Star-spangled Justice
Sermon
Sermons on the First Readings
Series II, Cycle C
Object:
In just a few more weeks we will be winding down the official summer season. The children start back to school and we all have one final summer fling during the Labor Day holiday weekend. Patriotic holidays like Flag Day, Independence Day, and Labor Day are best celebrated in the hot summer sun or watching "the rocket's red glare" under the stars.
Summer holidays have a tradition all their own: hot dogs and charcoal-grilled burgers, potato salad, baseball games, and fireworks. These times are fun for everybody -- well, most everybody. If you happen to work in the emergency room or the recreational industry -- a state park or a marina -- holiday memories might include drunken boaters, burn injuries, or four-wheeler accident victims.
Things like parades and speeches and flying the flag are traditions, which perhaps get a bit closer to the spirit of the season -- the more solemn side of the occasion. In much of the country national holy days like Labor Day and the Fourth of July have come back in vogue in recent years -- a stirring of our patriotic spirit. Such celebrations have long been recognized as essential to good citizenship. By singling out particular moments in history like the signing of the Declaration of Independence, or celebrating the establishment of labor unions and collective bargaining, our culture expresses the values upheld by the collective community, and we reflect on the struggle of those who have sacrificed to establish and uphold those community values. In doing so, we hope to shape the attitudes and values of future citizens.
In the United States, the common patriotic values we hope to pass along are focused upon freedom, both political (as with Flag Day and July Fourth) and economic (Labor Day). "Liberty and justice for all" is the theme that binds together the various people and ideologies into a common national myth expressing the best of what we hope to be as a nation. During our national holidays we remember and reflect upon the stories of those before us who have struggled to achieve our national ideals: the Minutemen of Lexington and Concord, the Continental soldiers of Valley Forge, the bloody battles fought to free slaves and maintain unity of the states, as well as those who have marched in picket lines and protest movements to gain fair wages and safe working conditions.
And more than merely remembering, we seek to honor those who still struggle and sacrifice to ensure liberty and justice for all even today -- by speaking for it in the public arena on behalf of those who have still been denied, and by fighting for it against those who would yet deny it to others. It is the American way, or at least it is the hope to which we strive.
But before it was ever the American way, it was biblical mandate. Those in our nation who would speak of liberty and justice while seeking to remove God from the public forum had best remember our history and the biblical foundations upon which it was laid.
While we need to be honest in telling our national story and to confess the harm we have often done in the name of God and country (that is another sermon entirely!), we must also give fair recognition to the good and noble things America has inherited from the faith traditions of our founding ancestors. The Liberty Bell in Philadelphia's Independence Hall bears the inscription: "To Proclaim Liberty Throughout the Land," but many civil libertarians who would separate church from state forget those words are straight from the Hebrew Scriptures. Before Congress ever passed a Labor Act or Thomas Jefferson ever penned the Bill of Rights, there was the prophet Isaiah. "Cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow."
Isaiah knew the intricacies of politics. He knew monarchies first hand: Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah -- he knew them all. He paid close attention as they struggled as a pawn amidst the larger military campaigns of their powerful neighbors. First it was Egypt and Assyria who wooed and courted and then threatened and coerced; later Babylon and Persia would join the fray. He watched as these kings depleted their national economy in order to pay tribute to these superpowers that promised military security, a security purchased on the backs of the poor. In the political maneuvering and gamesmanship, Israel's statesmen had forgotten their own national history -- and Yahweh's place in it. "Leave religion to the festivals and the high places," was the politically correct policy. Honor Baal, and Ashterah, and any other idol that promises success and fertility. Appease potential allies and their gods at any cost. "Religion and politics don't mix" we hear them cry in our own language. "Do what works for you."
But Isaiah did remember God, and he spoke out. Religious talk without the walk is useless, he insisted. Worse than useless, it is an abomination and an insult to God, who forged this people out of the suffering of slavery and delivered them from bondage to the very nation they were seeking to court as their protector. This God had created them from nothingness just as God had created the sun and the stars, the earth and the sea. To court this God with offerings while flirting with Baal and others for a better deal amounts to adultery. To offer sacrifices in God's temple and then ignore the demands of the covenant is hypocrisy, and an insult that will prove disastrous, Isaiah declared.
National security depends on national righteousness and not our military spending or diplomatic maneuvering. National righteousness means being who we say we are, practicing what we say we value, and putting our national budgets where our mottos are.
