Sermon delivered by Rev. Dr. J. Herbert
Nelson, II on Tuesday, June 30, 2015 on the occasion of remembering the
Charleston 9 and embracing the issue of race in the United States. The worship
service was held in the United Methodist Building on Capitol Hill in
Washington, DC.
“What We Are Contending With”
“For we are not contending with flesh
and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers against the world
rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly
places.” (Ephesians 6:12)
Today we remember the horrid incident in Emanuel
African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, SC almost two weeks ago. The funerals continue even today which serve
as a constant reminder that even the Church of Jesus Christ is not necessarily
a safe place in our society. However, it seems that signs of hope are
beginning. Dylan Roof, suspect in the killing of the nine who were attending to
prayer when the shooting occurred is incarcerated. Racially mixed unity marches
with thousands of persons calling for the removal of the Confederate battle
flag are occurring in South Carolina. The National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is renewing its fight for the removal of
the Confederate Battle Flag from the South Carolina State Capitol that began in
1988. Major corporations are now supporting the efforts to remove the
Confederate Flag by pledging not to produce or sell any products that feature
the confederate battle flag or the flag itself. Amid this tragedy, it seems
like the mill of progress is springing forth. Or is it?
The writer of Ephesians, believed to be a disciple of
Paul, is credited with this letter to the Church at Ephesus. However, one must
note that in chapters 3 and 4 the author assumes the identity of Paul as a
prisoner of Jesus Christ. The writer of Ephesians reminds us in our text for today
that the challenges we are facing are more than the symbols represented in the
confederate battle flag; or the public outpouring of sympathy extended to the
families of the victims; or the momentary unity marches among the descendants
of Europeans and Africans in the streets in South Carolina. He writes:
“For we are not contending with flesh
and blood, but against the principalities, against the powers against the world
rulers of this present darkness, against the spiritual hosts of wickedness in
heavenly places.” (Ephesians 6:12)
This community is grappling with the merging of Jews
and Gentiles in the same communal context of worship and faith. What does it
mean to unify across the lines of communal divide in the House of the Lord?
Inherent in this question is how do we take on the challenge of being the
community that God wants us to be while limping towards a unity in the oneness
of Jesus Christ. The writer’s warning is found in the recognition that this
will require engaging spiritual warfare for the sake of Jesus Christ in the
world. Therefore, he outlines the spiritual war clothes needed to remain
focused on the task of becoming and being what Jesus Christ wants them to be.
I must admit some frustration over the convenient
ways that people, commerce and other groups of my home State are coming
together around the guilt associated with this massacre after years of
ideological divide over the civil war; slavery; Jim Crow segregation; the
confederate flag; and a host of other racially divisive issues that has plagued
the State of South Carolina. My life is still pained by the massacre in my
hometown of Orangeburg, South Carolina during my growing years. Twenty-seven students
were shot, 3 of them killed from South Carolina State and Claflin Universities
(two Historically Black Colleges) and Wilkinson High School as they were trying
to integrate Harry Floyd’s Bowling Alley. My father was significantly involved
as a local Pastor and past State Conference President of the NAACP in South
Carolina. The violence that night on February 4, 1968 is now known as the
Orangeburg Massacre. Ironically, in 1968, two months before the assassination
of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. the Orangeburg Massacre occurred and in 2015
during the second term of the first African American President of the United
States the Charleston Massacre occurred. Both were fueled by race and the
belief that white supremacy still is the order of the day.
Therefore, I hear the words of the writer of
Ephesians who intimates that this is not an ideological war we are fighting.
No, this is a spiritual war throughout the United States. In speaking boldly to
the way ahead, the writer of Ephesians reminds us in these denominational
offices that we are engaged in spiritual warfare.
He writes in verses 14-19 “Stand therefore,
having girded your loins with truth, and having put on the breastplate of
righteousness, and having shod your feet with the equipment of the gospel of
peace; besides all these, taking the shield of faith, with which you can quench
all the flaming darts of the evil one. And take the helmet of salvation, and
the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God. Pray at all times in the
Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all
perseverance, making supplication for all the saints, and also for me, that
utterance may be given me in opening my mouth boldly to proclaim the mystery of
the gospel.”
Do you
hear this? We are called to a bold proclamation of the gospel! I am often
perplexed by how casually we assume the power of the gospel in this
environment. I remember a couple of years ago when there was a massive campaign
to pass a bill to reduce gun violence. The Manchin-Toomey Bill was on the table
in the Senate. There was a full court press from Gabrielle Giffords, Newtown
families, Virginia Tech Survivors and other mass shooting advocates for ending
gun violence across the U.S. Many were meeting here in this building. But, the
Manchin-Toomey Bill became so watered down with compromise that there was
really nothing left. Here in the faith community we compromised on the nothing
that was left. We are often vacillating between whether we are
pseudo-politicians or people of faith in our work on the Hill. I want to
suggest that faith has power over politics if we learn to lean on God’s
unhanging hand. Faith has power over politics when we declare as the bible does
in Proverbs 14:34 when it reads Righteousness
exalts a nation, but sin condemns any people. Jesus said
it another way,
“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has
anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim
liberty to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty
those who are oppressed, (Luke 4:18)
Our role is
to speak a prophetic voice to a nation that is falling in the ditches of
despair.
It is
imperative that Charleston not only becomes a watershed moment in South
Carolina, but a wake up call for those of us in this faith community and around
the world that our role is to speak truth in love to power, including to our
own faith communities with a unrestrained vigor and zeal for the living gospel
of Jesus Christ. If we leave this place in history only removing a flag while
the vestiges of Jim Crow education is still in our public schools across this
nation; while systems of incarceration and inequality place whole families in
systemic isolation from opportunity, and inequality remains the order of the
day. If we remove the vestiges of the Confederate flag, but leave the
domination of corporate greed in place, we will have traded one evil for
another and will still find death on our street corners; imbalance in world
markets; and justice and freedom eclipsed by the illusion of success in the
United States.
We must not
be afraid to challenge the powers and principalities in this present age. Our
work is about redeeming people through the hope found in Jesus Christ whose
statement of purpose is captured in Luke 4:18-19 “The Spirit of the Lord is
upon me, because he has anointed me to preach the good news to the poor. He has
sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the
blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable
year of the Lord.” In other words, to turn the world upside down that
righteousness might overcome the usury mill of corporate domination, our
electoral politics and the world order.
I too mourn
the loss of my brothers and sisters in Charleston, but have committed to making
my advocacy more visible and vigilant so that we can at least go to prayer
meeting and Church in peace. I am
thankful for the possible removal of the confederate flag that symbolizes all
of the vestiges of White supremacy in the South, but equally important is that
White Supremacist thinking and corollary actions not be dismissed by political
ideology couched in media sophistication. I am grateful and consider it an
undeserved honor to serve the Church of Jesus Christ in the nation’s Capitol,
but my daily prayer is that the Lord will keep me humble. I see too much pomp
and circumstance fueled by ego both on the Hill and in our faith community. We
are not exempt from that assertion. If we were, Capitol Hill would possess a
different climate. It would be a climate that denotes the Godly intention of
our founders – a nation truly “of the people, for the people and by the people”[1].
Let us
become weary in well doing. Let the Charleston 9 be a reminder that the epitaph
of our life will be written. We do not know the time nor the hour. What we do
know is that our work will be judged and so will our lives. God has placed us
here to be prophets who declare that powers and principalities are subject to a
day of reckoning. This may cost us something, but to play the game by the rules
of our political leaders will cost us even more. Who do we serve….Answer ye
this day!
