The Holy Gospel According to Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30
“But to what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another, ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance; we wailed, and you did not mourn.’ “For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon’; the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.” At that time Jesus said, “I thank[a] you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.[b] All things have been handed over to me by my Father, and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.
“Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
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In 1831, two French diplomats were sent by their government to the United States to study the American prison system. One of them was Alexis de Tocqueville who used the trip to begin his exhaustive study of American society called Democracy in America. It was published in two volumes, the first in 1835 and the second in 1840. The books are still considered a classic work of political and social science, in large part because many of the predictions made by Alexis de Tocqueville came to bear.
He predicted that the conflict over slavery would fracture our young republic. And he predicted a future in which the United States and Russia would be competing military superpowers. Pretty bold for a Frenchman in 1831. But, what I love most are his observations about American civil society. He wrote, “Wherever, at the head of some new undertaking, you see the government in France, or a man of rank in England, in the United States you will be sure to find an association.” It’s a resonant observation two centuries later because American civil society has been profoundly shaped by groups of people joining together to pursue a common good. 250 years of history have been made by American civic groups like the League of Women voters fighting for suffrage, and Rotarians working to eradicate polio, and Lutherans organizing to support refugees.
There is a real and vital thing that Christianity and democracy have in common: in both, the most essential relationship one person can have to another is neighbor. And, in both democracy and Christianity, “neighbor” is not defined or limited by borders or creed or race. Instead, to be another’s neighbor means to be in solidarity with them and to seek a common good together. Democratic societies and Christian communities are meant to expand what it means to be one another’s neighbor, not to shrink it.
All of Christian ethics and morality revolve around one question that a lawyer asks Jesus in the 10th chapter of the Gospel of Luke: And who is my neighbor? Jesus answers with the story of the Good Samaritan, the only one of three passersby who stops to help a man left for dead by the side of the road. And answering with a parable means that Jesus gets to ask the lawyer his own question in return: Which of these three, do you think, was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?” He said, “The one who showed him mercy.” Jesus said to him, “Go and do likewise.”
As we celebrate 250 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence, we must also reflect on how we continue to seek a common good together. And in so doing, show each other mercy and compassion, two qualities that are quickly disappearing from our civic life. Today, I invite us to pray together for our country by joining our voices in song. Because something miraculous happens when we sing together, we breathe together and our hearts synchronize. The hymn “O beautiful for spacious skies” contains prayer after prayer for our country. And so we will sing it verse by verse as I expand on each of these prayers.
We’ll begin by singing verse one, then I’ll preach, then we’ll sing another, and so on. At the conclusion of the sermon, we’ll sing the hymn all the way through together. Open your hymnal to page #888. Let us begin with the first verse:
O beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain, for purple mountain majesties above the fruited plain: America! America! God shed his grace on thee, and crown thy good with brotherhood from sea to shining sea.
If there is one single prayer that I have for this country it’s in this first verse: May God shine their grace on our country, and glorify goodness in love for one another from coast to coast. God’s grace closes the distance between who we are and who God has made us to be. It’s through God’s grace working in the lives of abolitionists and activists, civil rights leaders and ordinary citizens that this country has been able to make itself anew, over and over.
In his sermon, The Drum Major Instinct, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. preached about the great democratizing power of the call to a life of service: Everybody can be great, because everybody can serve… You only need a heart full of grace, a soul generated by love, and you can be that servant. In a democracy, the future is always being made new. Made new by prophets like Dr. King whose vision for beloved community still calls us to a life of service to one another and forward into the future.
We are not yet a country where all people are judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin, but in a democracy, the promise of a better life is always in front of us. Just as the kingdom of God is always in front of us. And it is grace that propels us forward. It is Grace that has allowed this country to remake itself with every generation and grace that calls us ever forward into this endlessly joyful work.
Now we turn again to our hymnals, and sing the second verse which is a prayer that we might honor those who came before us, who have loved mercy more than life, by replacing greed with moral integrity. Let us sing together the second verse:
O beautiful for heroes proved in liberating strife, who more than self their country loved, and mercy more than life: America! America! May God thy gold refine, till all success be nobleness, and ev'ry gain divine.
The founders of our country could never have anticipated the wealth we have now. And, yet, Americans live shorter, sicker lives than citizens of other high-income countries like Germany and Canada. And so I pray again: America, may God thy gold refine, till all success be nobleness, and ev’ry gain divine.
Of all of Jesus’s teachings, one of the most challenging is that there is enough for everyone, that God’s abundance is here for everyone, if only we are good stewards of it. And we’re not good stewards of it. If we were, then 11 million American children wouldn’t be living in poverty. In our Scripture today, Jesus says, “Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” Too often, it’s the most vulnerable in our society, like children, who bear the heaviest burdens of our country’s shortcomings.
And so our task as Christians living in a democracy is to cherish our neighbor, to seek good for them, to protect them, and to share in God’s abundance with them. I’m reminded of the second verse of the hymn “They’ll Know We Are Christians by Our Love” which says that our faith is made known when we guard each other’s dignity and save each other’s pride. We are not a burden to God and our neighbors are not a burden to us. We are a gift from God to one another. All of our neighbors are - regardless of when they arrived here or how much money they make or what language they speak.
We move now to the third and final verse and prayer for America, let us join hearts and voices:
O beautiful for patriot dream that sees beyond the years thine alabaster cities gleam, undimmed by human tears: America! America! God mend thine ev'ry flaw, confirm thy soul in self-control, thy liberty in law.
And what are the flaws in us we pray for God to mend? The answer grows clearer every day: it’s our relationships in need of mending. One of the great promises of the United States is equality in citizenship - no person can be more or less American than another, we are neighbors bound together in pursuit of the common good. In the same way, no Christian can be more or less Christian than another. It is a promise that we must reclaim, a promise worth defending, a promise to pass down to another generation. Because above all else, we are each other’s neighbors called to always making and remaking our country anew together. Amen.