Many of us are deeply troubled by what is happening in our country. I don't need to chronicle for you the seeming deliberate cruelty: the proposed cuts to food assistance, fuel assistance, Medicaid and as a result of an increased deficit, Medicare. The grabbing of people off the streets by masked men. The attacks on international students and judges and law firms and universities and journalists. The blatant violation of the emoluments clause. The rhetoric of threat and fear.
In this Easter season, many of our lectionary readings have been about love. This coming Sunday will continue the theme. But it is quite a challenge to remain loving in this time, and to remain hopeful that love has any power.
Haven't people longed for peace for thousands of years? Doesn't the Bible chronicle this yearning for wholeness, and doesn't it also chronicle the ways that human beings have been unspeakably cruel to one another? Does the Bible offer us hope that we, too, shall endure, or does it cause us to feel that nothing shall ever change? Kings were greedy despots in 3,000 BC, and they are greedy despots now.
I recall the words of Isaiah 65, written when people yearned for justice and peace.
For I am about to create new heavens and a new earth;
the former things shall not be remembered or come to mind.
No more shall there be an infant who lives but a few days
or an old person who does not live out a lifetime.
They shall build houses and inhabit them;
they shall plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
They shall not build and another inhabit;
they shall not plant and another eat,
for like the days of a tree shall the days of my people be,
and my chosen shall long enjoy the work of their hands.
They shall not labor in vain or bear children for calamity,
for they shall be offspring blessed by the Lord.
Before they call I will answer,
while they are yet speaking I will hear.
The wolf and the lamb shall feed together;
the lion shall eat straw like the ox.
They shall not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, says the Lord.
Can we hold onto this dream, this vision, this promise? Can we trust that God is at work to bring about a world where no one labors in vain, where no one goes hungry? Can we encourage one another to hold onto this vision, even when we are feeling weary and angry and despairing? We can. And we must.