Our national anthem extols "the land of the free and the home of the brave"; yet our initial public response to the terrorist attacks of September 11 has been to curtail personal liberty and due process of law in the interest of safety. Such a response is practical, but hardly brave. We have paid for added security in our public places by diminishing our spending on public welfare. We condemn other nations' arsenals of weapons of mass destruction while investing in our own: a practical national policy perhaps, but hardly a brave or honest one.
In New York harbor, the Statue of Liberty stands as an icon of what America aspires to be. Inscribed in her foundation are words by Emma Lazarus that stir our patriotic spirits:
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, temptest-tost to me;
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.
But our immigration laws bespeak quite another message: "Only the employed and educated from certain regions of the globe that are favorable to our way of life need apply." Practical national security perhaps, but not too brave.
Anyone listening to Isaiah's words to his nation can't help but hear a message to ours: National security depends upon national righteousness. The best defense against those who would destroy our freedom or prosperity is to live out our democratic ideals without abandon and to practice generosity without fear of want. Or, in Isaiah's words, "Seek justice, rescue the oppressed."
What we also need to hear from Isaiah is that this call to national righteousness is not one option to be considered amongst several others, any more than Yahweh was just one god to be worshiped along with Baal or Ashterah, or the deities of Egypt or Babylon. This is not a matter of "whatever works for you." In the end, righteousness is the only viable option, just as God is the only living God.
Isaiah knew, just as we know, that to abandon this truth in favor of what is convenient, or comfortable, or politically correct is to invite judgment and even destruction. National hypocrisy, like personal hypocrisy, is an abomination. We must be who we say we are, practice what we say we value, and put our money where our mottos are, or we will cease to be. "If you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured by the sword," God said to Judah and says to us.
Fancy worship that dazzles and entertains won't cut it. Neither will strict dispassionate adherence to doctrine and regulations. Worship without service is as useless as service without worship. What is required is radical trust in God's faithfulness (Love God) that finds its way into radical obedience to God's command, "Love your neighbor."
"Come now, let's reason together," says the Lord. ("Let's argue it out" is the NRSV translation.) "If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land." God desires to bless us, just as God desired to bless Isaiah and his people, and, through us all, to bless the world. But, before that can happen, we must bless God. We must bless God through our words and prayers and hymns of praise; and we must bless God in the words we speak to one another, and in the deeds of justice and peace that we perform in God's world.
Summer holidays have a tradition all their own: hot dogs and charcoal-grilled burgers, potato salad, baseball games, and fireworks. These times are fun for everybody -- well, most everybody. If you happen to work in the emergency room or the recreational industry -- a state park or a marina -- holiday memories might include drunken boaters, burn injuries, or four-wheeler accident victims.
Things like parades and speeches and flying the flag are traditions, which perhaps get a bit closer to the spirit of the season -- the more solemn side of the occasion. In much of the country national holy days like Labor Day and the Fourth of July have come back in vogue in recent years -- a stirring of our patriotic spirit. Such celebrations have long been recognized as essential to good citizenship. By singling out particular moments in history like the signing of the Declaration of Independence, or celebrating the establishment of labor unions and collective bargaining, our culture expresses the values upheld by the collective community, and we reflect on the struggle of those who have sacrificed to establish and uphold those community values. In doing so, we hope to shape the attitudes and values of future citizens.
In the United States, the common patriotic values we hope to pass along are focused upon freedom, both political (as with Flag Day and July Fourth) and economic (Labor Day). "Liberty and justice for all" is the theme that binds together the various people and ideologies into a common national myth expressing the best of what we hope to be as a nation. During our national holidays we remember and reflect upon the stories of those before us who have struggled to achieve our national ideals: the Minutemen of Lexington and Concord, the Continental soldiers of Valley Forge, the bloody battles fought to free slaves and maintain unity of the states, as well as those who have marched in picket lines and protest movements to gain fair wages and safe working conditions.
And more than merely remembering, we seek to honor those who still struggle and sacrifice to ensure liberty and justice for all even today -- by speaking for it in the public arena on behalf of those who have still been denied, and by fighting for it against those who would yet deny it to others. It is the American way, or at least it is the hope to which we strive.
But before it was ever the American way, it was biblical mandate. Those in our nation who would speak of liberty and justice while seeking to remove God from the public forum had best remember our history and the biblical foundations upon which it was laid.
