This is a turning point in American history. 

While still grappling with a global health and economic crisis, civil unrest, and rioting, we received a string of devastating and unexpected decisions from the Supreme Court that undermine religious freedom, the Constitution, and the right to life. 

It is hard not to be discouraged by the many challenges facing our country, but this is also an opportunity for our country to make lasting changes for the better and for people of faith to provide light in a dark time.  

Right now, there is a significant and pressing need for the body of Christ to rise to unprecedented levels of unity and solidarity regarding religious liberty, the sanctity of human life, limited government, and God’s design for marriage and family. 

Because if we are passive and silent, we may live in an America where the 4th of July isn’t a celebration, but a memorial of how America used to be. 

Ronald Reagan famously said, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”

As our nation carries forward in the struggle to correct injustice and create a more perfect union for all Americans, we must also preserve the core principles of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. 

We must strive to impact our culture and government in support of traditional family values, the sanctity of life, limited government, personal freedom, and original intent of the Constitution while revealing the truth about the failures of socialism and the blessings of liberty to every American. 

The battle we find ourselves in today is not a physical conflict like that which was fought for our nation’s independence, but we are engaged in a conflict that will determine our country’s future.

Our nation is locked in a great ideological battle between progressive socialism and individual liberty, and between secular humanism and Judeo-Christian values. 

We should engage in this battle not just out of love for country, but out of love for God and love for our neighbor. 

It will take courage, commitment, conviction, and character.

Courage to stand firm in the truth, even when it costs us something. Commitment to our principles and values, even when they’re not popular. Conviction to do the right thing, even when the world calls evil good and good evil. And character to act honorably, correct the shortcomings in our own lives, and love our neighbors as ourselves. 

In 1776, Thomas Paine wrote, “THESE are the times that try men’s souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.”

As we pause this weekend to celebrate America’s independence, let us not only celebrate our freedom, but recommit ourselves to fighting for and passing on the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness to our children and our children’s children. 

And as believers in Christ, let’s do it with a joyful spirit, bearing light to the world like a city on a hill that cannot be hidden. 

“Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty.” 2 Corinthians 3:17 

Nate Grasz

Nate Grasz

Policy Director
Nate is the Policy Director at Nebraska Family Alliance and host of the Capitol Report program.