Being Faithful In A Democracy

Being Faithful In A Democracy—Message for 3 November 2024

Rev. Dr. Elane O’Rourke

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength.

Deuteronomy 6 is central to Jewish faith, which means it was central to Jesus’ faith. So whether you are Jewish, or Christian, or think Jesus might be a wise fellow, loving the Lord with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might, and teaching that to your children, and reminding yourself and them, writing it on your doorpost, hanging it on the walls of your kitchen—whatever it is you need to do—loving God first is everything.

By the time that Jesus, the son of God, came onto the scene, the Jewish scholars and rabbis and wise folks had come to realize, through the power of God’s Spirit, that the first four of the 10 commandments are about loving God, while the latter 6 are about loving your neighbor.

 That’s where Jesus got  “love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and your neighbor as yourself.” It was part of the teaching he had received on his mother’s knee, and in the synagogue.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and your neighbor as yourself.

All the law of God and of faith comes down to those two. Period.

So what does that mean? What is love?

Love is wanting what is good for others and being willing to act on it, even if you think you know better than they do. Even if you will lose pride, or be embarrassed, or be wrong. Even if it costs you.

Love is wanting what is good for others and being willing to act on it

Loving always costs us.

Loving cost Jesus his life. Who are we to think that doing what is good should be easy?

Loving God means that nothing, no one, is more important than God. God is the creator and ruler of all creation. God is sovereign. God is king.

 We read in 1 Samuel that the Israelites had been governed by wise people, whom we know as the Judges. The Judges weren’t rulers. They were interpreters and arbiters. They made sense of the law and of human behavior. Their job, really, was to make sure that people had what they needed and that no one was taking advantage of others.

Othniel of Judah, Ehud of Benjamin, Deborah who was both prophet and judge, Gideon, Jephthah—these are among the most famous of the judges. The prophet Samuel was the last judge. When he had come to the end of that season of his life, and his sons were not the wise and loving man he was, the people demanded an end to that communal system—that system of guiding themselves. They wanted a king, like other nations had. The Israelites wanted to be like everyone around them, and have a king.

Samuel warned them that kings are not to be trusted, that if you give a human absolute power they will use it to elevate those who support them and destroy everyone else.

When Samuel went to God about the people’s desire for a king, God understood that their desire for a human king was in fact a rejection of God’s kingship. That commandment: “The Lord is our God, the Lord is One” means that the only being who should be Lord over your life is God.

Wanting a king is a rejection of God. There is only one King, and that is God.

Later on, when David had become king, still the wise ones knew that kings were a tricky lot. Psalm 146, which is attributed variously to David himself but also to prophets who followed him like Jeremiah, this song reminded the people and reminds us:

Do not put your trust in princes,
    in human beings, who cannot save.
4 When their spirit departs, they return to the ground;
    on that very day their plans come to nothing.

The Lord our God is the Maker of heaven and earth, who remains faithful forever upholding the cause of the oppressed and giving food to the hungry.
The Lord sets prisoners free, lifting up those who are bowed down, and watching over the foreigner, sustaining the fatherless and the widow.

The Psalmist reminds us that anyone who does not love the Lord their God with all their heart and soul and strength--who does not uphold the cause of the oppressed, give food to the hungry, lift up the bowed down, watch over the foreigner, and sustain those in need—is not to be trusted.

In fact, the “founding fathers” of our own country were running from a king. Now they were doing it largely because they wanted land and money, but they knew that kings were not to be trusted. They aimed for a representative democracy, and instituted checks and balances to keep the presidency from becoming a monarchy.

The founding fathers weren’t all Christians, but they knew the danger of kings.

 We, as people who claim Christ, who laud Jesus’ heavenly father as our own, have but one king, and that is God. And we have but two laws that determine all the rest: love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and your neighbor as yourself.

Any would-be ruler, or celebrity, or pastor, or employer, or manufacturer or anyone with authority who is not at least humble enough to know that they should uphold the cause of the oppressed, give food to the hungry, lift up the bowed down, watch over the foreigner, and sustain those in need, anyone with authority who is not aware that that will fail and must try again, is not worthy of our loyalty.

And no human being is worthy of your fealty, of you giving up your basic morality or sanity when they’re around.

There is but one Lord, and that is God.

Our nation is embroiled and divided largely because we have forgotten the two commandments. Not the 10 commandments, but the two.

 And like the ancient Israelites we have become tired of self-governing and are looking for a king. Unlike our founding fathers, we have forgotten the danger of kings.

Regardless of the outcome of this election, there will be unhappy people. There will be angry people.

Our duty, as Christians, is to love. Our duty is to deal with our own fear or anger or contempt, remembering that every single one of God’s people is fighting the same human battles as we are.

As Christians, we must learn to be faith-filled in a still-democratic nation in crisis. 

Our duty is to reach out and love and care for the endangered or forgotten people as far as possible.

Not to wallow in despair or satisfy our superiority, but to love and to speak and to act on behalf of the oppressed, and the prisoners, and the hungry, and the desperate, and the foreigners, and those in need who are not us, but who are the beloveds of the only king worthy of our trust: God.

If we claim to love God at all, to follow Jesus at all, to have been washed in the blood of Christ at all, we must serve the people God loves: the prisoners, those who are bowed down,  the sick, the foreigners, the fatherless, the widows—anyone whose human rights are at risk, anyone who is “the least of us”.

It is our duty as Christians to act as well as pray, pouring kindness and care into the world. Avoiding contempt and rage. Protecting the weakest ones, the ones who have no voice.

I have been saying it is our duty. Which it is.

But more important: love is our sacred calling.

Love and care, not disdain and vengeance, is what we are born to do. Love and care is our mission and our purpose.

Love and care are the reason we exist at all.

To do this, we must love God, our only king, first. And then the other beloveds who occupy this world who have less than we. Less security. Less voice. Less companionship. Less rights. Less medical care.  Less hope. Less food. Less safety. Those are the people we are commanded to love.

Here’s the secret to all this: we have to trust God in order to have the courage and the humility to love.

Trust in God, real trust, is the only thing that can give us enough hope and enough strength, and enough gentleness, to keep wanting what is truly good for others, whether we like it or not, and acting on it.

We must put our trust in God, who is the only truly faithful One.

How do we do all this? Practice. Check ourselves regularly. Did I speak in love just now? Did I notice Christ in that person? Or am I putting myself in the center of my universe right now? Am I trusting God to show up, and noticing when God does? Am I being grateful?

And then, when we mess up—and we will—to check ourselves again. What should I say to apologize and not excuse? How should I make amends? How do I train myself to not act so selfishly or thoughtlessly in the future?

My friends, we have no control over another human being. But we do have power over what we listen to, what we take in, what we think, what we say, and what we do.

We cannot predict the future. But we can take the next right step of love. And the next one. And the next one.

We can avoid enabling kings.

We can put our trust in God, the only faithful King.

We can put down our contempt or our complacency and pick up our ballot.

We can see Christ in everyone, even if that tiny light is shrouded in darkness.

We can do the next right thing.

We can check our own motivations and behaviors.

We can love.

And love some more.

Amen.