Make A Donation
Click Here >
fourth of july
As a kid, I grew up fishing and sailing on Lake Pontchartrain. I learned to respect the weather. One summer afternoon as I was standing near the Coast Guard Station at the mouth of the harbor, a vicious summer squall came roaring in. As I sat in the safety of the car, I watched a sailboat fight for survival. It was making a run to the safety of the harbor when the storm hit. It sat floundering in the high waves and brutal cross winds just at the entrance of the jetty that protected the harbor entrance. A few more feet and it would have found smooth water. Unfortunately, it was on the wrong side of the entrance.
For many Americans, the Fourth of July is important as it helps to define our national identity. For Presbyterians, Independence Day holds a special place in our collective consciousness.
The term “the road to war” is defined as the long and complicated process where various factors, actions and decisions lead to an outcome. This term can be applied to the events leading up to our own nation’s decision to fight for independence. On this “road to war,” two divergent visions of rights, freedom, governance, control and status clashed: the American vision and the British vision. And it was not until 1783, nearly eight years after the events in 1775 at Lexington and Concord, that a peace treaty would be signed in Paris.
Many preachers get a little antsy about preaching on and around secular holidays, among them the Fourth of July, Labor Day, Mother’s Day — and that biggest secular holiday of all, Super Bowl Sunday. In their minds, the culture and the church ought to be kept at arm’s length from one another.
The Declaration of Independence was an incredible document. For the first time in history, or at least for the first time in a history that lasted, it was declared that people have inalienable rights, endowed by God, that a government should protect and defend.
