Selected by reader, Brian, from DC
I stopped celebrating the 4th of July a long time ago. I stopped pledging allegiance to the US Flag more than 25 years ago. The most painful worship services I have been to in my life were in churches that had a full on “We celebrate the troops and the war” during the service. I cannot get past thinking that these things—done in church during worship services—is idolatry. We are called to be aliens and strangers in this land. The US is my current address but it is not my permanent home.

From John:
Brian and I have had many wonderful conversations via email. (I love hearing from readers!) I am so glad to have Brian’s voice regarding this post because I feel that Brian has a unique viewpoint, similar to views of Quaker and Mennonite communities. Some readers may agree or disagree with Brian and these well respected Christian groups. That’s okay.

This post made some readers on social media uncomfortable and was uncomfortable for me to write, being an extremely patriotic citizen who joyfully celebrates the 4th of July in my private life. But if what we read in the Bible only ever comforts us and never confronts us, causing discomfort, we might be missing part of what the Spirit wishes to say to us.

This post’s intention was never and is never to say “pledge” or “don’t pledge” to any flag or nation. (The post’s main concern is not what we do in our lives, but what we do in our worship services.) Instead this should call all of us to our knees before Christ to pledge that no earthly authority will be allowed to usurp His primacy. Brian has found where he feels God has called him to stand. We each must individually seek God’s face on this issue. May we do so with grace and humility.

Originally posted on July 3, 2018 with readings from Isaiah 65 and Matthew 13.

To a nation that did not call on my name,
I said, ‘Here am I, here am I.’
All day long I have held out my hands
to an obstinate people,
who walk in ways not good,
pursuing their own imaginations. — Isaiah 65.1-2

Reflection: Celebrating Earthly Kingdoms :: Readers’ Choice
By John Tillman

Celebrating the country in which one lives is not un-biblical but it can be a dangerous, idolatrous trap. In American churches, this past weekend (the closest to July 4th) many worshipers sang patriotic anthems with questionable theology or, in some cases, completely absent theology.

Hymnody has a long history of politically motivated and theologically dubious lyrics, usually expressing God’s divine blessing on the nation of the hymn writer. In 1778, New England hymn writer, William Billings, published this hymn as a declaration that the colonies were winning the war due to divine intervention. It’s a view that still survives in some quarters.

Let tyrants shake their iron rods
And slavery clank her galling chains
We see them not; we trust in God
New England’s God forever reigns.

Patriotism based on national pride is an easy idol to fall victim to. So is anti-patriotism. This is true whether anti-patriotism is based on national cynicism or idolatry of party instead of nation. Christians must avoid all of these.

In 1932 Germany, Dietrich Bonhoeffer struggled in a Memorial Day sermon with how patriotic days should be celebrated in his Berlin church.

When the church observes Memorial Day, it must have something special to say. It cannot be one voice in the chorus of others who loudly raise the cry of mourning for the lost sons of the nation across the land, and by such cries of mourning call us to new deeds and great courage.

It cannot, like the ancient singers of great heroic deeds, wander about and sing the song of praise of battle and the death of the heroes to the listening ears of enthralled young people.

Memorial Day in the church! What does that mean? It means holding up the one great hope from which we all live, the preaching of the kingdom of God.

No matter our country or party, by echoing jingoistic patriotic divisiveness we risk diluting the gospel of Christ. We must not be too enamored of any earthly kingdom. As Jesus said, our “kingdom is from another place.”

Wherever we live, we are in exile.
When we pray for our city, we are praying for the city of our exile.
When we pray for our country, we are praying for the country in which we are aliens, not citizens.

May we never settle for earthly kingdoms. May we yearn and long instead for Christ’s kingdom to come.

Prayer: The Call to Prayer
Know this: The Lord himself is God; he himself has made us, and we are his; we are his people and the sheep of his pasture. — Psalm 100.2

– Prayer from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Prayers from The Divine Hours available online and in print.

Today’s Readings
Ezekiel 3 (Listen – 4:41)
Psalm 39 (Listen – 1:49)

This Weekend’s Readings
Ezekiel 4 (Listen – 2:56) Psalm 40-41 (Listen – 3:57)
Ezekiel 5 (Listen – 3:28) Psalm 42-43 (Listen – 2:32)

Additional Reading
Read More The Seductive Idolatry of Politics
We must make sure we are pursuing actions that please Christ rather than pleasing human political kingdoms.

Read More about Temporary Victory
Elevating political victory to supreme importance is to confess functional atheism.

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Selected by reader, Lisa, from Gallatin, TN
I have family and friends that habitually critique the worship service immediately upon leaving. And, it’s usually critical and focused on some little obscure aspect of the service that has nothing to do with God. I firmly believe that the greatest surprise for all Christians will be what true worship looks like in heaven. With all the tribes, tongues, peoples, and nations that will be there from the beginning of time to the end… We, in our little bubbles, are clueless.

Originally posted on September 14, 2017 with readings from 2 Samuel 10 and 2 Corinthians 3.

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. — 2 Corinthians 3:17

Reflection: Inattentiveness in Worship :: Readers’ Choice
By John Tillman

As stodgy as C.S. Lewis sounds in his letter on Liturgiology (which we read together in two excerpts, here and here) one might mistakenly assume that he is campaigning for unilateral and unchanging homogeneity in worship style and liturgy. However, that is not the case. Lewis seems to appreciate variety, as long as the attention of the worshipers is drawn to God rather than the creativity of the celebrants.

Lewis chides his readers (Malcolm is a fictitious friend, standing in for Lewis’s reading audience) for casting judgment on the worship practices of others, making an appeal to variety within the community of the church.

