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“Resistance and the Breakthrough of God”
Romans 12:9-13:10
A sermon preached by the Rev. Douglas M. Donley
Today is Labor Day and as such it is a day that we don’t only celebrating working people but also workers who join together. This week, when I think of labor agreements, I can’t help but think of the recently averted baseball strike. That kind of organized labor makes this tried and true baseball fan even consider boycotting the stadium. I hope that this cynical bunch of overpaid players and owners don’t let us lose the focus of the need for organized labor. Most of labor organizing has to do with poor working people trying to maintain their rights. I think about the state workers who went on strike just a year ago to guarantee health benefits to all employees.
Labor has gotten a bad rap of
late. Paula Moyer reminded me in an
e-mail the other day that the rest of the world commemorates May 1 as Labor
Day, in honor of the Haymarket Martyrs who had organized a demonstration (in
The Haymarket Martyrs are buried in
Interesting side note, but
what does this have to do with God, you may ask? All good organizing points toward the golden
rule, summed up by Paul in today’s scripture, “love your neighbor as yourself.” If we love our neighbors as ourselves, then
everyone is respected. People get paid a
decent wage. There is love and community
in abundance. This is where God shines
through, in this kind of beloved community.
God breaks through the confines of our hard hearts and shows us how to
live as one human family.
But what about the many times it does not happen? We know there are times like this.
There are times when business colludes with government to make a bigger buck on the backs of innocent people.
There are times when alternative energy sources are shunned in favor of fossil fuels, which continue to escalate and confuse allegiances between oil dependant and oil producing countries—to the point where many of the key players demonize and terrorize each other, with seemingly no end in sight.
There are times throughout history that we can see governing authorities behaving in ways that are contrary to the golden rule.
When this happens, then it is up to the Christian, in honor of the golden rule, to make people and even powers and principalities live up to that ideal. That means resistance.
But here comes old Paul in one of his classic contradictions. He says we should love one another and then says that we should be subject to governing authorities who are ordained by God. “They are God’s servants for good,” says Paul. But it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to discover that not all governing authorities have done good.
Governing authority used to hold that women were not
full human beings and that people of African descent could not vote, own land
or live free.
Governing authorities broke treaty after treaty with
Native peoples.
Governing authorities ordered the killing of well over 6
million Jews, gypsies, prostitutes and homosexuals.
Governing authorities fight wars using terrorist
tactics.
Does God want us to blindly follow the dictates of a person just because she or he is a governing authority?
Is not our Christian role to resist evil, even when it
wears the cloak of government?
How do we reconcile this scripture, this
contradiction?
It’s really quite simple. Ultimate authority lies with God. God’s ethics are love, justice and
mercy. If governing authorities are not
exercising those ideals then they are not of God. This is where resistance comes in.
African American Theologian James Cone said that rights are never freely granted by the oppressors, they need to be demanded by the oppressed.
Frederick Douglass said it in a different way, “Power concedes nothing without demand. It never did and it never will.”
Then there’s activist Saul Alinsky who said, “I would rather collide than collude.”
In Star Trek, the Borg species represent the mechanized ultimate power. It is a race with no soul and it cares not about the one is assimilates. The refrain you hear from the Borg is, “resistance is futile, you will be assimilated.” In other words, it’s no use fighting back. Powers and principalities love to use this thought process. They even bring God into the picture. They quote Romans chapter 13 and say that we must be subject to governing authorities. They quote the Bible to say that opposing government is the same thing as opposing God. But luckily, this is not the last word.
The heroes and sheroes
of the good ships
I have to admit, sometimes it feels like I am a lowly human fighting against a super-powerful machine. I feel like my little resistance might be akin to spitting in the ocean. But that is exactly what God wants us to do. For if we continue to resist evil and hold fast to what is good;
If we continue to love our neighbors as ourselves;
If we continue, as Jesus said, to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us;
If we continue to no longer be drunk by the wine of the beast and render to Caesar what is Caesar’s, like trinkets of money but render unto God what is God like allegiance and respect,
then we will see God break through.
Because God is the God of justice.
God is the God of love.
God is the one who stands by us even when powers and principalities oppose us.
God is the one who sees the long arc of history bending toward justice.
God is the one who is longing to break through our hard hearts and show us a new way to live and move and find our very beings.
When people come together to work together, God breaks through.
When people resist the powers and principalities, then God breaks through.
When people gather to work for justice, then God breaks through.
What we are to do as the church, as people of faith, is to make sure that there is space for the breakthrough of God.
Baptists are by definition resisters at least
historically. We trace our heritage to
separatists who demanded that conscience was more important than conformity. It was Baptists that demanded that free
exercise of religion needed to be first and foremost in the bill of
rights. This also meant that no
governing authority could dictate what you believe or how you practice your
religion.
We are here to resist any power that would limit the
breakthrough of God. Even in a climate
of war, it is important to remind governing authorities of their godly vocation
to ensure justice, mercy and love.
But those larger institutional battles are harder to
grasp if you haven’t first done it on your own.
This takes some listening to God and some self-knowledge.
Our six-year-old Amanda is a very social person, as many
of you know. She so much wants to fit in. There is a club at her school that she
desperately wants to join because it has people in it she admires. But there’s a catch. In order to be in this club, you need to be
nasty to anyone not allowed in the club.
A number of time Amanda has had her little
heart broken because of some way she has been shunned by the club. It’s hard to convince a six-year-old that she
doesn’t need to be in such a nasty club, but the temptation is there. Those inside have popularity. They have status,
they have a special handshake and special rules. They tell you who to like and who not to
like. It’s like a gang for
six-year-olds. It’s the kindergarten
axis of evil. We try to remind her to
love everyone and try to be friends with everyone. But you see, the
temptation to make enemies starts young and it takes a lifetime of unlearning
it. That’s the extent of the walls we
build up to keep God out.
So sisters and brothers, as you enter this year I would
encourage you to think about those authorities that hem you in behind and
before. Are there places where you are
encouraged to disregard the golden rule to love your neighbor as yourself?
I would encourage you to resist the temptation to fit in
when fitting in denies the integrity of your self.
Resist the temptation to go along with the crowd just
because the crowd seems cool.
Resist the temptation to conform to what someone else
thinks.
Instead, know yourself and be true to yourself.
Commit yourself to love, mercy and justice. For when we do, we make room for the
breakthrough of God.
When that happens, God breaks through the walls, the
molds, and the barriers that we set up.
When we know that God is love, justice and mercy and we
resist anything that says otherwise, then God breaks through and the kindom of God is at hand.
That is what we seek in this church. That is why we gather at this table. That is why we come together on a Sunday
morning, so we can get a glimpse of how the world ought to be before we get
those assimilating messages every time we turn on the radio, or the TV.
So I give thanks today for all of those resisters who
continue to remind us of our highest ideals.
In them and in you, I see the breakthrough of God.