Good government is a gift from God and is worth celebrating. In the act of remembering, we consider our vocation of citizens and be more active in preserving the justice and peace that we have articulated in the Declaration and Constitution. We remember the fourteen generations and their hard work and sacrifices to give us this nation. We work as citizens to remedy our nation's flaws and seek "a more perfect union." And as Christians, we follow our conscience and do nothing contrary to God's Word.

The sign of the holy cross is one of the traditional ceremonies retained by Luther and other reformers in the Lutheran confession in the sixteenth-century Reformation. Luther urged in his Large and Small Catechisms that it continue to be used. This holy sign has been used in the church from apostolic times and continues to be used in our day.