Broaden your mind, Malcolm, broaden your mind! It takes all sorts to make a world; or a church. This may be even truer of a church. If grace perfects nature it must expand all our natures into the full richness of the diversity which God intended when He made them, and Heaven will display far more variety than Hell. “One fold” doesn’t mean “one pool.” Cultivated roses and daffodils are no more alike than wild roses and daffodils.

In a consumer society and culture, our identity is tied up in our tastes, and our tastes are broadcast through our criticism. The superiority of the role of worship critic is more attractive to us than the supplicative posture of a worshiper.

What pleased me most about a Greek Orthodox mass I once attended was that there seemed to be no prescribed behavior for the congregation. Some stood, some knelt, some sat, some walked; one crawled about the floor like a caterpillar. And the beauty of it was that nobody took the slightest notice of what anyone else was doing. I wish we Anglicans would follow their example. One meets people who are perturbed because someone in the next pew does, or does not, cross himself. They oughtn’t even to have seen, let alone censured. “Who art thou that judgest Another’s servant?”

We must cultivate in worship a certain kind of inattentiveness toward other worshipers and even toward the leaders—maintaining our attention on God as the focus of all our joined efforts.

*Excerpts from Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, C.S. Lewis.

Prayer: The Call to Prayer
For great is the Lord and greatly to be praised; he is more to be feared than all gods. — Psalm 96.4

– Prayer from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Prayers from The Divine Hours available online and in print.

Today’s Readings
Ezekiel 2 (Listen – 1:38)
Psalm 38 (Listen – 2:14)

Additional Reading
Read More about Idolatry of Identity
We desire marketable idols to identify ourselves as theological tastemakers.

Read More about Prayer for the Self-Centered
Feelings are, by nature, self-centered—true prayer is God-seeking and kingdom-focused.

Support our Work
Every week The Park Forum sends over 13,000 email devotionals around the world. Support our readers with a monthly or a one time donation.

Selected by reader, Charmaine from SF Bay Area, and reader, Suzanne
Charmaine: This is such a beautiful poem and a reminder of His unceasing patience and how the enemy uses intermediaries to blind us from Him. I continually come back to this, in times of turmoil and anticipation, for comfort and challenge.

Suzanne: This one really made my heart sing. Jesus waits with open arms for me! ME?!? He delights in me and is faithful to wait with open arms for me. I can’t wrap my brain around why He finds me delightful but I’m grateful beyond words that He does.

Originally posted on April 3, 2018 with readings from Proverbs 21 and Colossians 4.

Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. — Colossians 4.2-3

Reflection: Seeing the Lord :: Readers’ Choice
By John Tillman

Seeing the Lord—finally seeing him truly for who he is—is a huge part of the resurrection story. Perhaps seeing him truly as Lord is why so many did not, at first recognize him. He is not just a gardener. He is not merely a traveling scriptural scholar. He is so much more than a sea-side campfire chef.

May we see the Lord fully in this season of Easter. May we celebrate his mercy and take on the challenge of telling others what and who we have seen.

I Saw the Lord
By Matt Tullos

In the year of disappointment, loneliness, fear
in the year of confusion, desperation and chaos
I saw the Lord.

My eyes had been blinded by amusement, toys,
by savings and wealth
dreams and aspirations in the midst of the
sandcastles of my own self-importance.

My eyes were blinded by the temporal, until an
eternal God shook the doorposts of my soul.
He came to me. And I saw myself
for who I was outside of Him,
naked, dying, cold,
starving, and helpless.

He didn’t come in the sanctuary.
He didn’t come in the crowds.
He didn’t come in the ceremonies,
in the shifting dance of the day-to-day.
He came into my deepest closet of
hopelessness.

He didn’t come with four laws.
He didn’t come with three points and a poem.
He visited me at midnight when I least
expected to hear His voice.
He came to me at a time when
my hopes were dashed,
when my future appeared bankrupt.

He came to me when every solid foundation
seemed to collapse.
He came to me in the wilderness
of my own destitution.
He came to me in the poverty
of my own understanding.

He came to me when I laid down my toolbox
My first aid kit and my cookbook. He came to me!
Hallelujah! With a quick fix? No.

He came to me… with a list of seminars and
books to read? No.

He came to me and there was nothing,
absolutely nothing, I could offer
in my own strength.

The masks, alibis, and diplomas faded under
the light of His passionate gaze.
He didn’t need me. He didn’t need my talents.
He didn’t need my knowledge, my money,
or my influence.

On the contrary, He came to me because for the
first time in my life, I knew that I was
utterly helpless. I didn’t have the answers.

For the first time in my life I knew that
no word, no thought, no event would change me.
Only God. Christ alone could change my heart.

He came to me. He wrapped His arms around
me and said,

“My beloved, I’ve been waiting for you.”

(From And Now You Know the Rest of His Glory 1999)

Prayer: The Small Verse
Let me seek the Lord while he may still be found. I will call upon his name while he is near.

– Prayer from The Divine Hours: Prayers for Summertime by Phyllis Tickle.

Prayers from The Divine Hours available online and in print.

Today’s Readings
Ezekiel 1 (Listen – 4:47)
Psalm 37 (Listen – 4:21)

Additional Reading
Read More about The Lord Be With You :: Readers’ Choice
How many of us need to shed the circumstantial “god” for the reality of Christ.

Read More about Struggling with the Word
I found me in his Word because he put me there. God put me in his Word that I might hear him in the silence.

Support our Work
Every week The Park Forum sends over 13,000 email devotionals around the world. Support our readers with a monthly or a one time donation.