The United States of America, my nation, will soon mark 250 years of the Declaration of Independence. Such an occasion is more than a historical anniversary; it is a call to action. It reflects not only where we have been, but also what we long to become.
As this moment approaches, I pray that the Church seizes the opportunity to remind America of the profound hope—and practical help—that God has entrusted to his people.
The Church, after all, was America’s first volunteer network. Long before civic and governmental infrastructures existed, congregations faithfully fed families, welcomed immigrants, cared for the vulnerable, and stitched together the fabric of our society.
Remember who we are in Christ.
This anniversary invites us to remember who we were and to remember who we are in Christ. It’s a call to reclaim the Church’s public witness, not through fanfare but through the faithful, tangible love that Jesus modeled and gives to us as our mission.
We aren’t just called to go to church. We’re called to be the Church.
Service encompasses concrete gestures such as bringing a casserole to a sick neighbor or donating blood at a mobile clinic. These activities can be a good start into a deeper and more durable fulfillment of Christ’s command to love.
“Love your neighbor as yourself,” Jesus tells us (Mark 12:31). Here, God gives us an ingenious command.
How exactly do we love ourselves?
How exactly do we love ourselves? We care for ourselves instinctively and holistically. We tend to our needs consistently—day by day, year after year. To love our neighbors as ourselves is to apply that same pattern of ongoing, attentive, holistic care toward others.
This posture of service and love is not a matter of sheer determination. It is rooted in God’s grace, flows from his Spirit and is nurtured by his Word.
Of course, it is challenging to translate this admonition into practical activity—as individuals or as a local church. In today’s fragmented culture, many of us don’t know our neighbors at all, let alone have a robust sense of their needs.
Thankfully, for a culture obsessed with listicles (articles about lists that are effectively content marketing), the Bible provides us a list to spark our holy imagination.
He encourages us to be peaceful and to strive to secure peace.
In the latter portion of Romans 12, Paul paints a portrait of Christian love: practice hospitality, do good, bless and do not curse, do not seek vengeance, mourn with those who mourn, and rejoice with those who rejoice. He encourages us to be peaceful and to strive to secure peace; to be “joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.”
Our communities and nations would be utterly transformed if we obeyed this list in the Spirit’s power. Flickers of the early Church’s fiery faith would emerge in communities all over our nation.
I have been blessed by the power of such love. A Lutheran minister helped my parents when they immigrated to America. An Irish Catholic family owned the basement apartment where we lived. We attended and were loved by a Korean Presbyterian church in my childhood. And a Baptist youth pastor shared the good news of Jesus with me.
Bound together by a shared gospel.
Our story, like so many immigrant stories, is woven together by believers of different traditions but bound together by a shared gospel.
And I have seen this same witness around the world. In Malawi, I visited a community where Muslim chieftains entrusted their children to a Christian vacation Bible school hosted by an Anglican church, staffed by Baptists and Pentecostals, and organized by Presbyterians. Why? Because they’d first encountered a holistic vision of the gospel being lived out in word and deed. Christians had helped to build sustainable fishing ponds. They’d developed resources to strengthen marriages and empower young mothers to start their own businesses.
Christians showed up and addressed real needs.
Christians showed up and addressed real needs, holistically and intentionally, over a long period of time.
This service restored dignity. This service brought healing and hope to communities. This service made the gospel not just credible but utterly compelling.
As America prepares for its 250th celebration, American believers can renew this legacy of service. I'm honored to join Good Neighbor Day America in calling churches and ministries across the country to participate in a nationwide day of service on May 16, 2026.
If you live in America, or an American serving elsewhere in the world, gather a group from your congregation and join the movement. Invite neighbors to join. Clean a local playground, partner with a school, support a shelter, ask your town leadership what needs to be done—or ask your neighbors what they need.
Use the resources that God has given you... to bless the community where he has planted you.
Most importantly, use the resources that God has given you and any relationship you already have to bless the community where he has planted you.
Help the Church everywhere to remember its identity in Christ by returning to his mission of humility and service. In doing so, we can help shape America’s story, not with fear or nostalgia, but with hope, resilience, and Christ’s enduring love.
Walter Kim has been the president of the National Association of Evangelicals in the USA since January 2020. He previously served as a pastor at Boston’s historic Park Street Church and at churches in Vancouver, Canada and Charlottesville, Virginia, as well as a campus chaplain at Yale University. He preaches, writes and engages in collaborative leadership to connect the Bible to the intellectual and cultural issues of the day.
