America the Beautiful

I remember as a third grader watching a film in class that showcased all the beauty of our great country – the natural resources, the man-made marvels, and the human family that toiled in the fields, the factories, stores, and offices from sea to shining sea. The film came to a crescendo with a stirring rendition of “America the Beautiful”. I remember it like it was yesterday – the pride and patriotism I felt deep inside.

The Great Seal of the United States – our national coat of arms – contains the Latin inscription “E Pluribus Unum”, which means “one from many”. As an eight-year-old sitting in that third-grade class, America was “the beautiful”. A place where everybody is “one from many” and life is nearly perfect.

Then came the end of innocence. I grew up.

Today we seem more divided than ever, not by a thin ideological line, but by a canyon of contempt, as each draws their battle lines against the other side that sees the world differently. It may not be any worse than in previous generations, but I wonder when I watch the news. I once heard Crawford Lorrits say, “All families are dysfunctional. Sin is dysfunctional.” If America is a family, we are certainly a dysfunctional one. If the many are one, one what?

In 1893, Wellesley College English professor, Katharine Lee Bates, visited the 14,115 foot summit of Pike’s Peak, part of a cross-country trek she made from her east coast home. So captivated by what she had seen on her trip, culminating in the breathtaking view from high atop the peak, she wrote a poem on the spot titled “America the Beautiful”, which was later set to music by church organist and choirmaster Samuel A. Ward.

While the beauty of our great nation enraptured Ms. Bates, she wasn’t oblivious to America’s shortcomings. In the second verse she wrote, “America! America! God mend thine every flaw”. She captured the dysfunction that plagues not only our country, but also every sovereign nation and every human being on the planet. We have flaws – things that keep us from completeness on this side of Heaven.

Yes America, God has “shed His grace on thee.” But more specifically, God has shed his grace on every person on the globe through the sacrificial death of His Son, Jesus Christ, two thousand years ago on a trash heap outside of Jerusalem. It was a gift to all who will believe (Jn 3:16) to “mend thine every flaw” (1 Jn 2:2); a compensating act to cover the dysfunction of sin that we inherited from our original family (Rm 5:12).

You and I love our country, but our hope is not in the right or the left, Republicans or Democrats, or conservatives or liberals. Our hope is in Christ who “has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead (1 Pet 1:3).” Our hope is not in the stars and stripes, but in the scars and stripes that Christ bore for our shortcomings: “But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed (Isa 53:5).”

America is the beautiful, but it’s also America the broken. Not any more so than it ever has been, but as it’s always been; in need of God’s grace that can be shared and modeled by all of us (2 Cor 5:18-21) who follow the itinerate teacher from Nazareth. We have citizenship in a far greater country than America – the Kingdom of Heaven. We must all leverage the power of grace so we can help our country “mend thine every flaw”. And may we, as Katharine Bates penned, “Confirm thy soul in self-control; Thy liberty in law!” … the liberty found in Jesus Christ (Gal 5:1; 2 Cor 3:17).

Play to win this week in the game that really counts!