Love is Marching On........ 8/25/2024

I believe that the whole point of Jesus is that his life and death is meant to become humanity’s filter and lens through which we see everything:

• The world
• Nature
• Other humans
• Whatever life hands us
• Ourselves

Jesus is the lens and the filter through which we are to see and understand all these things, everything……including God themself.

With this in mind, let’s reframe 2 things that we hear in today’s readings—-reframe these passages through the filter of Jesus.

First of all, there’s the line in the Gospel reading when Jesus says: “.....no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father.”  This line has, for too long and too often, been interpreted with exclusion in mind.  It has been heard to mean that if one is not Christian, God is off-limits to them. Or if someone doesn’t practice Christianity the way I do, God don’t want them. And, of course, we make ourselves the arbiters of whether someone is Christian enough, good enough, or just enough in general.

But let’s remember to use Jesus as the lens through which we understand this statement. Jesus who said, in John chapter 10, verse 10: I came that they may have life and have it abundantly….. Of course we must ask “who is the they?”  Again: is it just Israelites or people from that time period or what? Now, Beloved, this is Jesus. Jesus who knows, believes, and trusts his origin story. He knows whereof he came and to where he is going. Jesus knows that our story goes like this: God saw everything that God had made, and indeed, it was very good. 

God—the Creator, the Source of all being, the One whom Jesus calls “Father”: God saw and declared that all of Creation is VERY GOOD.  All of Creation. So when Jesus says “....no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father….” We must remember that the Father grants access to all Creation—that all Creation may have life and have it abundantly….All of Creation is very Good; all of Creation is the They. We are the They. All of humanity is the They that Jesus came to make sure has abundant life. We are all invited to come within Love’s embrace, Love’s refuge, Love’s safekeeping.  That’s the lens and filter through which Jesus looked and listened. Beloved, Love calls it to be our lens and filter as well.

In the 1980s and 90s there was a brouhaha revving up in the Church music world. Who would have known that church music can be cause for a brouhaha? Well, pretty much any of us in the church. Anyhooo…..Different denominations were working on new hymnals. Now, I know the Lutherans among us publish hymnals on a regular basis. The Episcopalians are a bit slower to that work. But both of our denominations, as well as the Methodists and Presbyterians and others, were all involved in the same brouhaha back in the 80s and 90s: What do we do with militaristic Christian music?
You know the ones:
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored
He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword
His truth is marching on

And then there’s this one:
Onward, Christian soldiers,
marching as to war,
With the cross of Jesus
going on before!

And of course let’s not forget that classic one written by a priest:
Stand up, Stand up for Jesus ye soldiers of the cross…..

Some of us here in this room can sing parts of these hymns by heart; I know that I can. Why are they part of a brouhaha? One remains in the ELW hymnal, 2 of them remain in the  Episcopal hymnal…..but I haven’t sung them in a church for years. What’s the issue?

Perhaps the “theme” or “subject” under which these hymns are found within some hymnals can give us a clue: Christian warfare.  Yep, that’s right where these songs take us. They are battle songs to rev us up so that we can be impassioned to go out there and defeat our enemies…..defeat God’s enemies. Right? And we CAN hear these same echoes when we read this passage from Ephesians today. It can sound to us like Paul is calling  us to “gear up” to defeat our enemies, our human enemies who prevent us from being who God wants us to be, who prevent this world from being what God designed it to be. 

So what’s wrong with that?  Well, we have seen what CAN be wrong with that in these past several years.  When we think God’s enemies, our enemies, are other people….then we feel just fine dehumanizing other humans whom God has deemed very good. We feel justified and righteous using weapons of all kinds of destruction to take the enemy out. We create borders and boundaries and stop being concerned if those on the other side of the barbed wire have enough to live, much less live abundantly.  We create Kings and oligarchs and declare that God sent them to us…….all so we can better defeat our enemies.  Oh, yes, Beloved. We have seen this all in a much too close-up view. This way of thinking, this way of weaponizing God and faith, this interpretation of Scripture lives and breathes right in our midst.

One of the reasons these songs have been taken out of hymnals and/or folx have stopped singing them is that they are vistages of the Crusades—-history of which we are now ashamed. Where the “they” were simply siblings who understood God differently, but we saw them as the enemy and in the name of God, for the sake of Love, we did our best to obliterate them.  
But, Beloved, we have our own crusades in our own times. Growing up, I witnessed (and probably unwittingly) participated in crusades against: the LGBTQ community, black people, First Nations people, people of color, Muslims, Abortion rights supporters, overweight people, people with addictions, people with mental health concerns, the unhoused and the poor.
Whomever we deem immoral
Without value
Less than…..

These songs, these militaristic songs that seem to make God on our side and those “other” people the enemy…..they can con us into thinking we are Just when we take action to put them down, eliminate them, “put them in their place.”

But, of course, Beloved Jesus….Jesus, too, wants to “put them in their place…..”  At God’s right hand. Within the embrace of Love. At home with the Trinity. For that is where they belong, where we belong, where all belong.  Because here’s the truth when you read this passage from Ephesians with the lens and filter of Jesus: our enemies are not “out there”.....in other people. Our enemies are within.

Beloved, 
The only enemies God saves us from are the enemies within us. 
The only enemies God saves us from, Love saves us from, are the enemies within us.

Predominantly fear, for fear is Love’s archenemy. But all the other demons that come from fear: Greed, self-centeredness, apathy, division, injustice, hatred, an unwillingness to forgive, self-doubt, self-hatred, disdain for others…….evil. In all its forms and shapes.

Beloved, here’s why it’s hard to completely get rid of at least one of these marching, militaristic songs…..here’s the final verse of one:

In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea
With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me
As He died to make men holy, let us die [to ourselves]  to make [humans] free
While God [who is Love] is marching on
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
While [Love] is marching on