Love God. Love Neighbors.

An Election Eve Sermon

This is the sermon I preached on November 3 at church.

Deuteronomy 6:1-9 and Mark 12:28-34 | All Saints Sunday | November 3, 2024 | First Christian Church, Roseville, MN

My earliest memory of politics and elections was back in 1976.  That bicentennial election was between incumbent Gerald Ford and Governor Jimmy Carter.  I can remember having a mock election in my second-grade class where I voted for Carter, even though I liked Ford, which might have been a sign of my political trajectory. I like to say that my New Deal Democrat parents gave birth to an Eisenhower Republican.

My parents taught me the importance of voting. That was imprinted on me when I was young. We were only a decade from the passage of the Voting Rights Act, so I was taught that voting mattered because so many people who looked like me were barred from voting not so long ago. I remember going with my parents to St. Michael's Byzantine Catholic Church in Flint, Michigan, during that election and many others over the years as they made their choices.

I’ve always found elections and politics fascinating and I’ve blogged about these topics for years, though I have to admit that it has become less interesting over the last few years.  I can remember in college where I would argue about politics with friends and it was all in a good spirit.  These days we really don’t argue as much about politics as we yell at each other.  We no longer seek to persuade as much as try to delegitimize each other.  The other side isn’t simply wrong, but evil.

As election day draws closer and closer, I’ve sensed more and more anxiety in people, including myself.  Some feel a sense of dread.  Others are worried about what might happen after Election Day.  I’ve seen a tweet or comment that tries to offer a bit of hope in this uncertain time by saying that our nation has gone through trying times, but we will get through this.  I want to believe them and maybe so do you, but what if they’re wrong?  

Politics has become a high-stakes game where we talk about how the other side are communists or fascists and that if the other side wins it is the end of everything.  Politics isn’t just a part of our lives, it has become our lives.

Over the years, there have been efforts to try to bring people from different sides together. This service is one such attempt.  Our service is based on an event called Election Day Communion which was started back in 2012. Started by two Mennonite Pastors and an Episcopal layman, the hope was to bring people from different sides of the political spectrum together at the communion table.  The website which is still up, by the way, had this to say about the event: “On Tuesday evening, November 6, make a choice to remember. Let’s meet at the Lord’s Table. Let’s remember together.”  

It’s a wonderful event and I did this event at First Christian back in 2016.  The backers of the event were back in 2016 and 2020, but the page for Election Day Communion was not updated for 2024.  It’s like even the founders think it seems rather odd to think a little bread and grape juice could bring people together.

There is a moment from the 2008 Presidential campaign between Barack Obama and John McCain that stands out to me.  It happened here in Lakeville, Minnesota during a McCain event.  An elderly woman talked about her fear of then-Senator Obama because she believed he was a Muslim. Senator McCain defended Obama by telling the woman that Obama was a patriot just like him.  A lot of people have mentioned that fact of civility which I think is important, but many people forget how McCain treated the woman.  He didn’t treat her with contempt, but spoke to her with respect, using the words “Ma’am.” He didn’t have to do this, but he did.  Along with the civility he showed to his rival he showed grace to a woman who said something that seemed rather racist.

I look at our current political context and wonder if any of this could happen today.  I don’t think so.  

I’ve been thinking a lot about this gospel text and how it relates to this present situation. Jesus is in Jerusalem and he is having a back-and-forth argument with the religious leaders.  They ask him all sorts of gotcha questions like paying taxes to Ceasar or marriage at the resurrection.  They are working to find a way to get Jesus arrested and put to death.

In this passage, another scribe comes to ask a question.  But this scribe is different from the others.  He’s not interested in a gotcha question but has a real question to ask of Jesus.  He wants to know:  of all the commandments, which one is the most important? Now all of the law was is supposed to be equal, but rabbis would argue which one was the heaviest.  Some might say it’s the fourth commandment which is “honor your father and mother.”  

Jesus responds by reciting the Shema, a phrase that is heard in Jewish synagogues: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one.”  He adds, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.”

