Scripture reading:
Deuteronomy 26:1-11
Once there was a group of
tourists visiting the historical sites from the Revolutionary War. One day
their guide took them to an old church where George Washington had worshiped.
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| Memorial Day Celebration Live Oak CA 2014 |
Their guide pointed out
the very pew that had belonged to Washington, and he went on to describe the
church services of those days: how, sometimes, they lasted two hours or more.
Hearing this inspired one member of the tour group to comment, “So, George
Washington slept here too!”
Our scripture reading this
morning describes part of an annual celebration in which the people of Israel
gave recognition to God’s blessings upon their land. They gave thanks for what
God had given them.
It was a little like
Thanksgiving, a little bit like Independence Day, but it was also a little bit
like Memorial Day, too. It taught them to remember how they had got where they
were, and why they had what they had.
They were taught to
remember that they were part of a much bigger story than themselves. They were
taught to celebrate what God had done through their friends, and parents, and
grandparents, and so on, for many, many generations.
The people celebrating in
the old Tabernacle Tent, and in the Temple had worked, and maybe even slaved
and fought, to get, or to keep, what they had. But many, many others (more than
anyone could count) had done the same, each in their generation.
Our scripture reading is
about a Thanksgiving that memorialized this. The most important thing
memorialized was the plan, and the work, and the power, and the faithfulness of
God. The Lord had spoken to at least some of the members of all those past
generations. God encouraged them. God made great promises to them, and kept
those promises.
There was a time when
their ancestors were only wandering Arameans. (That means belonging to a
generic sort of people in the area of what is now Syria and Iraq. It, sort of,
means being nothing special.)
Anyway, when they were
nothing special nomads in the desert, or slaves in Egypt, it didn’t always look
like God was there at work. In spite of that, the Lord did have a plan, and the
plan was going forward, even when they couldn’t see it. Those worshippers who
brought their offerings to the altar came there to remember, and to tell the
story of how God made, and kept, his promises to their nation, and their
tribes, and their families.
They came there to
confess, for the record, that they were witnesses to God’s plan. They were
witnesses to the story of God’s faithfulness, and they confessed that they were
part of that plan themselves.
A memorial is a reminder.
Memorial Day started in
the South, as a way of remembering and honoring those who had died for the
confederate side of the Civil War. There, it was surely a sad day: a day for remembering
those who sacrificed themselves for lost causes. There’s more to remember than
we think.
I’ve served in some places
where it’s common for most people to go to the local cemetery, on Memorial Day,
to decorate the graves of all their family members who are buried there. This
happens in old, small towns. I’ve seen parents leading their kids among the
gravestones, telling them how they were related to each person buried there,
and telling them stories about how those people came to that place, and where
they had built their first homestead shack, and what had happened to them
afterwards. There’s more to remember than we think.
God’s people are called to
look forward in faith and hope. Today’s scripture reading instructs God’s
people to remember. There, it was the people of Israel remembering their life
with God, or God’s role in the story of their life.
In their case, they
weren’t only God’s people, as we are. They were also God’s nation with a
history, and they were to remember that God wanted them to be a certain kind of
nation. God’s people, in any nation, are taught to remember that God wants them
to be a certain kind of nation.
Israel was also a family
with a tradition, and they were to remember that God wanted to lead them and
nurture them, as a family, so that they could be the kind of family God wants
all families to be. God wants us to remember this, too.
God wants us to be good
rememberers, and to make a habit of being able to understand and retell how all
the things which God has done have come down to us. God wants us to search the
history of our nation, and to search our family stories, to find out where the Lord
has been at work. God wants us to remember people whose lives and sacrifices
have benefitted us; or taught and influenced us.
Sometimes it seems that we
hardly know anything about what God has given us through others.
The sense of things in our
society not working, or falling apart, has happened because too many people
have forgotten how to look around them, and at themselves, and think seriously
about what the Lord has given them. We have forgotten what the Lord wants to do
through us in our families, and our nation. We have forgotten that this is all
a gift.
It’s hard for us to
remember that our nation, our people, our family, and our friends are a gift if
we don’t also realize that God himself is a gift. The One who created
everything to be a gift has made a gift of himself to us.
As citizens of the Kingdom
of God, we have many Memorial Days to keep clearly in our mind what God has
done for us, himself, so that we can learn to love the gifts that people
remember on Memorial Day.
All the celebrations of
the church are memorial days. Christmas is a memorial to the Lord coming down
from heaven and becoming one of us, to be a humble Savior and a Servant King.
Palm Sunday is a memorial of the Lord coming to his own people, in which we
remember that some of his welcomers turned against him. Good Friday is the
memorial of the Lord offering himself as a sacrifice to take away our sins, and
the sins of the whole world. Easter is the memorial of the victory over sin and
death, that the Lord shares with us, so that evil and death can have no lasting
power over us. Pentecost is the memorial of the Lord sharing with us his Holy
Spirit, so that we can be supernatural people with supernatural resources.
The remembering means that
what God wants from us is more than memory verses. God wants us to remember how
great he is (as great as we need him to be), to know what he has done for us,
and for everyone, and to repeat it so that others can learn.
Since this is Memorial
Weekend I want us to be like the people in small, old towns, or in families
with long memories, who remember how God has shaped us through all those who
have given of themselves, whether in the life of our families, or family
members serving our nation in war.
