Every year around the Fourth of July, something interesting happens. We become a little more aware of the country we share. Flags appear on front porches. Families gather around grills. Kids chase fireflies before the fireworks begin. For a few days, we remember that America is more than politics. It’s home.

I like that.
None of that troubles me.

Loving your country isn’t the problem.
Making your country sacred is.

Loving your country is a good thing. Gratitude is a virtue. Working to make your community stronger is part of loving your neighbor.

Christian Nationalism is a different animal altogether.

Patriotism says, “I love my country.”
Christian Nationalism says, “My country is uniquely chosen by God.”

Patriotism recognizes that every nation, including our own, is capable of both greatness and failure.
Christian Nationalism tries to make the nation sacred.

That’s the difference.
Patriotism inspires us to build a better country.
Christian Nationalism tempts us to baptize the one we already have.

The funny thing is, once you decide God is automatically on your nation’s side, you stop asking whether your nation is on God’s side.

One is an act of love.
The other is an act of idolatry.

It doesn’t start with a flag in the sanctuary or a politician holding up a Bible for the cameras.
It starts when Christianity stops asking, “How can we follow Jesus?” and starts asking, “How can Christianity help us win?”

That is a subtle shift, but it changes everything.

The gospel becomes less about loving enemies and more about defeating them. Neighbors become voting blocs. Justice becomes whatever advances our side. Faith becomes a tool for acquiring and maintaining political power.

The irony is difficult to miss.

Jesus consistently refused invitations to become a political strongman. When crowds wanted to make him king, he withdrew. When questioned by Rome, he insisted his kingdom was not built on the machinery of empire. Again and again, Jesus challenged religious leaders who had grown too comfortable with power instead of truth.

Christian Nationalism asks the Church to do precisely what Jesus resisted.

To be fair, many Christians are drawn toward Christian Nationalism for understandable reasons. They see a culture changing rapidly, worry about the future of their faith, and want to protect what they love. Those concerns are real.

But fear has always been fertile soil for bad theology.

The temptation is to believe that if Christianity can just gain enough political influence, elect the right leaders, or pass the right laws, the Church will be secure.

History tells a different story.

Every time Christianity has relied on government power to preserve itself, it has become a little less like Jesus and a little more like the empire it hoped to influence.

If this all feels familiar, it should.

The Church has made this trade before. Constantine offered Christianity political power, and Christians, being human, accepted. It seemed like a good deal.

It wasn’t.

What started as a movement centered on a crucified teacher gradually became a religion capable of blessing emperors, armies, and conquest.

We’ve seen this movie before.
It never has a happy ending.
Every empire thinks it’ll be the exception.
History keeps the receipts.

Europe spent centuries demonstrating how difficult it is to separate the gospel from the interests of the state once the two become partners.

The founders of the United States understood that danger well enough to reject a national church. They were hardly unanimous in their personal beliefs, but they recognized that government should neither establish religion nor favor one faith over another. Religious liberty protects everyone precisely because it privileges no one.

Ironically, one of America’s greatest gifts to Christianity has been refusing to make Christianity America’s official religion.

Christian Nationalism almost never introduces itself as Christian Nationalism. It usually presents itself as protecting tradition, preserving morality, or returning America to its roots.

Sometimes it looks like requiring public schools to read passages from the Bible, as Texas has recently chosen to do. Sometimes it appears in laws requiring the Ten Commandments to be prominently displayed in public classrooms. Sometimes it comes through public officials insisting that America is, by definition, a Christian nation that must be reclaimed. There are other examples, but they all follow the same pattern.

Funny how the government never seems interested in requiring students to read from the Qur’an, the Bhagavad Gita, or the Tao Te Ching. It’s almost like this isn’t really about appreciating religion.

Instead, it begins treating one religious tradition as though it deserves a privileged place in public life. Little by little, faith becomes a tool of the state, and the state begins wrapping itself in religious language. Before long, questioning government policy starts sounding suspiciously like questioning God.

