“America, America, God shed His grace on thee!” The words are part of American, the Beautiful, a prayerful song that Katherine Lee Bates scribbled quickly into her notebook in 1893 after making a trip to the top of Pikes Peak. She recalled the setting. “One day some of the other teachers and I decided to go on a trip to 14,000-foot Pikes Peak. We hired a prairie wagon. Near the top we had to leave the wagon and go the rest of the way on mules. I was very tired. But when I saw the view, I felt great joy. All the wonder of America seemed displayed there, with the sea-like expanse.” Bates, a college professor and pastor’s daughter, had seen the urban misery that the industrial revolution had brought to millions. She despised the discrimination and sexism that was entrenched in society at the time. Yet, she knew the wonder that was America and her song is an impassioned plea for the beauty to overcome the darkness.
More than a century later there has been much progress, but we are a deeply divided nation. Racial, economic, political, and religious divides are deep chasms. Our 24/7 news channels pour fuel on the fires of division and cause too many to believe that this kind of division is unprecedented in our history. Not so, friend! Ours is not the first generation of Americans to be confused by rapid change, nor are we the first to grapple with problems that threaten to tear us apart. Intrigue, pride, greed, and betrayal were very much a part of the lives of the ‘fathers of our nation,’ though we tend to romanticize them and think of them only as wise, noble, and self-sacrificial people. The mid-19th century’s fights over slavery were brutal and led to a war that cost 600,000 lives! But, America lives on. Let us remember this 4th of July that we are a blessed nation, rich, powerful, and still a place of opportunity unlike any other nation in the world.
Christian we are citizens of two ‘kingdoms.’ We are first servants of Christ, called by God
to live under His reign to serve His purposes.
Transformed by the Spirit we are invited to love God and others in His
Name. We are able, supernaturally, to live honorably as citizens of these
United States. I am humbled to call
myself a Christian and glad to be an American.
I pray that my first calling makes me a better citizen of this great nation. The true Church, with her treasure of the Gospel of Christ, remains the true hope of America, and the world. However, it is not a “Sunday religion” that will make a difference. Only disciples who are totally committed to Christ’s call to love will rise above the noise of strife with a welcome to His peace. Christians cannot join the hate, the intolerance, the racism, the greed, and the xenophobia that infect our nation like a wasting disease! We are people of hope, our vision inspired by the promise of an eternal home where there will be just rewards and judgment. If America is to be peaceful and prosperous, we who are in Christ must lead the way from ‘me first’ attitudes that seek only our own good to that kind of nation for which Katharine Lee Bates prays in the song that seems almost naïve in our time.
Happy Birthday, America. On this Independence Day, I pray for a true spiritual renewal that goes beyond a civil religion of kindly ethics, a place where Christ is Lord and we are people who share in the ‘abundant life’ that He gives.
The word from the Word is an invitation and a promise for citizens of the Kingdom of heaven. These words are not to be mistakenly applied to our beloved country, but rather to help to understand our true hope as those who live in the care of the King of Heaven.
"The nations will see your righteousness.
Kings will be blinded by your glory.
And the Lord will give you a new name.
The Lord will hold you in his hands for all to see—a splendid crown in the
hands of God.
Never again will you be called the “Godforsaken City” or the “Desolate Land.”
Your new name will be the "City of God’s Delight" and the
"Bride of God,"
for the Lord delights in you and will claim you as his own.
Your children will care for you with joy, O Jerusalem,\
just as a young man cares for his bride.
Then God will rejoice over you as a bridegroom rejoices
over his bride." (Isaiah 62:2-5, NLT)
(Video of this blog at this link)
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(Ray Charles does it right!)
O beautiful for heroes proved in liberating strife
Who more than self their country loved
And mercy more than life
America, America may God thy gold refine
Till all success be nobleness
And ev'ry gain divine
O beautiful for spacious skies
For amber waves of grain
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain
America, America God shed His grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea
O beautiful for pilgrim feet
Whose stern impassioned stress
A thoroughfare for freedom beat
Across the wilderness
America, America God mend thine ev'ry flaw
Confirm thy soul in self control
Thy liberty in law
Katharine Lee Bates © Words: Public Domain
