Patriotic Stewardship: Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30 - Sixth Sunday after Pentecost / US Semiquincentennial

My grandfathers were in their early twenties when they were sent to the South Pacific to fight World War 2.

My uncle was nineteen when he enlisted in the United States Air Force and went to Vietnam. 

Reflecting: Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall by grahamvphoto on flickr. 

CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 

So many of our nation’s wars were like that: kids, not even old enough to drink, leaving home and putting their lives on the line, with so many not returning. 

Here we are, occupying such a unique position in human history, gathered for worship on Sunday morning in a church of our own choosing, without fear of persecution or violence. 

Sisters and brothers in other parts of the world risk death going to church, but they go anyway. 

I own more bibles than I can count. In many parts of the world, possessing just one can land you in prison. But the read them anyway and risk their lives to smuggle them so that others can know Jesus Christ.

For all the talk about America being a Christian nation, church attendance is declining rapidly. In other parts of the world, where Christianity is either illegal or persecuted, the Church is growing.  For all the talk about America being founded on Christian values, do you see as much charity, peace-making, and love for neighbor as you see greed, hostility, and hate?

As our nation celebrates its Semiquincentennial, my hope today is that we as Christians will consider what it means to live as Christians in 21^st century America, and I want to frame this question as a question of stewardship: a patriotic stewardship. 

The basis of Christian stewardship is that everything we have belongs to God. God entrusts these gifts to our care so that we may participate in God’s creative and redeeming mission. 

Among God’s gifts is this nation we call home. All nations belong to God, yet God has blessed us to live in this one. 

America was founded on the belief that we can do better than what other nations, civilizations, and rulers have done throughout history (and still do). 

Our nation was founded on the principle that “all [people] are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

The words “In God We Trust” are inscribed on our money, a reminder that the pursuit of godliness must never be subordinated to the pursuit of private wealth and personal gain.

America is a land of abundance. We have clean water, fertile soil, rich forests, plentiful natural resources, fairly good weather. Our oceans protect us from enemies who would wage war on us.

Patriotic stewardship means recognizing that the freedoms of this nation and the abundance of the land have been entrusted to us so that we may enact God’s righteousness. This is more than just private virtue; it’s public virtue, too. Righteousness is lived out in relationship with others. Righteousness is what leads to peace and justice—not fighting culture wars or vanquishing political foes.

It’s no accident that the cause of civil rights originated in the Church. We are called to be Moses, confronting all the Pharoahs who amass power and wealth through oppression and exploitation. Patriotic stewardship also means standing up for those who have no voice, and holding accountable the powers and principalities that exploit our neighbors and God’s creation. In a culture that’s made a pastime of bullying and humiliating others for amusement, we affirm the image of God in all people. The Church is where the least, the lowest, and the lost find rest from their poverty, persecution, and pain.

Patriotic stewardship means exercising the freedoms and privileges we enjoy to do build up the poor, the orphan, and the widow. People of faith and faith-based institutions do the bulk of volunteer work in this country—because people of faith are far more effective than any government bureaucracy or for-profit enterprise. Every workplace is a mission field, and we affirm that every vocation serves the common good.

Patriotic stewardship means exercising the freedoms and privileges we enjoy to live lives that put Jesus first, to reject the idolatry of wealth and the idolatry of self. We reject the moral filth propagated to us by the media industry that turns people into objects. As the Apostle Paul writes in Galatians, sinners must be warned against using freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence. Patriotic stewardship means caring for the land that has been entrusted to us; curbing our overconsumption and waste, recognizing God’s awesomeness in the amber waves of grain, purple mountain’s majesties, and fruited plains. 

Finally, patriotic stewardship recognizes that we belong to a kingdom that is not of this world, because it is bigger than this world, and most certainly bigger than America. All the nations of the world need God’s blessing, not just our own. All the nations of the world need God’s healing, not just our own. What we need isn’t more power, more wealth, more domination. What we need is the Kingdom of God and its righteousness. There are no easy answers or quick fixes for the crises we face as a nation, or as members of the global community. But God will lead us in righteousness, if it’s righteousness that we seek. We thank God for our nation where we are free to both seek and serve the Kingdom of God, and to bear witness to the coming of a new Kingdom, with Christ making all things new.

Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30 (NRSVue)

¹⁶ “But to what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another,

¹⁷ ‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
    we wailed, and you did not mourn.’

¹⁸ “For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon’; ¹⁹ 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.”

²⁵ At that time Jesus said, “I thank 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; ²⁶ yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. ²⁷ 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.

²⁸ “Come to me, all you who are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. ²⁹ 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. ³⁰ For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”