“But I am an American. I am a Christian. I have a duty to God and Country.”
This is the statement that started the conversation for last Tuesday. I did not give much background information, just posited a statement that was made on another site. I also said that it bothered me but not how or why. Then I gave all of you the opportunity to respond and you gave some excellent thoughts about the whole issue of duty.
Duty, as stated by one of the commentator’s, has a definition that anyone can look up in the dictionary. I did it and most do. When we do this we see that out of all the listings it boils down to basically two different things can be meant by the word.
It can mean a duty is something that you have to do or should do because of your job or some role that has been assigned to you. While in the army of this nation it was my duty to fight because of the job I took and the role I was given, not to mention the oath that I took. But it is also the duty of the janitor to sweep and mop floors. It is his duty, in this sense of the word, because it is his job. We tend to reserve the word duty, in this definition, for people that are a little higher profile than the janitor, but we shouldn’t.
Now the second sense, or definition of the word, is that duty is something we ought to do. Morally, legally, or spiritually I really ought or owe something to someone.
Read the last statement again and maybe you can “foreknow” or “foresee” what bothered me about the statement.
If duty, as the statement is implying, is something I owe, then it has to be to someone or some group of someone’s. In my view, the statement we started with has a couple of things wrong with it. First the implication is there that being an American and being a Christian are somehow equal and can be true. Before some of you get mad at me, I know we are Americans. But only in the sense that we live on a certain piece of dirt not in a sense of true identity. As people, Americans are not anything special. I am a Christian because the One who made that certain piece of dirt, and even made us out of some of it, chose to adopt me into His family thereby guaranteeing my eternal citizenship in the Kingdom of God. (Christianity) And we are special people.
As one of you stated “my allegiance is also to the Lamb” and therefore cannot be to the USA. This is a recent change in me, by the way. I can live here, work here, raise a family here, and even fight to protect what I have here, but it is still so very temporary. And I do not owe anything to America.
“Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country.”
This was a moving statement, provoking a sense of duty, possibly at a time when it was needed. But it is still a load of hogwash. (What is hogwash?) I believe you get what I mean.
A nation, especially this supposedly great nation, is supposed to be set up to serve and represent the people in it. Do I need to capitalize people here? This would be a time when I could go along with the sense of owing a nation, if it was meant to owe a group of people. But the United States is not a servant of the people anymore and according to JFK we shouldn’t even expect it to be. This nation stopped being about people a long time ago and instead is a machine grinding out one new group of self interested parties after another.
I owe it nothing. This country never made me, it never cared for me, and it never saved me. This country is an it. It is a place to live. It is a piece of dirt. I am paying monthly for my little piece of dirt so what else do I owe. The ones I am buying my dirt from bought it from someone before them, who bought it from someone before them,… who stole it from someone before them, who took it from someone before them,… who parked themselves on it and claimed it as their own before them, while the One who truly owns it all just has to be laughing at our ideas about possessions.
I do not believe we owe or have a duty, as implied in the statement starting all of this, to any nation. I am conservative in most of my values but getting more liberal in my affections every day. I believe this is what becoming Christ like is all about. I owe nothing to any entity but do owe all to God and also to you.
So many conservatives lashed out at every compassionate attempt at a solution to the illegal immigrant issue. (Which has been waylaid again) There have always been objections, and I think rightly, to any plan that lets someone come and be a citizen here if they are not willing to learn the language and forsake their allegiance to the country they are leaving. But Christian Americans are hypocritical in this sense. We just don’t want to forsake our allegiance to America for the Kingdom.
That seems to be because some of us have mistakenly believed America is the Kingdom of God here on earth. But we have fellow citizens all over the world. Some are even being blown up by American Christians right now. America never was a Christian nation and it never will be, unless God annexes it into the New Jerusalem. It was a nation founded on Judeo Christian values and that is that. Freedom of religion was a guaranteed right, from the start, no matter how many of the founders were Christians themselves. They seemed to understand what we sometimes don’t and that is, that this Kingdom we are supposed to be a part of is not a Kingdom advanced by the sword, but instead experiences growth only through loving service to PEOPLE themselves, not to a nation or any piece of dirt.
I am an American by definition based on where I live, but I am a child of the King, a citizen of The Kingdom of God, and an Ambassador for Christ and His Kingdom while he leaves me here on this piece of dirt called America.
To answer my own questions; I don’t like the statement and believe it to be false as stated, I have a duty to the God that saved me and He really only expects that as a loving duty and not coerced, and I don’t owe this nation a thing. It owes me the protection and service that it was set up for and even that I have to pay for. So that even proves that in one sense of the word, America has a duty to me. It is its job.
Love you all
Tags: allegiance, America, Christian Americans, Christians, Compassion, Conservative, God, god and country, Jerusalem, Kingdom, Liberal, Love, Self, Servant, USA, Work
Yesterday was Memorial Day, a holiday that is supposed to be in honor of fallen soldiers of the armed services of the USA. The wars that this country has been in have been devastating in many ways to young soldiers and families of all kinds.
We live in a great time in history. The levels of comfort, convenience, information, entertainment, and leisure, among other things, have never been found in history like it is now. Some of us enjoy the study of history and may even dream of living in some bygone era.
With my limited ability I do my best to teach two classes a week at church. I read the bible a lot, read all sorts of forums and blogs and try to interact with both Christian and non Christian to a degree. I pray. I will discuss God and the Kingdom with anybody at anytime. I write these blog articles and try to promote it and my brother’s blogs also. I pray before meals in restaurants and in hospitals while visiting family. I try my best not to even make a promise that I am not sure I cannot keep, much less lie. I am not ashamed of the gospel or my Savior in any way.
If we were to unpack this statement we could find many things in it but the focus here will be on Rights. Three of the Rights that supposedly were self evident to the framers of the document are the right to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. These Rights are also supposedly given to us by our creator.
