining silent were much greater.

There are some things in this life that are worth living and dying for. Expressing these truths is living as our Creator intended. We have all been given a purpose to find and serve with our whole being. Martin and other HeArtwork artists make me appreciate the passion by which they lived… and the conviction by which some of them died. Because those truths ripple out beyond them, and into eternity.

Living those truths requires great strength. But oh, what a world it would be, if we all lived with the passion, conviction, and love… as MLK did.