Rev. Tom Sorenson, Pastor
September 16, 2007

Scripture:

Let us pray: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable in your sight O God, our strength and our redeemer. Amen.

Where have all the flowers gone?
Long time passing.
Where have all the flowers gone?
Long time ago.
Where have all the flowers gone?
Young girls picked them every one.
When will they ever learn?
When will they ever learn?

Many of us I imagine remember that old Pete Seeger song that was popular back when some of us were protesting another protracted American war abroad. Through a series of additional questions and answers the song portrays the futility and inanity of humanity’s endless cycle of war upon war, in which, traditionally, our young men die and our young women become widows. After each verse Seeger again asks that haunting question: “When will they ever learn, when will they ever learn?”

I don’t know if Seeger meant that as a rhetorical question the obvious answer to which is “never” or not, but it sure is easy to conclude that “never” is the only realistic answer to the question. Humanity indeed seems as stuck as ever in its fascination with and eager readiness to resort to war as the only apparently viable solution to whatever problem we think we’re facing. War is the way of the world, and we Americans are really good at it. No nation or armed group in the world could defeat our military in open battle. Of that I have no doubt.

Yet no one I know thinks that war is actually a good thing. Everyone acknowledges, with their words if not with their actions, that war is an evil. Not long ago I heard an American soldier who either was serving in Iraq or who recently had done so be very candid about that reality. On a national television broadcast he said that his job was “killing people and blowing up their stuff.” We like to sugarcoat that truth. We say the military’s function is to defend our freedom, and maybe it is at times; but the primary method the military has to do that is to kill people and blow up their stuff. And that, my friends, can never, never be anything better than a tragic necessity, a necessary evil. Many of us doubt that it ever rises even to that problematic level of morality.

War is the way of the world. About that there is no doubt, but there also is simply no doubt that it is not God’s way. Jesus establishes this fact beyond all doubt for those of us who call him Messiah and Lord. In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus very plainly says: “You have heard that it was said ‘You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven….” Matthew 5:43-45a. I have a bumper sticker put out by the Church of the Brethren, one of the historic peace churches, that drives the point home. It says: “When Jesus said love your enemies, I think he probably meant don’t kill them.” That’s pretty hard to argue with. Not killing someone would seem to be the minimum one should to with someone they are called to love.

Jesus, however, did more than tell us not to resort to violence, he lived a life of nonviolence. He would not even let his Disciples resort to violence to save Jesus’ own life. The Gospel of Matthew—the story appears in several Gospels but I’ll use Matthew’s version here—relates that when the authorities came to arrest Jesus one of his followers pulled out a sword and struck the slave of the high priest with it, cutting off his ear. Jesus said to the Disciple inclined to violence “Put your sword back into its place; for all who take the sword will perish by the sword.” Matthew 26:52 NRSV Jesus’ way was the way of nonviolence. He was even willing to die to live out that way. He simply would have no part of violence, no part of war.

Yet Christians have been infinitely creative in coming up with ways to avoid Jesus’ teaching of nonviolence, to convince themselves that he really didn’t mean it and that we don’t have to follow it. I won’t review all of those Christian rationalizations here. The most famous of them is the so-called “just war doctrine,” which some Christians continue to espouse despite the fact that no war fought since the inception of the doctrine some sixteen hundred years ago has ever truly met all of the doctrine’s requirements. The point for now, however, is only that all of the efforts Christians have made and continue to make to avoid Jesus’ lesson of nonviolence are rationalizations and compromises of Jesus’ teaching. You can reject Jesus’ way of nonviolence if you want. We humans usually do. Please understand, however, that when you do you are rejecting a central message of the teaching and the life of the one we call Lord and Savior. Jesus taught nonviolence. God’s way is nonviolence. Period.

