This week Americans will celebrate Independence Day. The number of politicians who have announced their candidacy for President of the United States continues to grow. The Fourth of July offers us the opportunity to reflect on the history, values, and meaning of the United States. The upcoming national election in 2016 demands each of us reflects and expresses our vision for the nation’s future.

For Christians, it is easy to allow the loud voices of our nation and partisan politics to drown out the quieter voice of the Holy Spirit. If we are not careful we will confuse patriotism for America with Jesus’s call to seek God’s kingdom first. We run the risk of letting the platforms of candidates shape our political priorities rather than submitting our priorities to Jesus. In order to keep the values of God’s kingdom clear, and to ensure we are following Christ before a candidate or party, we must engage in that most basic Christian political act: prayer.

Until recently, Christians learned to pray by reading the Book of Psalms. In this collection of prayer-poems we find numerous prayers for the nation and its leaders. The psalms overflow with political speech. The writers show us God’s agenda and teach us how to prioritize it first. They teach us what kind of nations and leaders God blesses.

I published a devotional, The Politics of Praise: Devotional Readings on Psalms 72 & 146, that helps readers pray through these two very political psalms. Psalm 146 is a terrific prayer as we listen to candidates share their agendas. Praying this psalm allows us to see God’s agenda of creation, justice for the oppressed, and renewal for the abandoned. Psalm 72 is a prayer for governmental leaders, but it gives us an image of the kind of nation God blesses. As we celebrate this July 4th, let us think of the kind of nation God desires. This is a nation that prioritizes the weak and needy, the people on the margins.

The Politics of Praise is available in both the Kindle format and paperback at Amazon.