Today is a cheerleading sort of day.  I am tempted to pull a couple of pom poms from behind the pulpit, wave them in the air and shout out go team.  On this day of so much action and activity, words may seem a bit superfluous.  But I have heard a rumor that the personnel committee is considering paying us by the word,  so I will hedge my bets by at least offering a few.
 
The sixty-fifth psalm, which we heard this morning,  is a cheer of sorts.  It is usually categorized as a song of praise or a communal song of thanksgiving.  It is often associated with the autumn harvest festival of the ancient Jewish people.  In the midst of all of the good work we are engaged in across the city this day, it would be easy to get caught up in how wonderful we are and lose track of God today.
 
But this offering of the psalmist to God continually points in the direction of the divine.  “Praise is due to you, O God in Zion; to you vows shall be performed...you who answer prayer...you are the hope...you are girded with might...you silence the roaring of the seas...you make the gateways of the morning and the evening shout for joy...you visit the earth...you water its furrows abundantly...you crown the year with your bounty.”
 
 A professor at Princeton seminary, has an tongue in cheek expression she uses when a student in one of her biblical studies courses goes a tad too far afield in their analysis of a text.  “It’s all about God, stupid.”  That is what this text reminds us and what this flurry of activity today is really all about.  Mitzvah day is not about patting ourselves on the back because we are such good people.  It is not about how we are going to single-handedly fix all that is wrong in this world.  It is not about helping others because we feel guilty that we are materially better off than many of the people who live in this city. All of our good work today is done in joyful response to our God who has blessed us with the amazing creation that surrounds us.

All that we are and all that we have is a gift from God, and on this day we are expressing our gratitude to God by seeking to serve God’s children here in Buffalo.  Just as we worship God with music and prayers, we also worship God with our actions in this world.

I have already noted how this psalm has a history of being used during thanksgiving like harvest rituals in ancient Palestine.  But there is an interesting secondary connotation to this psalm.  The verbs that celebrate God’s awesome deeds, and salvation, and hope can also be interpreted as imperatives.  In other words, this psalm can not only be read as a song of praise to God but also as a plea for God’s intercession.

I find this dual meaning particularly appropriate today as we engage in this vital event of Mitzvah day.  As we come together to serve in harmony, Christians, Muslims, and Jews, we are all too aware that our little song can be drowned out by the roar of violence and prejudice which spans the globe and much of the history of humanity.  Our efforts alone will not transform the myriad of geopolitical nightmares our world is enduring in the name of religious faith.  And our efforts here in Buffalo will not be sufficient either to cross all of the boundaries we face or to bring healing and hope to all of the downtrodden people we will seek to help on this day.
 
But that is the nature of our human place in the world.  We cannot take credit for the amazing gift of this creation which surrounds us, and we cannot fix all the ways it has become broken.  What we can do is respond with joy to our loving and generous God who has given us so much.  We can go out into the world, or at least our little corner of it, trusting that our faithful efforts will be used by the divine as part of a larger effort of mending all that has been broken.  We can go out into the world with the promise that one day all of creation will sing in grateful harmony to its creator.

So let us indeed cheer this day.  Let us celebrate our generous God.  Let us go out into the world with gratitude for all that God has done creating this world and with the deep hope that God’s work is not finished in this world.  Let us trust that each and every small gesture of healing and wholeness that we offer, is being sewn together by God into a tapestry that will color of all of creation into a reflection of God’s loving glory.

Amen.