Sermon for July 6th

“Onward Christian soldiers, marching as to war, with the cross of Jesus going on before. Christ, the royal master, leads against the foe; forward into battle, see, his banners go. Onward Christian soldiers, marching as to war, with the cross of Jesus going on before.” Many Christians have a love/hate relationship with this song. They like the tune, but they don’t like the implications of the song. What it might mean for thinking about God. What it might mean for thinking about ourselves.

Christians, in American culture, are often portrayed as peaceful, weak, quiet, bland sissies. Many Christians themselves believe that when you come to church you have to leave your passion, your strength, your assertiveness and your intelligence at the door. Church is considered to be mainly for women and children, the older the women and the younger the children, the better. Talking about soldiers, wars, battles, kings and banners flying sounds more like an action adventure movie than a Sunday morning sermon.

So, this song, “Onward Christian soldiers,” is an anachronism, full of ideas that seem out of place for our time. Today, Jesus is talked about as loving, tolerant and peaceful, not, as the song puts it, a royal master, leading us against enemies, forward into battle with banners blazing behind and before. Does this song belong in our church hymnal or have we finally outlived the usefulness for these types of metaphors when describing God in our civilized peace-loving day and age?

God’s Word is sharper than any two edged sword, that is, it cuts both ways. It cuts to the right and it cuts to the left. For those of you who imagine Jesus as simply a non-violent pacifist, he brings a sword! He is the same God who led the Israelites in countless wars against their foes. He doesn’t pray for peace as we do, in quiet prayer groups or at night before bed, he commands it! He is assertive! He doesn’t stay a baby in swaddling clothes forever, but as the reading from Zechariah says, he comes as a king, triumphant and victorious.

Jesus Christ cannot be labeled as purely an anti-war flower child. As Jesus said a couple of weeks ago in our gospel lesson, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.” Jesus is a peacemaker, this is true, but he is also not the namby-pamby many people make him out to be. He is a king, a warrior, a prince. In our reading from Zechariah today, the author uses the symbolism of war and battle, of fighting and arms to express God’s deeds of power, his glory. However, the glory that is expected, the glory is not what we had imagined. The glory is that of peace and humility.

God’s word is sharper than any two edged sword. It cuts both ways. The Jews imagined their Messiah as a victorious warrior king. If Jesus was this Messiah, their Savior, many Jews figured it was time for a little payback against the nations that had power over them. They expected Jesus to destroy their enemies and trample the bodies into the dust. For those of you who imagine Jesus as simply a battle-hero, an awesome warrior king!—he comes humbly riding on a donkey. He doesn’t take prisoners of war, the reading today says he sets free the prisoners of hope. He doesn’t pillage neighboring towns for retribution for his people, he restores double to those who were exiled from their homes out of his own kingly coffers.

Jesus undermined the symbols of glory and power for those hungry for destruction and dominion among the Jews. With these same symbols, he offends the civilized sensibilities of those of us hungry for comfort and tolerance in our day. God’s word cuts both ways, to the right and to the left.

We worship the God who freed the oppressed Israelites from their slavery to the Egyptians. Yes we do. But we also worship the God who drowned Pharaoh and his army in the waters of the Red Sea in order to seal this escape. It’s the same God. We worship the God who gave us eternal life through Jesus Christ, and the God who sent his only son to death on a cross. It’s the same God. We worship the God who commands peace, but brings a sword. It’s the same God. God is not the battle hero we all want him to be nor is he the pacifist we all want him to be.

We are in the midst of wars across the world in Iraq and Afghanistan. You are all intelligent citizens and can make up your own minds about how you think and deal with these things politically. I’m not going to tell you what to do. I’m not going to tell you what to believe or that God is on one side or the other because he is on both. God knows the necessity of war and the pain of war. God knows the sins of war and the righteousness of war.

The more you hear God’s Word, read it at home and converse with others about it, the more it affects your understanding and beliefs. However, as soon as you or I try and wield it like an axe against others either to lead the war charge or to cut off an olive branch, the axe head falls off and stubs our toes. This doesn’t mean that we aren’t to judge based on God’s word. It means that God does the judging—with his words—and that he always judges you and me with his words before we can see start swinging at the log in our neighbors’ eyes.

Today’s reading from Zechariah was not written as an oracle about the war in Iraq or Afghanistan. It was an oracle for the Israelites coming out of exile. This reading strengthens our faith in God and informs our understanding of how to faithfully live our lives during these wars, but we cannot take these verses and chastise our neighbors or government without taking at look at ourselves first. The words interpret us first, pointing out our sins and then pointing out our hope. God knows that war and peace will come and go. We are driven to seek hope in God’s righteousness and not in our own.

You have a God who is not unfamiliar with wars and battles. He has led the charge, he has healed the wounded and he has buried the dead. He has even died on a cross. He knows what it is to suffer, to be despised, to be punished and to be struck down in a battle. Not just against evil but against the devil himself. There are people we love at home and abroad who are fighting for this country and being placed in harms way. We can trust that God is there with them, fighting with them, suffering with them and protecting them from harm. And when death happens on the battlefield, from friendly fire or from a road bomb or from an ambush, we can trust that their Lord and Savior will not leave them or forsake them just because they are part of a war. He has been there before.

You also have a God who is not unfamiliar with the struggle for peace and the end of war. He has promised long ago to judge between many peoples and nations, that they will beat their swords into plowshares and use their spears for pruning hooks. There will come a time when nation shall not lift up sword against nation and not learn war any more. He has not only called us to peace, but has taken it on himself to command peace to nations. Peace is finally God’s responsibility even while we do our best to pray for that peace to come. You can trust that God is listening to your prayers for peace. He doesn’t want any soldiers from any nation to die whether they are Christians or not, for as the book of Ezekiel proclaims, “God finds no pleasure in the death of the wicked.” Instead, he is always seeking those who are lost so that they might turn to him and live, not only happily on this earth but also eternally in heaven.

God loves you. When you are in the midst of wars and battles, he fights alongside you with the goal of giving you peace as the prize. When you are praying for peace, he will do battle with the forces of evil, apathy and destruction and command that peace as a triumphant and glorious king. His love is not based on your political preference. You are made right with God by faith alone. You are loved by both a peaceful and a powerful God. Amen.