4th Sunday after Pentecost Sermon
If you’re German, and it’s Octoberfest, you put on your lederhosen or dirndls, then go drink a lot of beer with friends and strangers. If you’re Japanese and it’s springtime, you wear kimonos, then go strolling amongst the cherry blossoms. And if you’re American, and it’s July 4, you do like Cynthia and I did Friday: you wear red, white, and blue and eat hotdogs and corn on the cob and watermelon, then listen to the neighbors shooting off fire crackers.
Why? Because that’s what you do. It’s human nature. Throughout time and place, every culture has done the same. We find our corporate identity through our traditions and customs – remembering where we’ve come from, honoring the values and ideals that validate our existence as a people (a tribe, a nation). And the way we do that is with holidays and costumes and food. It’s human. And it’s good. Because being human is good.
For us, as Americans, Friday marked the 249th anniversary of our country’s founding…which means we’ve now entered and begun our 250th year. July 4, 2026 will mark the quarter millennia of our nationhood.
For many, I imagine, this past 4th of July was like any other: the same customs, the same feelings, the same patriotic pride. For others, it was a conflicted day. I’d gone out for a walk and stopped to chat with my neighbor in his yard. He ended the conversation, “Well, happy 4th, anyway.”
Amongst all the other ruptures and tensions wrenching apart our national fabric, this July 4th was marked with the president’s signature on the so-called “Big Beautiful Bill,” a budget plan with sweeping consequences. There were certainly many who celebrated its passage, believing it will ultimately foster a better, healthier county. But it also leaves a huge swath of our citizenry in a state of outrage and dread: Where is this taking us? What will the consequences be?
And so, I’m sure many of you had a jarring reaction when you arrived at church and saw the American flag on such prominent display today. After all, one of my stated priorities is that – in returning each week to worship – we are returning to a sanctuary of worship, to a shelter from the chaos of our days, to a grounding in the elemental values of God. And national flags are – by design – potent symbols, with power both to inspire… and divide.
So let’s talk about this. I would like to take some time exploring the role of symbols – especially the way we choose to include them (or not) in our worship space. To be clear, St. John’s doesn’t have any official policy on this. But I do have a practice and rationale for the choices we make.
I choose not keep the flag on permanent display because the signs and symbols that define this space should be those that distinctly represent the faith of the Christian church. We come here to worship God. And as we do, we seek nourishment and renewal to this faith and our resolve to “be like Jesus.”
And so – here at St. John’s – the most important signs are those that line up right-smack on the center axis of this nave: the baptismal font as we enter; the altar as we face forward. These are the signs of Baptism and Eucharist – our principal sacraments that represent the heart of our understanding of who we are in Christ and who we are called to be as his followers. Everything in our faith radiates outward from this understanding. And then – also on that same axis (but lifted up) – we find two other prominent symbols. Before us is the cross of Christ – the sign of his suffering, obedience, and sacrifice. Behind us is the huge stained-glass window, with its central motif of that moment in Jesus’ ministry when he washed his disciples’ feet and told them to do the same. It was a symbol and gesture of humility and practical, servant love. And it is this same image we’ve adopted here at St. John’s to express our understanding of what it means to be a member of our parish. In fact [at the 10 o’clock service / later in the service] we’ll be welcoming six new members, gifting them with their own basin and towel.
And so the signs of our worship are those that denote and reinforce our primary loyalty to God. Our grounding identity is as God’s children and image-bearers, called to join Christ in God’s redeeming work of love and sacrifice. By necessity, this must be an identity that spans all borders, for we are one with God through Christ, whose love is without barrier or preference, save for God’s clear, preferential option for the poor. Throughout the Bible – New and Old Testament – this is clear: the people of God must prioritize the wellbeing of those most neglected or made vulnerable by the brokenness and division of this world.
But on those Sundays that fall on or near a significant national holiday, I choose also to include the American flag. Why? Because America is the context in which we principally live out our faith. It is this land and its creatures of which we are stewards. It is these people who are our most immediate neighbors. It is this government whose policies inform the conditions that affect everyone – both here and abroad. There is no way for us to be separate from our country. We are a part of it. And it is a part of us.
