Red, White and Blest

Dear friends in Christ, grace to you and peace, from God our Father, and His Son, our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

When Marsha and I were young parents in Rochester, Minnesota, we came to know Huck and Lynette Usgaard. Huck’s a bishop now, but in those days he was a pastor at Zumbro Lutheran Church. He wasn’t our pastor, but he and Lynette were our friends, and we spent a lot of cheap Friday night date nights playing the board game Risk in their dining room or ours. Huck and his daughter Jenny had a delightful nighttime ritual that I had the privilege of witnessing countless times. Just before Huck turned out the lights, he would ask Jenny “Why do I love you so much?” And she would always respond “Because you love me so much.”

It is an astonishing exchange, if you think about it. It begins by dad affirming every night that he loves his daughter. She doesn’t have to ask; she doesn’t have to wonder. Every night he says it; “Jenny, why do I love you so much?” But the prize comes in Jenny’s response: “Because you love me so much.” You just love me, daddy, that’s all. You just do. You see, anything more than that would be conditional love. If Jenny were to say “You love me because I ate my supper” then her father’s love would be conditioned upon her eating her supper. If she said “You love me because I didn’t have an accident in my pants today” then her father’s love would dependent upon her bladder. “Jenny, why do I love you so much?” “Because you love me so much. You just do.”

An odd way to begin a sermon on Independence Day? Perhaps. But it allows me to address a topic today that is very delicate and yet very important from a biblical perspective. It has to do with God’s blessing of our nation. We hear of the phrase a lot. When presidents and political candidates address the public, they often conclude their remarks by adding “and may God bless America.” Many baseball stadiums play that song these days during the 7th inning stretch, and many congregations will sing that hymn today. God bless America. Buttons and bumper stickers and banners invoke the same idea: God Bless America. Is it a command, is it a request, or is it merely a statement of fact: that God blesses America. Maybe it doesn’t matter…He just does.

But here is where the rub comes: Does God bless America because of something we’ve done as a nation? Is it because 76% of Americans claim to be Christians that God blesses America? If so, what happens if the number drops to 49%? Does God bless America because we stand for freedom, and therefore, against tyranny? I don’t know, the Saudi Arabia government is a rigid tyranny and they seem to be pretty blessed. Would God bless America more if Americans blessed God more? If we started praying more, if we started sinning less, if we broke fewer laws? If that were true, then God’s love for us is conditional upon us being good. “Jenny, why do I love you so much?” “Because I didn’t have an accident in my pants, that’s why.” And that would not be unconditional love.

Now before I go one step further, I want to be clear about something: God has indeed blessed America. The freedom we share, the abundance of natural resources we possess, the abundance of ideas and innovation we create, the love and generosity we display, and the melting pot of cultures that we value; it’s all blessing, is it not? But what we cannot know it why we have been blessed so. I reject the notion that we have earned it. I don’t believe we necessarily deserve it. And therefore, I don’t believe that we lose God’s blessings when we’ve messed our pants. To some people, hurricane Katrina, or September 11th, or oil spills, or economic meltdowns are evidence that God has turned his back on us. America has assumed for a few generations now that God is on our side, which, in itself, is self-indulgent thinking. But now that we have experienced a series of significant challenges, there are those who suggest that we need to earn back God’s love and trust and blessing. I think that is contrary to the idea of a gracious God. I know there is a basis for this in the Old Testament, but it is not present in the New Testament. God’s blessing is a gift, unmerited and free.

But what we actually need to do is to determine what constitutes a blessing from God. On a national level, is it simply being a world military power, leading the world in exports, and having the best soccer team at the World Cup? On a personal level, does being blest mean that you have financial success, or high school popularity, or beautiful children, or a big house, a new car and a fast boat? Because if that’s how you define “blessing” then you’re aiming your sights too low. In fact, none of those things is ever mentioned favorably in the bible. You know how God’s blessings are defined in the bible? Here’s the list:
• Blest are the poor
• Blest are those who grieve
• Blest are the meek
• Blest are the hungry
• Blest are the merciful
• Blest are the pure in heart
• Blest are the peacemakers
• Blest are those who are persecuted
I know that the list is not an attractive one. I mean, who wants to be poor, or hungry, or persecuted, or grieving? We’d rather be wealthy, or famous, or popular, or a world military power. And that’s the problem; that if God’s blessings make us self-reliant and invincible, then we won’t need God anymore. Isn’t that the height of irony? But we are blest because we are absolutely dependent upon Him, and absolutely interdependent on one another.

These past two years have been challenging ones for a lot of people in America. Unemployment has led to financial hardship, stress has impacted marriages and families to the breaking point, political sniping has divided the people of our land, and natural disasters and human error have wreaked suffering on so many. In the midst of it all, people have wondered where God’s blessings are in all of this. I don’t have an answer to that question, and I don’t trust those who do. What I do have is a conviction that God has not abandoned us in the storm. Like Job, we hurl questions and insults at God and God still loves us. And in the end, perhaps that’s his blessing: that he chooses to love us whether we are obedient children or rascals…whether we walk the straight and narrow, or mess our pants on a daily basis. People, God loves you. God loves me. And in our sacred moments, we may even ask “God, why do you love us so much?” And God responds “Because I love you so much…I just do…and that will never end.”

My seminary advisor, Gerhard Frost writes a brief piece that speaks to the heart of God’s blessings, a piece entitled “Benediction.”

Preschool, and she didn’t like it
Standing in the shadows of the cloakroom
I sadly helped her with her overshoes as the bell began to ring

With only seconds to think, my mind raced;
“What can I say? Is there no word, O God
Give me one thought to anchor a day
To comfort this child and chase a tear away!”

It came: “You are blessed, little one;
Remember, Granddaddy told you,
You are blessed!”

A quick caress, and she was away,
No, not quite, for just as she was about to step beyond my view
She turned, and with a smile, she said,
“And YOU are blessed.”
Children of God, YOU are blessed! Rejoice! Amen.

©2010 Steven Molin