While we need to be honest in telling our national story and to confess the harm we have often done in the name of God and country (that is another sermon entirely!), we must also give fair recognition to the good and noble things America has inherited from the faith traditions of our founding ancestors. The Liberty Bell in Philadelphia's Independence Hall bears the inscription: "To Proclaim Liberty Throughout the Land," but many civil libertarians who would separate church from state forget those words are straight from the Hebrew Scriptures. Before Congress ever passed a Labor Act or Thomas Jefferson ever penned the Bill of Rights, there was the prophet Isaiah. "Cease to do evil, learn to do good; seek justice, rescue the oppressed, defend the orphan, plead for the widow."
Isaiah knew the intricacies of politics. He knew monarchies first hand: Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, and Hezekiah -- he knew them all. He paid close attention as they struggled as a pawn amidst the larger military campaigns of their powerful neighbors. First it was Egypt and Assyria who wooed and courted and then threatened and coerced; later Babylon and Persia would join the fray. He watched as these kings depleted their national economy in order to pay tribute to these superpowers that promised military security, a security purchased on the backs of the poor. In the political maneuvering and gamesmanship, Israel's statesmen had forgotten their own national history -- and Yahweh's place in it. "Leave religion to the festivals and the high places," was the politically correct policy. Honor Baal, and Ashterah, and any other idol that promises success and fertility. Appease potential allies and their gods at any cost. "Religion and politics don't mix" we hear them cry in our own language. "Do what works for you."
But Isaiah did remember God, and he spoke out. Religious talk without the walk is useless, he insisted. Worse than useless, it is an abomination and an insult to God, who forged this people out of the suffering of slavery and delivered them from bondage to the very nation they were seeking to court as their protector. This God had created them from nothingness just as God had created the sun and the stars, the earth and the sea. To court this God with offerings while flirting with Baal and others for a better deal amounts to adultery. To offer sacrifices in God's temple and then ignore the demands of the covenant is hypocrisy, and an insult that will prove disastrous, Isaiah declared.
National security depends on national righteousness and not our military spending or diplomatic maneuvering. National righteousness means being who we say we are, practicing what we say we value, and putting our national budgets where our mottos are.
Our national anthem extols "the land of the free and the home of the brave"; yet our initial public response to the terrorist attacks of September 11 has been to curtail personal liberty and due process of law in the interest of safety. Such a response is practical, but hardly brave. We have paid for added security in our public places by diminishing our spending on public welfare. We condemn other nations' arsenals of weapons of mass destruction while investing in our own: a practical national policy perhaps, but hardly a brave or honest one.
In New York harbor, the Statue of Liberty stands as an icon of what America aspires to be. Inscribed in her foundation are words by Emma Lazarus that stir our patriotic spirits:
Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, temptest-tost to me;
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.
But our immigration laws bespeak quite another message: "Only the employed and educated from certain regions of the globe that are favorable to our way of life need apply." Practical national security perhaps, but not too brave.
Anyone listening to Isaiah's words to his nation can't help but hear a message to ours: National security depends upon national righteousness. The best defense against those who would destroy our freedom or prosperity is to live out our democratic ideals without abandon and to practice generosity without fear of want. Or, in Isaiah's words, "Seek justice, rescue the oppressed."
What we also need to hear from Isaiah is that this call to national righteousness is not one option to be considered amongst several others, any more than Yahweh was just one god to be worshiped along with Baal or Ashterah, or the deities of Egypt or Babylon. This is not a matter of "whatever works for you." In the end, righteousness is the only viable option, just as God is the only living God.
Isaiah knew, just as we know, that to abandon this truth in favor of what is convenient, or comfortable, or politically correct is to invite judgment and even destruction. National hypocrisy, like personal hypocrisy, is an abomination. We must be who we say we are, practice what we say we value, and put our money where our mottos are, or we will cease to be. "If you refuse and rebel, you shall be devoured by the sword," God said to Judah and says to us.
Fancy worship that dazzles and entertains won't cut it. Neither will strict dispassionate adherence to doctrine and regulations. Worship without service is as useless as service without worship. What is required is radical trust in God's faithfulness (Love God) that finds its way into radical obedience to God's command, "Love your neighbor."
"Come now, let's reason together," says the Lord. ("Let's argue it out" is the NRSV translation.) "If you are willing and obedient, you shall eat the good of the land." God desires to bless us, just as God desired to bless Isaiah and his people, and, through us all, to bless the world. But, before that can happen, we must bless God. We must bless God through our words and prayers and hymns of praise; and we must bless God in the words we speak to one another, and in the deeds of justice and peace that we perform in God's world.
