LEWISBURG, WV (WOAY) – Celebrations in Lewisburg continued for Martin Luther King Jr. Day at the United Methodist Church.
The church service was full of music and fellowship all leading up to the keynote speaker Dr. Joseph Evans.
Evans is currently the Dean of the Morehouse School of Religion in Atlanta, but he grew up in Lewisburg. On Monday, he said his message would be all about the radical change needed to improve the struggles in West Virginia like poverty and the opioid crisis.
“That is the evidence of an inward pain and the inward lack of opportunity,” Dr. Evans said. “It’s natural for people to want to excel and there should not be barriers to that ability, and I would argue God-given ability to excel and so I hold leaders in my home state accountable for being honest with her citizens.”
Dr. Evans also said that he has preached at Harvard and Dr. King’s church, but that he was more than delighted to preach in his hometown.