Let me tell you a little
bit about my Grandpa Evans. He was very good with his hands. He could work on
heavy machinery. He had experience as an industrial photographer, and he could
work on cameras. During the depression, he got a job adjusting navigational
instruments for a shipping company in New York Harbor, and he accomplished
something that none of his predecessors had done before. He got completely
caught up on all of the company’s boats and ships at the same time. When this
happened, it being the Depression, the company realized that it wouldn’t need
his services, for a while, and so they laid him off. He had to find another
job, and he never went back to them.
He was forty-one when we
entered World War II and he enlisted in the Navy. He was a reconnaissance
photographer in the belly of a navy bomber in a battle over the Aleutians and his
plane got shot down.
Since the Navy hadn’t
thought that it was important to train him in the use a parachute, he was smart
enough to know about pulling the cord, but not how to hit the ground. He landed
on an island in the middle of a battle and broke both his legs and had a very
harrowing escape.
I think my Grandpa Evans
represents a family tradition of conscientiousness, neglect, hardship, bad
luck, good luck, and survival.
The Israelites would
repeat the story, “My Father was a wandering Aramean, and we were slaves in
Egypt.” It became a story of their remote past, and yet the tradition, and
their need for that tradition, went on and on.
Their heritage often
repeated itself. It told them what God was able to do for them when they felt
like they were wandering aimlessly and didn’t know where they would end up.
That’s what heritage is for. That’s what remembering and what memorial days are
for.
In the seventh, eighth,
and ninth chapters of Deuteronomy, Moses warned Israel never to fool themselves
about their story and how they were able to succeed. “Don’t think it was
because you were larger, or stronger, or better than other nations, because you
weren’t. You succeeded because God loved you and helped you when you needed him.”
The Lord wants us to
remember the things that make us humble and human as a nation, and as a family.
As a kind of memorial, I
want to read part of a copy of a letter that my family has kept from a long
departed relative, writing to my great-great grandfather from the front at Fredericksburg,
Virginia, in 1862, during the Civil War. “My beloved brother, although I have
written to you last, I cannot wait for another from you, as we were paid off a
few days ago. I think you may need the money, and even if you do not it is not
safe for me to keep it for we expect to have a big fight and when we move from
here there is no telling how soon I shall have the opportunity of sending a
letter to you again. I think we shall be paid off again in a short time, say
two weeks – for another two-month’s pay is due to us tomorrow night. I send
this draught of eighteen dollars which is the biggest lot I have sent before. I
think I shall have my debts all paid by the time I get out of this, I guess.”
This brother of my
great-great grandfather died not long after sending his pay. He wasn’t even
born in this country. They were both born and raised in a poor working-class
family in England and they came to America to improve their lives. This soldier
enlisted to pay his debts. He was surely a hero.
One of my heroes, from
that time, is Abraham Lincoln, who was really placed by God in the right place
at the right time. Lincoln thought and prayed about forgiveness and compassion,
and the horrible idea of using war as a cure, even for such an evil as slavery.
I realize that my relative, fighting the rebels down in Virginia, probably gave
those things hardly a thought. He was just trying to get along as best he
could.
And yet, both Lincoln and
my old relative had a lot in common. They were both familiar with poverty. They
were both in serious trouble. And they both needed the Lord’s help.
If we were better at
remembering who we really are, and how we got here (especially the stories of
those who have gone before us and given us our heritage) we would realize that
we have the same thing in common with them.
They have something to say
to us. They say, “You’re just like us. You need help.” Then, the Lord tells us,
“I will help you, that’s what my strength is for.”
“Remember the original
Wandering Aramean,” says the Lord. “Look at Abraham. I gave him a goal, a
promised land. He didn’t know where it was or how to get there, and I got him
there. You don’t know where to find your promised land, but I can lead you to
the real thing. Look at the Hebrew slaves in Egypt. For generations, they were
slaves. They forgot how to think for themselves. They forgot how to live
without fear and suspicion. But I taught them how to have courage. I taught
them how to be free people. I taught them how to live by faith. I can make
their story your story. I can teach you to maintain courage and faith. I can
teach you how to be free.” Thus says the Lord.
In the Gospel of John,
Jesus says, “If the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.” (John 8:36)
William Barclay once wrote
about some missionaries who travelled through the villages of India with a
slide show of the gospel story. With a projector hooked up to a generator, they
showed the pictures of the life of Jesus on the white-washed wall of some house
on a village square, with all the people sitting on the ground. One night, they
reached the scene of Jesus dying on the cross. A man in the crowd jumped up and
shouted, “Jesus, come down from the cross. I should be there, not you.”
That man had received a
new memory. He had been given a new story, and a new heritage. The story of
Jesus on the cross became part of him and his own story. That new memory would change
his life.
The Lord is a Savior: a
helping, rescuing, life-changing God. Knowing this God (whom we meet in Jesus)
and trusting him in your life, and trusting his ability to work in your family,
and nation, and world (whatever the needs may be): that is what is really
glorious.
It’s a different kind of
glory than we would have chosen for ourselves, or our family, or our nation. It’s
the glory of needing help and finding it. It is by the Lord taking over our
stories, in our need, that we have something worth remembering.
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