MLK and the Danger of Perfect Heroes

This past week, my 7 year old daughter came home from school with a Martin Luther King Jr. discussion guide. She wanted to know more about who he was.

I paused longer than I expected. How much does she need to know?

It has almost become a ritual on social media: every MLK Day, the tribes suit up, and the debates erupt. Conservatives point to his unorthodox theology and infidelity to argue he shouldn’t be honored. Progressives treat any hint of criticism of as evil racist revisionism. Everyone picks a side. And I found myself uncertain how to navigate this with her.

Personally, I have been in the habit for the last several years of listening to old King sermons/speeches on MLK Day. Two of my favorites are the “Drum Major Instinct” and “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop”. The Mountaintop speech is particularly moving as it is his final public speech before being killed and it has an eerie prophetic quality like he knew death was coming and moved forward to say one last thing anyway. That courage is something I’ve always admired.

In spite of these positive points, there are truly damming and thoroughly documented things about King that my daughter’s elementary school guide doesn’t mention. And I wasn’t sure how to talk about them or whether to talk about them at all.

It honestly surfaced a broader question that our culture has been wrestling with for the better part of this century. We all love our heroes, but what do we do when we discover they’re flawed, imperfect, human?

Gospel Security:

Christians secure in Christ should be able to do two things that the majority of our culture finds almost impossible.

First, honor achievements—even from heroes outside our “tribe”. When anyone advances God’s kingdom pursuing justice, human dignity, or liberty—even unknowingly—we should celebrate it. Our refusal to give credit to “their” heroes reveals our own tribal insecurity, not confidence in Christ.

Second, acknowledge failures—even from heroes inside our “tribe”. We must speak honestly about evil, cruelty, and moral failure while remembering we’re not the final judge, we have our own limitations, and we should judge with the measure we wish others to judge us in the future (Matthew 7:2). Our reluctance only reveals our own idolatry, asking heroes to carry weight and significance that only Christ should bear.

Here's the test: Can you do both? If you can only defend your heroes and attack theirs, you care more about your team winning than about truth.

If your identity and worth truly come from Christ, you don't need your tribe's heroes to be perfect or "their" heroes to be villains. Christ's death and resurrection determined your ultimate allegiance. No secondary identity (not nationality, not race, not political party) is worth compromising your character to denigrate or defend.

A Case Study: MLK

Let’s try applying this to Dr. King…

What King advanced for God’s kingdom: The Civil Rights movement embodied Christ’s cause: promotion of human dignity, pursuit of justice for the oppressed. King was motivated by a deep conviction that every single person, regardless of race, was made in the image of God. That belief allowed him to build remarkably diverse coalitions: he refused to exclude any race or class from the work. He even worked productively with Lyndon Johnson (a mixed past on race) because he understood that advancing the kingdom mattered more than ideological purity. His strategic brilliance, his willingness to suffer for others’ freedom, these advanced the kingdom whether or not his theology was orthodox. The Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act moved America closer to reflecting the equality the founders could only write about.

King’s failures: Theologically, his seminary papers deny the virgin birth, question the bodily resurrection, reject Christ’s divinity. Now, I hope he became more conservative and orthodox later, but we don’t have any evidence of that. If his theology stayed there, that’s heresy by historic Christian standards and deserves our condemnation. Personally, he was serially unfaithful to his wife. This is not debatable and has been acknowledged by even those closest to him.

But here’s where it gets uncomfortable.
Watch what happens when we move on from King…

Conservatives defend Washington and Jefferson with "judge them by their achievements, not contemporary standards"—honoring men who advanced principles of liberty even as they personally enslaved people. But they refuse that same grace to King. They won't honor how he advanced God's kingdom for justice because his theology departed from Christian orthodoxy or because it validates progressive politics. They demand theological purity from King while giving the Founders a pass on slaveholding.

Progressives flip it exactly backward. They demand unbending moral standards for the Founders: “slavery was evil inexcusable and invalidates all other achievement, tear down the statues!” But then they won’t apply those same absolute standards to King’s serial infidelity. They treat criticism of King as right-wing smears while treating any defense of the Founders as racism.

