The Price of Freedom: Living Like It Cost Something

This Memorial Day, don’t just remember the fallen — honor them by how you live.

They didn’t come home.

Not for barbecues.

Not for mattress sales.

Not for a long weekend of lounging around and pretending the world is fine.

They didn’t come home — so you could.

Memorial Day isn’t a party. It’s a pause.

It’s not about “supporting the troops” (that’s Veterans Day). It’s about mourning the ones who didn’t make it home. It’s the one day a year where America is supposed to go quiet for a minute and reckon with the cost of its own existence.

But let’s be honest — most people won’t.

They’ll scroll. Grill. Sip cold drinks.

And they’ll miss it.

They’ll miss the sacredness of it.

Because this day isn’t about what you do. It’s about what they did.

Real people. Real names. Real blood.

Not statistics. Not faceless soldiers.

Kids fresh out of high school. Dads with pictures of their kids folded in their vests. Women who ran toward the sound of gunfire so others wouldn’t have to.

They gave up every birthday that came after.

Every chance to fall in love, or tuck in their child one more time.

Every Sunday with their families. Every quiet moment.

They gave it all.

And here we are — scrolling our phones, yelling about politics, numbing ourselves with distractions.

So here’s the question:

Are we living lives worth dying for?

That’s what hits me hardest every year.

I can say “thank you for your sacrifice” all day long — but if I live like a coward, like a complainer, like a man who takes it all for granted… then what exactly am I thanking them for?

Because freedom isn’t just the right to speak, believe, work, and live.

It’s the responsibility to make it count.

Freedom isn’t free — and it’s not guaranteed.

It’s handed down by the blood of others.

It lives or dies in the next generation depending on whether we have the spine to protect it.

We live in a country where we can still worship openly, raise families boldly, speak truth without chains — for now.

But that’s only true because others died to make it so.

And if we lose it?

It won’t be because the enemy was stronger.

It’ll be because the people got soft.

Because men chose comfort over conviction.

Because churches forgot how to stand.

Because parents got too tired to lead.

Because we started treating freedom like a right instead of a gift with a price tag.

Memorial Day should punch you in the gut.

It should make you sit down and ask, “What am I doing with the life they gave me?”

It should remind you that your ordinary day is someone else’s ultimate sacrifice.

They died hoping this country would stay free.

That it would stay good.

That we would carry the torch forward with integrity and courage.

Not just in politics. Not just in war.

But in the home.

In the church.

n our communities.

In how we treat each other.

In how we raise our kids.

In how we vote, speak, serve, and live.

A Personal Note

This hits differently now.

As a man of faith.

As a father. As someone who’s walked away from God and come back with scars and a fire in my chest.

I don’t take Memorial Day lightly.

I don’t see it as a day to argue about wars or governments.

I see it as a day to remember the weight of sacrifice — and to be humbled by it.

I want my kids to understand that flag isn’t decoration.

It’s not just some red, white, and blue fashion statement.

It’s a battle standard.

It’s soaked in the blood of men and women who believed this country — and the people in it — were worth dying for.

So I’ll fly it. I’ll stand for it. And I’ll teach them why it matters.

Not because America is perfect — but because somebody loved it enough to give everything.