Pentecost 8B, 2024

8th Sunday after Pentecost, Year B

In the name of the Father, and of the +Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Brothers and sisters in Christ: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.

We don’t see the prophet Amos much in our 3-year lectionary. When he does come up, we get this vision of the plumb line. It’s clear that the wall built with a plumb line is built by God, and it’s a metaphor for Israel. God had built Israel to be straight and upright. They had been given a moral code (God’s Law) and to live by that was the path to blessing and abundant life. It would ensure God would always be on their side. And the people simply could not do it. They wanted too much to make their own idols, or to be their own gods. They wanted to make gods who would answer to them; they didn’t want to have to answer to the God Who Is higher than them, even though it was Him who had made them, and it was Him who had delivered them from slavery. They didn’t want to answer to anyone but themselves.

This same problem recurs often in the Old Testament. We see it frequently - as a reminder that this was not simply one set of people in a certain part of Jewish history. This happens over and over again, across generations. Many wicked kings, many faithless priests, and many, many gullible people who followed them. It’s a sad commentary on how easily human beings will turn their backs on the Living God, and how quickly we forget how much the True God has blessed us.

When this happens in the Old Testament, each time God sends His prophet. God’s prophets do not come bearing happy messages. They come to warn the people to turn back to God and remember what He has done for them. When they don’t listen to the warnings, they feel God’s wrath, often in the form of war - a war which the Israelites lose, because God doesn’t protect them in that particular moment.

We would be wise to learn from those incidents. God does not bless disobedient children. Anyone who is a parent understands this. It is unwise to reinforce disobedient behavior. Such behavior demands punishment… correction. God wants His children to be righteous, to live as He created us to live…to be straight and upright and aligned with His plumb line.

Personally, I believe that God was deeply involved in the founding of our country. I believe that the principles our nation’s founders built our government upon were inspired by the Word of God and put on paper by Christian men of faith. And yes, I believe that our country was blessed by God as it began. It’s not coincidence that many of our early settlers were Christians coming to the New World. I’m not saying that our country was a new Israel or a new promised land. I’m simply saying that we were a nation that God had blessed, and He did bless the United States for many years. And we embraced that, and proudly called ourselves a Christian nation… or at least a nation founded on Christian principles.

For me to say this publicly today, I would (and maybe will) be faced with great opposition. Atheists and others who shout loudly how much we’re not a Christian nation… citing supposed evidence of many of our historic figures who they claim were actually not religious men. These arguments happen on social media constantly. But to be blunt, I’m not nearly as concerned about the past as I am the present. Are we a Christian nation today?

Look around at our society. We have stopped prosecuting theft and larceny to the point where people will just go into stores, load up a shopping cart or bags full of merchandise and just walk out. Employees are told not to interfere or lose their jobs. Violent criminals are also not charged when they mug, assault, destroy property. Courts let them free with minimal or no jail time.

On the other hand, just in the last few weeks, a Christian man was sentenced to 10 years in prison for praying in an abortion clinic. You see, he was guilty of interfering with access to abortion services. By praying. Quietly and peacefully. Another case: a woman was recently sued by her local government because she was asking questions - too many questions - about the curriculum in her children's schools. Asking questions about the homosexual and sexually explicit materials being presented to young children. Asking questions… and they sued her. Or how about the father in Virginia whose teen-aged daughter was assaulted by a boy who “identified” as a girl. Same boy had assaulted another girl in another school, and his only punishment was to move him to a different school. The FATHER was apprehended by law enforcement, because he protested this at a school board meeting. The whole meeting was stopped, and the public were kicked out of the meeting. Those who embraced traditional values were labeled as hateful bigots.

I don’t suggest that our country should be run as a theocracy, where government is controlled by religious figures. But why, when a Christian is running for higher office, are Christian principles treated as toxic and dangerous? When congress was interviewing Amy Coney Barrett as a candidate for the Supreme Court, Senator Diane Feinstein, clearly opposed to her being approved, told her that her Roman Catholic “dogma lives loudly in you”, suggesting that her faith would taint her ability to be a fair supreme court justice. Since when did the Golden Rule and the 10 Commandments become principles that non-Christians should hate? Loving neighbor as you love yourself is a bad thing? Our society drifts farther and farther from God as the months and years pass…or so it seems. The number of Christians among our population is not growing. It is shrinking. Are we a Christian nation?

Last night, former President Donald Trump held a rally in Butler, PA… not far from where I grew up. During that rally, someone shot at him. The Secret Service guarding him immediately covered him and whisked him away to safety. As this was happening, they shot and killed the shooter. There may be other injuries, but that’s all the detail I have so far. I’m also told that Mr. Trump fought with security so that he could pump his fist in the air to let the crowd know that he was ok. It sounds like the bullet only grazed his ear.

