“Sing a song full of the faith that the dark past has taught us
Sing a song full of the hope that the present has brought us
Facing the rising sun of our new day begun
Let us march on till victory is won”
One of my absolute favorite hymns is “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” It is a patriotic hymn that doesn’t gloss over the past but doesn’t constrain us to it. It is a song of hope, but doesn’t see hope as a denial of all sin and tragedy, but as the possibilities that happen when we are willing to build, re-build, and continuing visioning in the midst of an imperfect, sometimes even devastatingly unjust reality.
It also declares as primary our identity as Christians, which then colors our citizenship to our country, rather than wrapping our patriotism as our primary identity. We are first Christians, which is how we identity what is and isn’t just in our communities and country, and our Christianity drives us on to “Till earth and heaven ring, Ring with the harmonies of Liberty, Let our rejoicing rise, High as the listening skies, Let it resound loud as the rolling sea.”
This is not a Christian nation. It is a nation founded under humanist principals of justice, freedom, and dignity. It is not a nation that has yet succeeded in fully living into those principles and we work to continue to edit.
However, I am a Christian, and a member and citizen of this nation. The ideals of this nation are not good enough for Christ, but that isn’t on the law, that is on me. The ideal of the law honors the dignity of people, but the ideal of Christ honors that all people are beloved children of God. As a Christian, we fight to make the laws just, but also hold ourselves to a higher assumption of justice - with empathy, patience, forgiveness, and grace, that can never be enshrined in law.
Over the last week, the Supreme Court has made choices that have divided us more and has fueled many a Facebook post on my wall with versions of “If you agree/don’t agree you can just unfriend me.” However that may feel like a release in the midst of a nation editing and discerning around their implementation (or lack of implementation) of their principles, it isn’t the work of a Christian seeking to see Christ in all persons and love their neighbors as themselves. It isn’t the work of a Christian hoping to see past the law to the work they have been given to do, which does require listening to people with whom we disagree, establishing common ground, and creatively exploring what Christ’s justice, empathy, grace, and love looks like in the works of our hands, feet, mouths and thoughts. It isn’t the work of a Christian reflecting on our where, when and what we have, to build up a world that embodies God’s intentions.
This 4th of July, find the hope in the work we have left to do as a country, but also in your primary identity as a Christian rather than American. Don’t despair in what is wrong, divisive, unjust, or hypocritical, both in our history and present, but instead look toward the “rising sun, of our new day begun, let us march on” serving Christ in this place and time which God has called us.
