June 14th is Flag Day and I have a confession:
I had no idea what this day meant or why America even had it.
I would see it on the calendar and year after year it came and went and I barely even nodded at it. But, this year I decided to look into what this day means for me and for our country. By definition, Flag Day is to commemorate the adoption of our United States flag, a resolution signed on June 14, 1777. The idea to celebrate this day came to a teacher in Wisconsin who wanted to celebrate our flag’s birthday with his students in 1885, but it didn’t become a national holiday until May 30, 1916.
Our nation’s flag has seen us through many storms. It is no secret that this beloved country of ours is flawed and broken. If one person is happy about a direction we are heading there is someone else who is equally upset. But along the way, whether happy or disappointed, I have fallen in love with this flawed country and the flag that represents it.
The landscape over which this flag waves is beautiful, bursting with bright, sandy beaches, mountain tops, hillsides, vast prairies, and hot deserts. We have stunning coastlines, forests, caverns, farmland that stretches forever and thriving metropolis cities. This scenery is a breathtaking picture of what our flag stands for.
If we long for change, we have a voice; we can stand up for what we believe in and do it in a way that can create the change we desire. United we stand, divided we fall. The men and women who have died to give us this right is a sobering picture of what our flag stands for.
Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
~The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776
Through all of the highs and lows, policies, presidents and problems, one thing remains constant through it all, our flag. Franklin K. Lane, Secretary of the Interior in 1914, gave a Flag Day address in which he repeated words he claimed the flag had spoken to him that morning: “I am what you make me; nothing more. I swing before your eyes as a bright gleam of color, a symbol of yourself.”
Did you catch that? I find that quote to be so incredibly descriptive of what this country is. “I am what you make me; nothing more.” Take a few moments today and remember what this country has given you, your friends, and your family. No, this land isn’t perfect. Yes, we have a lot of work to do. But it only takes a few seconds of deep thought and perspective to realize how blessed we are here in America and that is what our flag waves over… a blessed land and a blessed people.
