Can Christians pledge allegiance to Country?<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
 
Can a Christian pledge allegiance to Country, or is that a sin against God, a type of idolatry, a kind of disloyalty?  To answer that question, let's consider two ideas together since I believe one idea helps clarify the other.  Let's consider both Allegiance to God and Love to God. 
 
God requires our highest allegiance and love.  Compared to other loyalties and loves, the others are as if hate: "If anyone does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, and come after me, he is not worthy of me", and other similar statements Jesus made.  These days, we know little of either loyalty or love.  Because of the emphasis on self – self aggrandizement, self esteem, self image, self promotion, self improvement, self love – there is little comprehension of allegiance or duty to others.  Because of the <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />Hollywood image of love, we typically don't know what real "love" actually is.  We categorize it as an emotion, a feeling, a positive goose bump.  God-type love is more a commitment for the benefit of the one loved, a protection for the ultimate good of the one loved, a sacrificial – even humbling – service to the one loved.  Jesus demonstrated all of this in his love.  Our love of God causes us to not be ashamed of God, to serve God, to worship God, to be humbly grateful to God, to obey God ("one who has my commands and keeps them loves me"), to enjoy fellowship with God, to value the presence of God, to emulate God in Jesus.
 
Is Jesus teaching that we love only him alone, and literally hate our family?  No. Jesus taught that to hate someone without a cause is tantamount to murder.  He taught us to honor our father and mother – not hate them.  We are told to love our spouse as our self. Husbands are to love their wife as Christ loved the Church. That's a high love! However, it is subordinate to our love for God.  We are told to love our children, and that proper, wise, caring, judicious discipline is part of that love (as exemplified by God to his children). Yet, by comparison, those loves shared on earth are as "hate".  As an example, the brightest light we can make on earth, when compared to the sun, is as nothing.  There are stars literally millions of times brighter than our sun.  Our brightest manufactured light would be as "darkness" compared to their unimaginable light.  And God's light, God's love, is far brighter still. 
 
Continuing the analogy of love and allegiance, we are to love God continually with ALL our heart, soul, mind and strength.  Yet we are told to love our spouse, our children, our parents, our neighbors, and even our enemies.  How can we do that when we already gave "ALL" our love, in its full measure and from every source and at all times, to God?  How?  This answer comes to my mind: We do it because love when divided is not diminished and when given is not diluted or exhausted.  For example, a parent loves a child with all the parent's love.  They can't generate any more love.  Yet, another child comes along, and that same parent loves that new child with all the parent's love. But wait a minute: the parent ALREADY gave ALL love to the other child.  How can this be?  Because, love when divided is not diminished, and love given is not diluted or exhausted!  In fact, that same parent already, before the children arrived, gave all love to a spouse.  Moreover, that same parent can still give all love to a third child, ad infinitum.  Love divided is not diminished and love gifted is not diluted or exhausted. 
 
But there can be, and is, a hierarchy to loving.  We love God highest.  We love our spouse, only in this hierarchical sense, above our children but somehow less than God.  We love our children above our parents, friends and neighbors. There's an ordinal priority within our love. 
 
So, we love God above all.  Because we love God (if for no other reason), we obey Him, and that obedience includes loving our spouse, children, parents, neighbors, etc. ALL this WITHOUT lessening or diluting our love for God; and without thinning our love for any persons loved.  Yet, all those other loves are ordinally ranked under God – and comparably should be "as hate." 
 
Now let's apply that to allegiance.  The concepts of allegiance and love are transposable here.  We can love and give allegiance both to God and to Country.  Love of and allegiance to one's Country does not diminish or dilute love of and allegiance to God.  Love of God is ordinally above Love of Country.  If Country contradicts God, God overrules.  That's also true of spouse, parents, friends, etc.  God's position, rank and priority is above all.  One's allegiance to God is not lessened or lowered by allegiance to Country.  If Country takes a position clearly against God, our higher allegiance is to God and we disobey Country.  Our allegiance to God informs our efforts to mold our country through voting or political activity or educating our children. If our Country says we cannot preach the Bible, we still preach the Word.  If Country says we cannot pray, then like Daniel we still pray.  If our Country says we cannot share our faith, then in an obedience to God like the Apostles, we go on sharing what we know is true.  Jesus is Lord. If Christians do not vote as Christians and govern themselves as Christians ought, then the time may be near at hand when Christians in America find this God –v– Country choice a daily reality.
 
It must be noted here that God's requirements of individuals compared to his requirements of nations are not the same, and are in some instances opposite.  Jesus' standards of conduct for individuals do not apply in the same way to nations.  The Sermon on the Mount, for example, was to the disciples, to individuals, not to governments.  The Bible specifically and clearly gives different commands, regulations and rules of conduct to governments than to individuals. 
 
Our highest, first and strongest allegiance, our only ABSOLUTE allegiance, is to God.  We have allegiance to spouse, children, parents also – but that allegiance is subordinate to the demand and claim of God on us.  In our allegiance to God, obedience to God overrules any contradicting or interfering allegiance to any other person or entity.  "We ought to obey God rather than men."  But that does not mean we never obey man.  It does mean allegiance to man is subordinate to allegiance to God.  Similarly with Country.  Joshua required allegiance of his troops.  David inspired extraordinary allegiance from his men both to him and to Israel.  Nehemiah and Ezra demanded allegiance of their people to the nation of Israel.  As I read it, allegiance to Country is not forbidden in any Scripture taken in context as understood by the writer and by the people to whom it was originally written.  The notion that it is always sin to pledge allegiance to country is misguided.  It is proper to pledge allegiance to Country as we do it "under God" signifying that our first allegiance is to God.