250 [Proper 9A - Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30]

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The Rt. Rev. Jeremiah Williamson

Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30

 

250

Zion, Colton

 

Yesterday we celebrated the 250th anniversary of the birth of our country.  The semiquincentennial is a momentous occasion – a cause for parades, fireworks, and fanfares.  And we live in an amazing part of the country to revel in it.  Our diocese is dotted with blue historical signs pointing to the earliest days of our national organization.  And yet, for many, it was a complex event given the national strife we are experiencing.  In our United States, we feel the weight of our divisions.  Our one country can feel like an uneasy collection of competing ideologies. 

 

We live in an intensely partisan time – one driven by social media, cash infusions, and political theatre.  The partisanship in our nation is exhausting and it is relentless.  At some level it feels like not many of us really like it, and yet we can’t seem to quit it.    

 

The strife of this season feels intense.  But it is true that the history of our nation is complicated.  In our first century, we were already at civil war – a war in which about 700,000 citizens died (including two of my own distant grandfathers) and countless others were maimed and scarred.  That war ended in Reconstruction and a hope for greater racial equality.  Which was met with the formation of the Ku Klux Klan.  Our nation is a messy push and pull, a reflection of the best and worst human tendencies.  The tension of open and closed.  The competing impulses of national unity and partisan division.  Human rights are forever expanding and contracting.  For every action there is a reaction.

 

Jesus lived in the tension of his own reactionary society.  His kindness was met with biting critique.  His generosity inspired anger.  His love pushed people to violence.  Those who opposed his kingdom message even tried to trap him in their own convoluted partisan rhetoric – trying to pit Jesus against his prophet, John the Baptist.  Divide and conquer is an old strategy.

 

Jesus simply chose not to participate in the sniping or segmentation.  Instead, he offered a vision of peace and unity.  He offered an exhausted populace a place to rest.  Jesus offers his people a way forward that doesn’t hurt.

 

Despite the fiery rhetorical flourishes that populate comment sections, I truly believe that most people want something better than the fault lines that run through friendships and families and communities.  As followers of Jesus, we have a beautiful message to share about a love that crosses the chasms and a peace that passes all understanding.

 

In today’s Gospel Jesus makes us an incredible offer – one that is irresistible and yet for many seems too good to be true. “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.  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.  For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

 

In a weary world, in a tired nation, Jesus is offering a place to rest.  In his arms we find peace.  In the shelter of his heart, we find our comfort. 

 

This tender kindness is also woven into the fabric of our national story.  At our best this nation is made of neighbors supporting each other, loving each other through the hardest times.  At our best this nation aspires to reflect Jesus’ own welcome.  The poem on the Statue of Liberty resonates with the words of Jesus’ invitation:

 

From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

 

In this land of our sojourn, we best serve our neighbors by also resonating with the words of Jesus’ invitation.  In a time of partisan division and dangerous fault lines, we can shine with the light of peace.  In a time of heated rivalry, we walk with a gentle Jesus.  In a time of blaring certainty and cruel insult, we can model the merits of a humble heart.

 

Our heavenly citizenship is a gift to our mortal homeland.  We must love our nation enough to live like Jesus.  We must defend mercy and insist on justice so that our most perfect national aspirations might be realized.  We must live into our calling to respect the dignity of every human being so that liberty and justice for all will be our national hallmark.  

 

Every anniversary is an opportunity to look back and to dream forward.  The past is trod through dark valleys and brilliant heights, scarred by pain and buoyed by triumphs.  It is the story of a human family striving to live into an ideal.

 

The future is not yet written.  It is a future that we will help write.  May we write this nation’s future in acts of kindness, words of peace, and gentle strokes of justice. 

 

 

 

  

 

 

Location: Colton, NY 13625, USA

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