Dr. Martin Luther King's legacy was celebrated at the 48th Annual Dr. Martin Luther King Commemorative Service at the Beulah Baptist Church in Poughkeepsie on Sunday evening.

Rev. Dr. Jesse Bottoms Jr. has celebrated the legacy of Dr. King for the past forty years at the Beulah Baptist Church. The soft-spoken pastor of the church gathered with a large number of parishioners and elected officials from various levels of government to welcome the event's guest speaker, Pastor Ezra Tillman Jr., to Poughkeepsie.

Tillman is the pastor of the First Trinity Missionary Baptist Church in Flint, Michigan, where he has worked tirelessly to solve the Flint Water Crisis. Pastor Tillman has been at the forefront of the movement to solve the problem. His church helped to arrange the donation and distribution of a half-million bottles of water to Flint residents while also arranging weekly deliveries of water, hand sanitizer, Clorox wipes, and baby wipes to a variety of community groups that are affected by the crisis.

At the well-attended service, the guest speaker delivered the message that the work of Dr. King must continue. He indicated that things have certainly improved since 1968 but there is still a large percentile of people that are trying to keep the "old spirit" alive therefore the church needs to uplift those people so that all can achieve the American dream.

President-elect Trump was also mentioned regarding his war of words with the longtime ally of Dr. King, Congressman Lewis from Georgia. Pastor Bottoms considers Lewis to be one of the last living legends who was in the heat of the battle with MLK and deserves respect for all of his work. Pastor Tillman considers Trump's remarks towards Lewis as consistent behavior that shows his inability to show restraint which will not bring about the unity that this country needs.

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