The flag I fly...

Last Saturday Joy and I went for a walk. As we were driving home our route took us through a town that had loads of Union Jacks and St George’s flags flying. Now, realise, we had recently got back from 3 weeks holiday…..so I found myself wondering, “had I missed some big celebration or national event?” When I got home, I did a quick google and quickly discovered the Unite the Kingdom event planned for London, and the nationwide campaign for people to fly the flag.

So, I would love to share a few thoughts. Very much my thoughts. You might disagree. And very much offered with our value of “gently done” in mind.

Raising my head above the parapet isn’t something that comes easy to me.

But give me grace as I attempt to. Give me grace as you read. Give me grace if you choose to respond.

Having spent lots of time in the US, I’m really aware of American patriotic fervour.

How they love to sing the national anthem at sports games – even high school games.

How they take their hats off and place their hand on their heart when the anthem is sung.

And how the Stars and Stripes is displayed on the platform of most churches.

From a faith point of view, I’ve always felt uneasy.

There’s a veneration of the flag that at best confuses our Kingdom-calling as Christians, and at worst, verges on idolatry.

In part, the emphasis on the flag and what it represents, feeds into the current state of politics in the USA.

So I worry when I see the focus on the flag here in the UK.

I worry about what this focus really represents, and am reminded that as a follower of Jesus, my first allegiance is to his Kingship and His Kingdom.

Please don’t hear what I am not saying.

I love the UK. I love living here. It’s a beautiful country with a rich history.

But as a Christian, I have been born again into a new kingdom. My identity is now “in Christ”. I am His. I live in this world, but do no belong to it. I am, as Peter writes, “an alien and stranger” – I belong somewhere else….and that “somewhere else” is where my allegiance is to lay. In fact, as we will see when we get there in our current series on Jeremiah, this is something that the prophet speaks about – in Jeremiah 29 he tells God’s people, that as exiles (as people who don’t belong) they are to “seek the peace…the shalom” of the city in which they find themselves. That is our calling as God’s people – to seek to bring God’s shalom to the towns and nations in which we find ourselves.

Seeking the shalom….

….I think will include aligning myself with God’s heart, will mean caring about the people that God cares about, standing against practices and ideologies that, I think, grieve God’s heart…and not just standing against, but maybe even calling out, and learning to view issues through a ‘kingdom lens’.

I get that politics is messy…that leaders will wrestle with what policy is good and best, and I get that can mean different things to different people. I get too, that even Christians will disagree on politics. That’s fine.

As Christians we are called to be wise as serpents and as innocent as doves (Matt. 10:16). I think Jesus means we are to be both wise and harmless as we navigate how best to live in this world.

So for me, being wise means acknowledging that, at the very least, the current “flag campaign” is to some degree (and we can debate to what degree) linked to nationalism, anti-immigration sentiment, and intolerance – and if that understanding is correct, then as a follower of Jesus, I must distance myself from it. And being innocent means I must seek to sow love where I see division – I am to live in such a way that brings healing, and does not perpetuate hurt.

As a follower of Jesus, I am to called to submit to authorities (Romans 13:1-2) and to pray for my leaders (1 Tim. 2:1-2), but I am called to declare, (and live in light of this declaration), that Jesus is Lord.

The flag that I fly must be the flag of His Kingdom, which, according to Song of Songs 2:4 is love.

p.s. Dr. Krish Kandiah recently released this short video – it’s aimed at children, but is wonderfully done. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAMOP4-dES4