And we don’t get it. We can’t accept it. We, most of us, insist on following the way of the world not the way of God. We insist on calling the world’s wisdom wise and God’s wisdom foolish. It has ever been thus. Twenty-six hundred years ago the Prophet Jeremiah, speaking for God, cried out: “For my people are foolish, they do not know me; they are stupid children, they have no understanding. They are skilled in doing evil, but do not know how to do good.” Jeremiah 4:22 NRSV And the Psalmist of Psalm 14 echoes his cry, saying “They have all gone astray, they are all alike perverse; there is no one who does good, no, not one.” Psalm 14:3 NRSV They could almost be speaking today instead of more than two millennia ago. Most of us reject God’s way of nonviolence and embrace the world’s way of war.

Yet the Psalmist overstates the matter. There are some who do good, some who know God’s truth. Some say yes, from the perspective of the world it is possible to make a case for war that on its surface at least is plausible, as General Petraeus, Ambassador Crocker, and President Bush, acting from what I consider to be a distorted worldly wisdom in the interest of American Empire, all did this past week. Some say that while it is possible, indeed it is quite easy, to punch holes in that case even from a worldly perspective, doing so misses the point. Some say that the point for us Christians is that we are called not to follow the wisdom of the world at all, we are called to follow the wisdom of Jesus Christ, the wisdom that rejects violence radically and fundamentally. There are some like that. I count myself one of them.

But I am not alone. There are others today who cry out God’s truth. Today I am joined at least by John Thomas, President and General Minister of the United Church of Christ, and by the other top leaders of our denomination. They have all asked us UCC pastors on this Sunday to read to the people of the church a pastoral letter they have written calling for an end to the Iraq war. I’m actually not going to read that whole letter here, in part because it is too long and in part because I don’t agree with all of it. I don’t think it goes far enough in calling for an end to war as a legitimate human activity. I will, however, read a couple of passages from it. After recounting the deceptions that led to the war, the horrors of the war, and its tragic consequences for us at home and for the people of Iraq the letter states:

We confess that too often the church has been little more than a silent witness to evil deeds. We have prayed without protest. We have recoiled from the horror this war has unleashed without resisting the arrogance and folly at its heart. We have been more afraid of conflict in our churches than outraged over the deceptions that have killed thousands. We have confused patriotism with self-interest. As citizens of this land we have been made complicit in the bloodshed and the cries. Lord, have mercy upon us.

Near the end the letter says: “Today we call for repentance in our nation and for the recognition in our churches that security is found in submitting to Christ, not by dominating others.” To which all I can add is a heartfelt “amen.” I have put some copies of the complete letter in the Fellowship Hall if you want to read it.

Friends, it is time for us to learn that violence only begets violence. In the world today our violence, always directed against people weaker than us because no one is as strong as us, makes us less safe not safer. It will never convince people of the value of democracy and human rights. It only inspires the enemies of democracy and human rights and recruits new legions of young people filled with hatred and bad theology who are ready to throw their lives away in futile acts of more violence.

Our denomination’s leaders have asked us to read that letter, and they have asked us to invite the people of the church prayerfully to consider signing a petition they have drafted that they intend to present to Congress next month calling for an end to the Iraq war and for a fundamental change in the direction and nature of American foreign policy in the direction of peace and justice. They hope to gather 100,000 signatures on the petition. As of this morning, according to the web site, they had just over 14,000, so they have a long way to go. The text of the petition is in your bulletin. Paper copies that you can sign if you feel called to do so are in the Fellowship Hall, or you can sign the petition on line at ucc.org. Or as always you are free to make a different decision and not sign the petition at all. It’s up to you.

Will the petition make a difference? I don’t know. Probably not. One of our members told me earlier this week that I will never convince people of the message I am preaching this morning. Maybe she’s right. The wisdom of the world is so firmly entrenched in our minds that it is almost impossible to overcome. Yet ultimately that the Gospel of Jesus Christ may be rejected is no reason to stop proclaiming it. That the truth has trouble getting a hearing has never stopped it from being the truth, nor has it been a reason for us to stop proclaiming it. All we can do is keep speaking God’s truth. And as we do we cry with the great Pete Seeger: When will they—when will we ever learn. Amen.