This morning I was struck by a tweet from the US Marine Core (@USMC) wishing Marines a happy Flag Day. The tweet quoted Ronald Reagan, who declared in a presidential proclamation that “when we honor our flag we honor what we stand for as a Nation – freedom, equality, justice, and hope.”

As you might imagine, I struggle with what it means for Christians to pledge “allegiance” to a flag, a nation, or a government. I believe my allegiance is due to God alone. But what struck me this morning is how closely Reagan’s expression of American ideals parallels my own understanding of the kind of society Christians should be striving for. By devoting allegiance to God alone, we can nonetheless commit ourselves to helping the U.S. achieve its own ideal of being a society characterized by “freedom, equality, justice, and hope.”

Yet in the American public discourse, this fourfold list of ideals has too often been reduced to the single value of “freedom.” In our national rhetoric, soldiers have dedicated their lives to “preserving our freedom.” True enough. But if Reagan is right, they have also dedicated themselves to preserving the equality, justice, and hope that should characterize us as a nation. Why do we celebrate “freedom-loving” Americans, but not equality-loving Americans, or justice-loving Americans, or hope-loving Americans? We have reduced the American vision to one of freedom alone, with scarcely a thought of the equality, justice, and hope necessary to turn freedom into something truly beautiful.

As a Christian, it seems to me that it is in fact these other three terms that are central to the faith. The Bible scarcely mentions freedom—certainly not in the sense of an individual’s right to do whatever they want. Rather, when the Bible speaks of freedom, it most often refers to shaking off the shackles of sin, setting us free precisely to love one another. Jesus declares as much in his summary of the law as loving God and neighbor (Matthew 22:37-40). So, too, Paul tells the church in Rome that the core of the Christian life is that “love does no wrong to a neighbor” (Romans 13:10).

In other words, for a Christian, freedom isn’t the end goal. Rather, freedom is only good to the extent that it results in love of neighbor. For the Christian, freedom has no value unless it recognizes and empowers the inherent worth of every single person we encounter. Freedom is nothing without love. Freedom is nothing if it disregards the dignity of any human being. Freedom is nothing if it does not secure justice for the poor and the oppressed. Freedom is nothing if it doesn’t give even the most downtrodden among us hope for a better future. Freedom is nothing if it doesn’t result in neighbors loving one another.

For me as a Christian, Flag Day means respecting the flag (and the republic for which it stands) enough to engage in the struggle to achieve these ideals—not only of liberty but also of justice for all.