That’s what happens when we start making the nation sacred.

And once a nation becomes sacred, people inevitably become expendable.

Immigrants become threats instead of neighbors. Religious minorities become suspects instead of fellow citizens. LGBTQ people become culture-war talking points instead of beloved children of God. The poor become burdens instead of people to be lifted up.

That’s the pattern. It isn’t because Christian Nationalists are uniquely cruel. Most are sincere people who genuinely believe they’re protecting both their country and their faith. The problem runs deeper than motives.

Whenever we convince ourselves that preserving the nation is God’s highest priority, people eventually become secondary to the cause. The nation has to be defended. The movement has to be protected. The “right people” have to stay in charge. Before long, neighbors become obstacles instead of people to love.

Jesus consistently moved in the opposite direction. Again and again, he interrupted systems, challenged institutions, crossed boundaries, and ignored the social lines everyone else insisted were sacred. He kept putting the person standing in front of him ahead of whatever everyone else thought needed protecting.

That’s one of the clearest differences between the way of Jesus and Christian Nationalism.

One asks us to make the nation sacred.
The other keeps reminding us that people already are.

Some Christians celebrate these moments as victories. I see them as warning signs.

The moment Christianity needs government preference to maintain its influence, it has already begun to forget the way of Jesus.

The Church turned the world upside down long before it had senators, lobbyists, school boards, or political action committees. It did it through compassion, courage, generosity, and a stubborn commitment to loving people the rest of society had written off.

If those things are no longer enough, the problem isn’t that the government has become too secular. The problem is that the Church has forgotten where its strength came from in the first place.

Here’s the difference.

Patriotism asks, “How can we make our country better?”
Christian Nationalism asks, “How can we prove our country is already blessed?”

Patriotism admits national failures because it wants the nation to improve.
Christian Nationalism often denies those failures because criticism feels like betrayal.

Patriotism values freedom of religion because it understands that faith cannot be coerced.
Christian Nationalism quietly prefers freedom for one religion.

Patriotism loves its country enough to tell it the truth.
Christian Nationalism spends its energy making the nation sacred.

Those are not small differences.

They shape the kind of nation we become, and the kind of Church we leave to the next generation.

The Church has never been at its best when it held the reins of political power. It has been at its best when it fed the hungry, welcomed the stranger, cared for the sick, challenged injustice, and reminded every empire that no nation stands above moral accountability.

That work does not require government endorsement.
It requires courage.

The Church doesn’t need special status.
It needs integrity.

It has never needed a seat at Caesar’s table nearly as much as it has needed the courage to flip Caesar’s table over. It doesn’t need politicians quoting Scripture. It needs people living it.

The healthiest faith doesn’t ask the government to do the Church’s work.
It asks the Church to do the Church’s work.

This week we’ll wave flags, light fireworks, and celebrate a nation that is still becoming what it promises to be.

Celebrate.
Give thanks.
Honor those who sacrificed for our freedoms.

Then remember something that’s easy to forget.

The most patriotic citizens aren’t the ones who insist America can do no wrong. They’re the ones who love it enough to tell the truth, confront injustice, and keep working toward a more perfect union.

The same is true of faith.
Following Jesus has never required defending a nation.

It has always required loving our neighbors, welcoming the stranger, caring for the vulnerable, telling the truth, and refusing to bow before the idols of wealth, power, or empire.

If America remains a place where people of every faith, and no faith, are free to live according to their convictions, Christians should celebrate that, not fear it. Religious liberty isn’t a threat to Christianity. It is one of the greatest gifts this country has ever protected.

So this Independence Day, fly the flag if you wish.
Sing the anthem.
Enjoy the fireworks.
Love this country enough to help it become more just.
Love your neighbors even more.
Nations become stronger when their citizens do that.

Churches become stronger when they stop trying to make the nation sacred.

Loving your country isn’t the problem.
Making your country sacred always has been.