Season & Savor: In-Dependence Day

Welcome to Season & Savor Sunday — because feeding our bodies is not enough.

I walk every morning in our neighborhood. It’s my thing; most days, my hubby joins me for a loop, then he heads home to get ready for the workday — since my boss is a little more forgiving (hint: it’s me!), I usually take another loop. Both times are special; connecting time, prayer time, my reset before the day takes over. But this week, something was different.

Flags. Everywhere.

Not just a few front porches. Lawn after lawn after lawn, smaller flags on stakes lining the grass, bigger ones flying from posts, American flags catching whatever morning breeze we’ve got up here at mile high. Red, white, and blue as far as I could see. And my heart just swelled.

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The good kind of swelling, I hope. Not the pride-goes-before-the-fall kind. Just the grateful, I-live-in-this-beautiful-country kind. You know the difference.

Yesterday, our neighborhood did what it has done since its inception — over 40 years ago, and for our family, 25 years worth. We throw a party. Not a little neighborhood cookout. I’m talking a thousand people, tents, a massive BBQ, lawn games, a fun run, a kids’ bike race, a legit parade, complete with a hook-n-ladder firetruck, floats and more, pool games run by our swim team coaches (pretty personal, since our boys spent their childhood on that swim team and our oldest was head coach a few years back), not to mention the famous belly flop contest. People come from all over: neighbors, guests of neighbors, and some as total strangers who somehow found their way here.

True story: someone from our neighborhood once sat next to a passenger on a plane, chatting about their 4th of July plans. The passenger mentioned they were headed to “this great neighborhood party.” Turns out it was ours. Our neighborhood. That actually happened. Or so I’ve been told — urban legend? Maybe. Great story? Absolutely.

We start every year with the national anthem. And here is where I lose it, every single time.

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The Boy Scouts

A few years back, it was a group of young Boy Scouts.

They were not polished. They did not nail every word. Standing up there in their uniforms, a little nervous, a lot proud, some of them working hard to remember the lyrics, they belted it out anyway. For us. For our neighborhood. For America.

I could not keep it together. Still can’t, just writing about it.

There is something about a kid who chooses to stand up and sing for their country that wrecks me in the best possible way. No irony. No performance. Just a boy in a scout uniform, hand over heart, looking up at the flag flying high near our pool, giving it everything he’s got.

That is America to me.

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What Holds It Together

I helped organize our parade for about seven years. Passed the baton a couple of years back, but I’ve watched this celebration grow from close up for a long time, and I still can’t fully explain why it works the way it does.

We are not a politically homogeneous neighborhood. Not even close. There are yard signs here every election season that represent just about every point on the compass. People disagree, sometimes loudly, sometimes quietly, sometimes across a fence.

And then July 4th comes, and we all show up anyway.

Nobody organizes the unity. Nobody gives a speech about it. It is just there, unspoken, an agreement that for this one day we are Americans first. We love this country — and we are going to celebrate its birthday together.

I think about that a lot, especially lately.

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What I Actually Believe

I’ll be honest with you, because that’s kind of the whole point of this space.

What I love most about this country is our freedom. Freedom to worship. Freedom to speak. Freedom to disagree and say it out loud and not disappear for it.

What scares me is our hatred. Our division. The way we’ve learned to see people who think differently not just as wrong, but as enemies.

And what keeps me steady? It is not a political party. It is not any government or institution or flag, as much as I love that flag.

It is Jesus Christ.

I am fiercely patriotic. My hand goes over my heart for the anthem, and I mean every single word. But my allegiance, my first and deepest allegiance, belongs to the Lord.

I celebrate this country. Fully, joyfully, gratefully. And I hold it with open hands.

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The Other Declaration

Here is the thing about Independence Day that I keep turning over in my mind.

We declared independence. From a king, from tyranny, from being told what to think and believe and worship. And it was right, and good, and worth the cost.

But the deepest freedom I have ever known did not come from independence.

It came from surrender.

“So Christ has truly set us free. Now make sure that you stay free, and don’t get tied up again in slavery to the law.” Galatians 5:1 (NLT)

“So if the Son sets you free, you are truly free.” John 8:36 (NLT)

Not free from difficulty. Not free from heartbreak, or from a country that sometimes breaks your heart too. Truly free. The kind of free that doesn’t depend on election results or the news cycle or who is in charge of what.

The kind of free that holds steady when everything else is shaking.

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Being a Light

I’ve been spending a lot of time in the Beatitudes lately. Matthew 5 is not a quick read, even though it’s short. Every verse has weight.

“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called children of God.” Matthew 5:9 (NIV)

Peacemakers. Not peacekeepers. There is a difference. Peacekeepers just keep the lid on. Peacemakers do the harder, slower work of actually building something.

And then there’s this one, which I’ll be honest, I find harder than almost anything in Scripture:

“But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also.” Matthew 5:39 (NIV)

I don’t think that means be a doormat. And here is something I’ve been sitting with lately that completely changed how I read this verse.

Jesus specifies the right cheek. In the ancient world, striking someone on the right cheek meant a backhanded slap — the kind reserved for someone you considered beneath you, an inferior, it was a putting you in your place. It was an act of humiliation, not just anger. But if you turn your left cheek toward them, you force a choice. They can back down, or they can strike you again — but now only with an open palm, the way you’d strike an equal. Suddenly the power shifts. Not through retaliation, but through dignity. The Bible Project puts it this way: turning the other cheek is a bold declaration that the aggressor holds no power to shame you, because your honor doesn’t come from human approval. It comes from somewhere else entirely. It can even open a door — pushing the other person to either back down or finally see you as an equal. (paraphrased from The Bible Project)

Jesus wasn’t telling us to absorb abuse. He was telling us to refuse to be diminished by it.

Don’t let someone else’s anger decide how you show up. Don’t let what divides us be the thing that defines us.

That is what I wanted to be at the party yesterday. Not the loudest voice, not the most right voice — nope, none of those things. Just a neighbor, a fellow American, a light. Just someone who shows up and loves the people around her, all of them, regardless of what their yard signs said last fall.

That is what He called us to. That is the freedom He bought.

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I stood in that crowd yesterday when the anthem played, and some kid up there got a word or two wrong but sang like they meant every single one of them, and I was the one with tears running down my face.

Not because everything is perfect. Because nothing is perfect and we are still here, still celebrating, still showing up for each other.

That is worth protecting. That is worth praising God for.

“What joy for the nation whose God is the LORD, whose people he has chosen as his inheritance.” Psalm 33:12 (NLT)

Happy semiquincentennial birthday, America. And thank you, Lord, for the freedom that holds when all the others feel fragile.

~ With grace at the table, and beyond

P.S. Brad and I watched A Great Awakening a few weeks ago, a powerful, powerful movie about how one person can change a nation. I highly recommend it!

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