I’m not worried about Mr. Trump. He’s going to be fine. If anything, this will probably give him more to talk about on the campaign trail. I am, however, concerned about our country and the impact this event is going to have.

I am not here to take sides in this election. I encourage all of you to do your civic duty and vote. I’m not going to tell you who to vote for. But I think all of us need to vote this year. It is our duty.

But the last 5, maybe even 10 years have been more divisive than I ever imagined our country could be. People being assaulted for a bumper sticker or a red baseball hat. Kids getting kicked out of school for wearing a T-shirt with what used to be considered a mild political statement. There’s a story about a guy who was a motorcycle enthusiast, and his brand of bike was Triumph. He wore a T-shirt of that brand and got yelled at for it, because it looked like the name “Trump”. We have become downright tribal and hateful toward each other.

There are many in our country who believe that Donald Trump is an evil human being who will act like a dictator if he gets back in office, that he will destroy the US Constitution, and end our “democracy”, and they are passionate about preventing him from having another term. There are others in our country who believe that the 2020 election had a lot of very questionable facets to it, and those questions didn’t get answered…causing them to question the results of that election and the fairness of the process. They see President Biden as taking on some dictator-like behaviors and that he’s been eroding the rights of conservatives and those who disagree with his administration. They don’t like how his COVID policies targeted churches and small businesses but favored big businesses. They don’t like how citizens weren’t allowed to question the COVID policies and masks and school closures and the damage it did to our kids. There are definitely two distinct sides in this year’s election season, and there’s really not much in the middle. Both sides are angry. Angry at the other side, angry at the other candidate. More than once I’ve heard things like “national divorce” and even “2nd civil war”.

This attempt on Donald Trump’s life has me concerned. All this anger that has been boiling between the political left and the political right over the last few years is just waiting for something to set it off. I’m concerned that this could do it. And I don’t want that to happen. I don’t want to see our own people taking up arms against their fellow citizens and neighbors. I don’t want any more riots in the streets or police officers being killed. I don’t want our nation to be more divided than we already are.

So what are we to do about it? First and foremost: pray. We need to pray that God would look upon us - our whole country - as His Children - children who need forgiveness… and as children who need His plumb line - His Word and His Truth. We need to pray for our leaders - both the sitting president and the former president. They need our prayers as much as anyone else. Those of you who don’t pray daily, please start. Those of you who do - please keep it up.

We can also be a peaceful presence to those around us. All of us need to carry God’s Word of peace to our circles - our friends and family, our co-workers, and our Facebook pages. There are enough people in our country who are addicted to outrage - we don’t need be counted among them. Our society has become convinced that anger is an emotion of strength, and so the angrier we are, the stronger we are. This is not God’s truth; this is the world’s lie. It takes far more strength to be calm in the face of anger than it does to try and out-anger the angry person in front of you. Seek God’s strength and be the voice of calm and reason.

Most of us, I think, probably remember when Ronald Reagan was shot. I was a little too young to appreciate the weight of that moment. Thankfully, Mr. Reagan survived that one. Quite a few of you remember when John F. Kennedy was shot. I’m told the whole country stopped when they announced his death. This was before I was born, so I don’t have personal experience with it. I’ll have to lean on your memories of that day. I encourage you to share that memory with the younger generations. Explain what it means to our nation and our society when our president is killed by an angry citizen with an agenda.

As Christians, we have a calling in how we respond to this kind of an act. We would do well to take a lesson from the West Nickel Mines Amish community when 10 girls were tied up and shot, or the members of Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, SC who lost 9 members of their church to a shooter driven by hate and wanting to start a race war. In both of these horrible situations, these faithful Christians did what God called them to do - they publicly forgave the killer. In that one act, each of these Christian communities showed what Christians can do in the face of conflict. They can follow God’s Will and defy the world’s expectation.

It would have been very easy in both cases to lash out in anger at the perpetrators… especially in Charleston. That shooter could have EASILY gotten his way and started a race war. It wouldn’t have taken much. But the faith of these people showed the whole world that God is bigger than hate. God is love, and his children live by that, not by hate.

Brothers and sisters - let’s all be in prayer for our country in the days ahead. Pray for our neighbors, our community, our state, and our nation. Pray for our leaders at all levels. Pray for both Donald Trump and Joe Biden - that they would listen to God’s Will for them and not be instruments of hate and division, but instead of peace and reconciliation. Encourage your fellow Christians to do the same.

When you encounter the hate, the outrage, the anger that is sure to come from this incident, listen for the Holy Spirit to guide your input to the discussion. Don’t stoke the fires of controversy and conflict. Let God’s voice speak through you. Inject peace and calm if you can. This is how we can best respond to this… and it’s a good posture to take for the next 4 months leading up to the election. If we’re ever going to be a nation to receive God’s blessings again, this is how we’ll get there. And maybe we’ll even be straight enough to match up to God’s plumb line.

In the name of the Father, and of the +Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.