Let me try and hit this Q&A style:
Since Christ didn’t establish an earthly government, don’t we have to have allegiance to some government? Again, I’d point us back to the early church. They were told to be subject to the government, but that’s much different than being allied with the government. In the Roman Empire, many nations had to submit to Roman authority, but they wouldn’t see themselves as loyal to the government. Can you imagine the inhabitants of Judah pledging their loyalty to Rome? Christians would have been taught to be subject, respectful and obedient, but not allied with any human government.

But doesn’t it benefit the church to ally itself with the state? History says no. The alliance of church and state tends to strengthen the state and weaken the church. The church is the bride of Christ; can she unite herself with another partner and not have it be adultery?

Don’t Christians effectively have dual citizenship? I may have already spent too much time on this question (see “Good Citizenship” and “Alien Life”). However it often comes up in these discussions. We’re not dual citizens. When we were born again, we were born into the Kingdom of God, leaving the kingdoms of this world. The Bible speaks of it as a transfer. Paul, a Roman citizen, writing to the Philippians, Roman citizens, said, “Their mind is on earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven.” (Philippians 3:19-20) Our citizenship is in heaven. Powerful words, given the circumstances. We’re aliens here. Better yet, we’re ambassadors here, emissaries of the heavenly kingdom, living in a foreign country to act on our home nation’s behalf.

Aha! You mentioned Paul. He made use of his Roman citizenship. Shouldn’t we follow his example? That’s a good point, one that has troubled me in the past. In Acts 16 and Acts 22, Paul made use of his Roman citizenship to obtain legal benefits. While considering those passages, don’t forget this one: “Then Paul, knowing that some of them were Sadducees and the others Pharisees, called out in the Sanhedrin, “My brothers, I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee. I stand on trial because of my hope in the resurrection of the dead.”” (Acts 23:6) Do we also advocate joining Jewish sects on the same basis? No, those are all things that Paul counts as skubalon (translated as “dung,” “rubbish,” etc. in the English Bible; apparently it was a pretty strong term he used in Philippians 3:8). From what we can tell, Paul didn’t go around flaunting his Roman citizenship. He didn’t even mention it in Philippi until after he’d been flogged and imprisoned. The only citizenship he talks about in his letters is our heavenly one. I think we’re on shaky ground to try and justify as much as we do by appealing to what Paul did on those two occasions. If anything, we can justify using our citizenship if we are ever arrested in a foreign country. I might appeal to the embassy that my tax dollars support if I ever found myself in trouble in another country. (Is that hypocritical? Feel free to point out any inconsistency you see there)

So do you say the pledge? I no longer do, but I told my kids the other night that I wasn’t ready to tell them not to do so. I explained my reasons for no longer saying it. My wife explained that it was a similar clause in the application for citizenship that kept her from finishing that application (it also spoke of bearing arms, something she’s not willing to do for any country).

Do you consider yourself anti-American? Hardly. I love this country and appreciate many of the things that it provides for its people. I pray for the well-being of America just as I imagine that Paul, the Roman citizen, prayed for the well-being of Rome. Our goal is to spread the gospel. We pray for peace and well-being for all nations, in order that we might further that goal. An ill-tempered commentator asked me about Cuba the other day, saying that my visits there should make me that much more supportive of our government. The church is growing by leaps and bounds in Cuba, growing over 2000% in the last 25 years. I do pray that the government there will be more respectful of human rights; I pray the same for our government and all governments everywhere. I don’t pray for regime change; my kingdom is doing just fine in Cuba. Adverse conditions can often be good for the church. We don’t seek persecution, but we don’t flee it either. The testing of the church makes it stronger.

Let me close with a poem I wrote for an earlier post called “I Pledge Allegiance…”:

I pledge allegiance to my God,
All else falls far behind.
No land, no piece of earthly sod,
Can my obedience bind.
May my love for this world and the kingdoms thereof,
Not make me forget what I read in the Word.
My citizenship lies not here but above.
My true loyalty belongs to my Lord.

As we consider the Christian response to the Pledge of Allegiance, we have to find some way to attempt the almost impossible: separate the pledge from its context. Its very tempting to make this a discussion of the relative godliness of the United States compared to other nations. But that’s the wrong focus. The question is: what relation should Christians have to any Christian (ed.–oops, meant to say “earthly”) nation? This question becomes more and more relevant as the church grows faster outside the United States than inside. Do we encourage Christians in other countries to make a similar commitment to their governments?
Ethnocentrism is the belief that your people’s way is the correct way, that everything should be evaluated by how your culture does things. Years of hearing “We live in the greatest country in the world” lead us to accept that as fact, without considering how other people might view their particular country. Are we going to encourage Nigerian Christians to make the same sort of pledge to their government? Russian Christians? Colombian Christians? What if the United States went to war with one of those countries like Nigeria or Cuba where we have thousands of brothers? Would our pledge of loyalty lead us to take up arms against brothers in Christ?
If we are to teach Christians in the United States to pledge their allegiance to this country, we need to be prepared to teach the same to Christians in every country. Loyalty to human government is loyalty to human government. It’s right or it’s wrong, for every Christian.
“But our nation is more godly than other nations.” I love the U.S., but I don’t kid myself about the morality of our government’s actions throughout history. I know that the faith and religiosity of the American people is one thing, and that of our government is another. If you want to believe that this country has always acted in a godly fashion, I’ll leave you to that. I just know that “more godly than others” doesn’t cut it.
But it’s not about bashing the United States. It’s about our living as aliens and strangers, pilgrims and sojourners. We’re not at home here. Our allegiance lies elsewhere.

Well, you’re not much help! Just kidding. Since no one advanced any ideas about just what is being pledged, let me propose a few:
Literally we are pledging loyalty. Since the pledge was developed in the years following the Civil War in an attempt to unify the country, I’m guessing it was especially directed at southerners who still might feel resentment about the war.
I think that obedience is implied. That’s admittedly the part that scares me a bit. To some extent, the pledge is saying: “I will do what this country asks of me.”
To what extent are we pledging our loyalty? Some have said, “As long as the nation is under God.” How do we determine that? If we see that the government has done immoral things, do we stop being loyal? Let’s use the classic example: Nazi Germany. At what point would the country have lost your allegiance? Or would it have?
Can you picture Christians saying a pledge of allegiance to Rome? In any form? The Romans had a simple version of the pledge. It said: “Caesar is Lord.” Christians directly attacked that statement, countering with “Jesus is Lord.”
I’ve got some more thoughts, but I’d like to hear yours first.

I enjoy reading Al Maxey’s Reflections. I don’t always agree with him, but he always makes me think. He recently wrote about a subject that fits with what I’ve been talking about lately. Al wrote about the appropriateness of saying the Pledge of Allegiance. I’ve written some on this before. (see I Pledge Allegiance) My teaching in the last few years has been that, when we say the Pledge of Allegiance, we are always placing an asterisk at the end of the pledge. We pledge allegiance with the understanding that allegiance to God comes first. We pledge allegiance as long as the nation remains under God.
But now I wonder about that even. Just what are we pledging? What are we promising to do? I guess this is sort of like an oath, and oaths make me uneasy anyway. But I especially worry when I’m not even sure what I am pledging. What does it mean to be loyal to the flag and to the country? Up to what point? In what ways?
When I got married, I made a pledge to my wife (pledging her my troth, for those that like the old language). I understand what those vows involve. I’m not sure what these vows involve. And I’m not sure that I’m altogether comfortable with making a promise to an earthly kingdom. But I’m more than willing to learn, so please enlighten me with your views. Just what’s being pledged?