But Jesus isn’t done.  He then adds the following, “Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these.” That’s not part of the Shema.  But Jesus is making a point: our love of God is actualized in how we treat others, especially our neighbor.  When Jesus says that there is no commandment greater than these, it can also be interpreted as all of the commandments hang on these two commandments.  Everything in the law hangs on loving God and loving others.

The scribe is pleased with the answer and he tells Jesus that loving God and others is more important than all of the burnt offerings and sacrifices.  You can offer the biggest burnt offering imaginable, but if you don’t show love to God or your neighbor, then it means nothing.  Jesus responds by telling the scribe that he isn’t far from God’s kingdom.

How should the church respond during this election?  Some will say that we must respond to the rise of Christian nationalism or that we should stand for the unborn. But I think this passage tells us what really matters.  It isn’t how we respond to threats or votes as much as how do we act in the world.  The church should stand in love.  The church should put love first. Of course, we should speak out on issues that we hold near and dear.  But the song doesn’t say they will know we are Christians by our policy positions, but by our love and that love is extended to the neighbor.  And the neighbor is someone who goes beyond our understanding of a neighbor.  The story of the Good Samaritan isn’t just a story that says we should help people.  It is a story that tells us that our neighbor, isn’t simply someone we know, but someone that might be an enemy.  We are called to be a neighbor and love someone even if they are an enemy because they are a child of God.  In a time like this, we should remember our baptism and know that everyone from the people that we like to the ones we don’t like, which in this case might be a Trump voter.  How do we love them? How we do live our baptism?

Larissa Phillips a farmer in upstate New York wrote an article in the online newsmagazine The Free Press about being a liberal living in Trump country.  She and her family used to live in Park Slope, Brooklyn a very progressive area of New York City and then moved to Greene County, south of Albany.  This is a very Republican area and she was definitely in the minority. Time and the life of farming meant that her opinion of her neighbors changed. “It’s hard to care where someone stands on politics when they race to your house to save a dying lamb,” she writes. “This is the gift of living in a rural area: I keep finding reasons to see my political adversaries as human.”

She shared the story of a young boy who used to come and play with her daughter.  One day he stopped coming to the house because he learned they were liberals.  Larissa decided to find a way to bridge this gap.  She knew Lucas loved their aging shepherd dog, Cleo so she asked him to walk Cleo when they were gone, which he did.  The time came when Cleo was too sick and needed to be put down.  She invited Lucas to come and say goodbye.  Lucas came and sat with Cleo for a long time telling her what a good girl she was. “It’s not clear whether he still spurns those who vote differently from his people,” she said. “But I like to think it’s gotten a little harder for him to do so. I know it has for me.”

As Christians and as Disciples in particular, we are centered on the communion table.  We are centered on a table that isn’t our table, but God’s table.  If this is God’s table then it is God that welcomes people to the table, not us.  Who does God welcome? Everybody.

So as we enter into this election time, how are we the church?  Not the progressive church, not the MAGA church, but the church of Jesus?  How do we be a people of justice, but also a people of love? Do we realize that Jesus life and death was for all of us, no matter who we are?

I began this sermon with a story about my parents and since it is All Saints Sunday, I want to end with another story about my parents.  In 1989, I was in college.  I joined them on vacation to visit relatives in Louisiana.  We almost always drove from Michigan and we were on our way and stopped in a rest area in Mississippi.  We were getting ready to get back in the car and head back on the road to central Louisiana when a middle-aged white man came up to us.  He looked disheveled and tired.  He told us that he and his family were moving from Alabama to Oklahoma, and needed food.  I looked over to the station wagon. Besides the man’s family, I could see it was filled with what seemed like their life’s possessions.  

Mom would pack a lot of food for the trip, sometimes more than we needed.  We gave them some food to help this man feed his family and sent them on their way.

What I remember of that encounter was my parent’s generosity.  Here in the Deep, deep South an African American family helped to a poor white family who had no food.  My parents lived out loving God and loving the neighbor.  They loved God through loving neighbors.

How will we act during this time?  By loving others.  By remembering at the table that God loves us, all of us, and because of this we can do the same.

As we follow the returns Tuesday night and feel either excited or scared, let’s remember no matter what that we will love one another- even the one who is our enemy.  Thanks be to God. Amen.