Both sides fail the same test twice: We won’t honor achievements from “their” heroes, and we won’t condemn failures from “our” heroes. It’s not about principle. It’s about tribe. We need our side to win more than we need Truth.

King isn't unique. Every “hero” in history bears this same complexity, genuine achievements alongside genuine failures. This shouldn't surprise us. The gospel teaches that all have sinned, that every human being is both created in God's image and broken by the fall.

So why do we struggle to hold both truths together when it comes to our heroes?

Abraham Lincoln: Emancipated the slaves and preserved the Union—advancing liberty and human dignity. Yet in 1858, he stated: “I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races.” He told Horace Greeley: “If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would do it.” He supported colonization (sending freed slaves to Africa) saying “there is an unwillingness on the part of our people, harsh as it may be, for you free colored people to remain with us.”

Billy Graham: Preached the gospel to millions. Yet refused to march with King, telling him to “put the brakes on” in 1963. He later admitted: “I think I made a mistake when I didn’t go to Selma.” Secretly recorded tapes revealed him telling Nixon that Jewish media control was “a stranglehold” that must be “broken”—invoking Hitler. Comments he later publicly repented of.

Gandhi: Led India to independence through nonviolent resistance. Yet he wrote that Black Africans were “uncivilised” and lived “almost like animals.” He subjected young female relatives to “celibacy experiments”—sleeping naked with them to test his self-control. He refused his dying wife penicillin, saying “Why do you not trust God?” She died. Weeks later, he took quinine for his own malaria.

So what do we do with this? Dismiss their achievements? Pretend the failures don’t matter? Give up on heroes entirely?

Three Keys for Talking About Flawed Heroes

1. Celebrate Good wherever you find it

When anyone advances justice, dignity, or liberty (even from a different tribe, even unknowingly) celebrate it. Don’t let tribal loyalty keep you from giving credit where it’s due. Secure Christians aren’t threatened when the other team’s heroes did something great. Why? Because God can use anyone to advance His kingdom, and His kingdom is bigger than our tribes.

2. Tell the truth about wrong

Don’t ignore or minimize sin. King’s infidelity, Founder’s slaveholding, Graham’s blind spots, Gandhi’s treatment of women—these were all wrong. Call out sin, even when it’s “your” hero. Romans reminds us that all have sinned. Admitting our heroes' failures doesn't threaten us because we never based our identity on their perfection.

3. Walk humbly

Know that you have blind spots too. “With the measure you use, it will be measured to you” (Matthew 7:2). Micah 6:8 calls us to “walk humbly”. These mean we must recognize our own flaws and failures even as we speak truth about others. We can judge evil while also recognizing that we are all unfortunately capable of making the same choices.

Back to the Worksheet

So what will I tell my daughter about that discussion guide?

I’ll tell her that Dr. King marched to stop the terrible things happening to Black people and to give them the ability to vote. I’ll tell her that the people doing those terrible things didn’t do them because they were white—they did them because they were human. Because all humans, Black and white, are sinful and broken and capable of great evil.

King spoke out against that evil and fought for change. He wasn’t perfect, but God used him anyway. It was really God’s idea, that every person is made in His image, that changed people’s hearts. It was many Black people (and some white people too) who suffered and marched and turned the other cheek like Christ who changed our country and the whole world.

And personally, I’ll keep my MLK Day traditions. That final speech still moves me. I can admire the founders and honor Lincoln’s emancipation while not explaining away their racism. I’ll recognize Gandhi’s nonviolence while being disgusted by how he treated his wife and niece.

My worth doesn’t rise and fall on whether these heroes were perfect: “Our citizenship is in heaven” (Philippians 3:20). That means my ultimate identity isn’t my nationality, race, or political tribe. It’s whether or not I belong to Christ.

National heroes, tribal victories, political movements—these are lesser matters attached to lesser identities. They don’t deserve my ultimate loyalty. I can be inspired by their stories without undermining my character to defend their reputations.

Only Christ and His kingdom deserve that.