Our loyalty is to God and to the ways of God.
And America is the context. This is the place where our discipleship and faith will be proven. Or not.
So when you see the flag in worship, it is not a sign of that murky blending of church and state (that gets all churches and all states in trouble). No. It is there as a sign of our duty. In our country, as her citizens: Be like Jesus; make manifest the Kingdom of God; go in peace to love and serve the Lord, here and now.
Just as Jesus sent out his disciples, two by two, to prepare the way for Jesus to come, so we go out into our towns and cities as laborers in the vineyard, to proclaim the Kingdom of God in ways that resemble the work of Jesus. After all, the old mantra, “What would Jesus do?” still holds true. And if there’s any confusion about what that looks like, a safe list is found in Jesus’ own words when he summarized his ministry for the disciples of John the Baptist who was confused because Jesus wasn’t doing what he thought the Messiah should do:
Go and tell John what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have good news brought to them. And blessed is anyone who takes no offense at me (Luke 7:22-23).
The Episcopal Church has struggled with its national identity over the years. After all, the National Cathedral is, in fact, an Episcopal cathedral. As our presiding bishop recently wrote, “34 of the 56 signers of the Declaration of Independence were members of what became [the Episcopal] church after the Revolution, and 11 presidents, including George Washington, have professed our [version of the] faith.” [1]
He went on to write, “When religious institutions like ours enjoy easy coexistence with earthly power, our traditions and inherited systems can become useless for interpreting what is happening around us….[But to live] faithfully, we must see beyond the limitations of our tradition and respond not in partisan terms, but as Christians who seek to practice our faith fully in a free and fair democracy…. God calls us to place the most vulnerable and marginalized at the center of our common life, and we must follow that command regardless of the dictates of any political party or earthly power.”[2]
This clarity of mission must certainly stand at the center of the institutional church: How are we, as Episcopalians, as the parish of St. John’s, living out our mandate to be as Christ for the good of this nation? this world? This kind of clarity absolutely should dictate how we are making decisions in what we do and don’t do as a church. In fact (I’m pleased to say), this is exactly what the vestry has been working on for the past several months. In a few weeks’ time we’ll be sharing with you the details of our “We Choose Love” campaign.
But this kind of clarity is equally needful for us as individual Christians, guiding each of us in how we are choosing to live. Ultimately, what it reveals is our character – that we are (in fact) becoming “like Jesus.” And I can’t tell you how gratifying it is to me when I see just such love emerging through you.
For example, it is as a church that we choose to host four different 12-step group in our building each week, helping to provide sobriety and stability, community and hope for those struggling with addiction. But just yesterday I discovered there’s a member of our parish (entirely of her own volition), who – once a month – brings breakfast to both of the Saturday morning AA groups that meet here. That’s probably 60 people or more. I had no idea she did this. Her own child struggles with addiction, and in feeding them, she is feeding him. For so it is in the Kingdom of God. We all are one. And so it is, that the Kingdom of God is made manifest here, through her and her one act of obedience and love.
Or I think of another couple in the parish, who – over and over again – have opened their home to create a safe and welcoming place for teenagers whose own families have rejected them because of their transgender identity. And, you know, what’s more important than the politics or ethics surrounding any transgender issues, is the loving hospitality being offered a youth who has been rendered homeless because of it. That is the truer virtue.
And it is to such virtuous living that we are called to live.
It is not easy, I know. It is always a risk to choose another’s well-being, especially when it threatens our own comfort and security. The way of Christ, after all, must eventually bring us to the Way of the Cross.
But there will also be joy along the way.
Like it was for the seventy disciples who Jesus sent in mission as laborers in the harvest, there is joy in doing this work of God. There is joy in being part of healing and hope and restoration.
Let not our faith be rendered as some small or selfish thing. Let it become the joyous thing of becoming partners with God in bringing life to this world.
[1] The Most. Rev. Sean W. Rowe, Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church, in an opinion piece published in Religion News Service, July 3, 2025.
[2] Ibid.