One of the most important battles in the history of our nation
was won by 262 Minnesotans. It is generally agreed by historians
that he battle of Gettysburg was the turning point that led the
North to win the tragic Civil War. That battle was going badly for
the North, and at one point the Confederates had them in retreat
and they were in hot pursuit. They were only a half mile from a
position where they could cut the union line in half and have a
decisive victory.
The only troops who might prevent this were the First
Minnesota Volunteer Regiment. These 262 officers and men were
camped right in the path of the attacking Confederates. They
were out numbered many times over, but when Colonel Covill gave
the order to charge they did so with such force that they stunned
the larger army. They were cut to ribbons, however, and most of
them died. Only 47 survived, but they held the line until
reinforcements arrived and made it possible for the North to
finally win that battle that led to the winning of the war. General
Hancock, who was there, said of this sacrifice on July 2, 1863,
"There is no more gallant deed recorded in history."
I discovered this bit of history in the book 101 Best Stories Of
Minnesota by Merile Potter. It made me realize that we cannot
remember what we have never known. Just as you cannot go back
to where you have never been, so you cannot remember what you
never forgot because you never knew it. I never liked history as a
student, and it is a shame that so many students feel this way. It
should be one of the most exciting classes in school.
God made history a required course for His people, and then
gave memorials to make sure they never forgot their history, and
the grace of God that made them a people. Everything they were,
and all they had, was because of events of the past. The
deliverance out of Egypt was the beginning of Israel as an
independent people. They owed their existence and survival to the
Passover when God judged Egypt and set them free. God felt it
was so important that every generation of Israel remember this
event that He established a memorial feast of the Passover, and it
was so important that the people observed this memorial in every
detail that God gave severe laws to excommunicate anyone who
treated them lightly.
In Esther 6:1 we read where the king could not sleep and
ordered the record book of his reign to be read to him. In so doing
he was reminded of the heroic deed of Mordecai the Jew, and
because of that memory being restored by that record the entire
race of Jews was saved from the conspiracy of Haman to destroy
them. They were saved by the power of memory. The Bible makes
it clear that God loves memorial events, for they force our minds
to reflect and remember, and this keeps the past alive in the
present so that the future can be what He wills.
That is why Jesus left the church only one event to remember
Him by. It is a memorial service that we call communion, and by
which we remember that His death on the cross is the foundation
for all we have as Christians in time and eternity. Do this in
remembrance of me Jesus said because He knew the power of
memory and the importance of having roots in the past.
Memorial Day has never had a great deal of meaning for me. I
have had many members of my family in the armed services, and
an uncle who won the purple heart, and who was a prisoner of war.
I've never lost a loved one in war, and so I have never been a part
of a family who went to the cemetery to place flowers or a wreath
on the grave of one who died for our country. It use to be called
Decoration Day for that is what families did for loved ones who
died in service.
Even those who had such graves to visit began to lose interest.
Theodore Ferris, who was pastor of the historic Trinity Church of
Boston, had a long family tradition of doing this. His grandmother
said, "When I am gone nobody will continue this," but his mother
did all her life. But when his mother died, he reasoned that his
loved ones were not in the cemetery and so he let the tradition die.
My point is, Memorial Day for the majority of people is more a
day for making new memories of a great weekend of fun and travel
rather than a day of remembering the past and the sacrifices that
make such enjoyable freedom possible.
I do not feel it is of any value to try and provoke a guilt trip in
anyone's mind, but I do feel it is of value to try and get us all to
give thought to the value of memorials and to the power of
memory. Our nation has fought 8 majors wars, and over a million
men and women have died in them. All that we enjoy as
Americans has had a high price tag. Somebody else had to
sacrifice for the benefits we enjoy. The least we can do is to
acknowledge their sacrifice.
Memories of bad things of the past are an aid to preventing bad
things in the present and future. War is terrible and we need to be
reminded of its terror and cost lest we forget and let it happen
again. In Israel there is a memorial called the Memorial of
Witness and Warning in Jerusalem. It is in memory of the 6
million Jews killed in the Holocaust. There are mementos and
even pictures of children being herded into the gas chambers.
What a horrible memory to keep alive, but the Jews work hard at
it. On this memorial are the words of an 18th century Jewish
scholar which read, "Forgetfulness prolongs the exile:
Remembrance is the secret of redemption."
It is the remembrance of just how awful prejudice and hatred
can be that will save the world from another Holocaust. It is
forgetfulness that leads to history repeating itself in its most
despicable events. Memory is the key tool in the prevention of the
terrible. Memory is what helps all of us become efficient in the
prevention of suffering. Bad experiences of the past, when they are
remembered, cause you avoid those same experiences.
There is a positive side to Memorial Day. The day had its
beginning in the loving compassion of Civil War mothers in
Columbus, Mississippi. In the spring of 1863, 2 years before the
war ended, these mothers went out to lay flowers on the graves of
their Confederate dead. There were Union soldiers buried there
also. These mothers realized that the mothers of the North could
not come to the graves of their sons, and so in love that rose above
the hatred of the war they put flowers on the graves of the Union
soldiers as well. This practice spread all over the South and then
into the North, and that's how Memorial Day began. It was a day
to remember an honor all who died in war. In our day it has come
to be a day to remember all who have died in any way, for life itself
is a form of warfare, and so all who die do so in combat of some
sort.
Lynette Wert was a student traveling in Italy when she got a
letter from her mother urging her to visit the American cemetery
in Florence where American service men were buried. A friend's
son was buried there and the mother never saw the sight, nor had
any of the family. It all seemed so meaningless to her, and it was
out of the way, but she finally found it. There were rows of crosses
and finally she found the one with the name Terry Stewart. She
was shocked to discover that he had been born the same day as her
father. It could have been her father buried there, and she would
have been deprived of the chance to even exist.
She gained a deeper appreciation for the sacrifice of American
service men, for she realized that her very existence depended on
someone else paying the price so that others could be free to live,
love, and make a future possible. She said, "My father could have
died in warfare, but he did not, for others died in his place. My
grandfather could have died in war, but he did not, for others died
in his place. My great grandfather and his father, and on and on
you could go. All of them were spared because others died in the
wars that might have killed them. Everyone of us is here today
because we have a family tree where our limb was never cut off
because someone else died in the place of the one who kept our
branch growing. Everyone one of us owes our very existence to
those who died."
Both our temporal life and eternal life are ours because of the
death of others for us. Only the death of Jesus makes our eternal
life possible, but many have died that we might enjoy the present
physical life. And without physical life we could never have eternal
life. This leads to some startling conclusions that make Memorial
Day far more significant than any of us could imagine. If began
with those mothers who rose above prejudice and honored the
enemy soldiers who died fighting their own sons. This unity of all
humanity, and oneness even with our enemies, is an inevitable part
of Memorial Day, for the dead who died for our freedom and very
existence were often people very opposite from us.
Catholics died for Protestants and vice versa. Blacks died for
whites and vice versa. Atheists died for Christians and vice versa.
In war every traditional enemy died for the other. Arabs died for
Jews, and Jews died for Nazi lovers. Every one alive is so because
of the sacrifice of their enemies as well as their friends.
Remembrance of this reality could go along way in preventing the
prejudice and other human follies that lead to the evil of war. For
the Christian it is also another reason for the promotion of loving
those who may not love you. If there are people you do not like, it
is likely that some of their very group died in a war in order that
you might enjoy the life you do. The memory of this can have the
power to heal your prejudice, and produce in you the compassion
of Christ for those very people.
The Civil War was the worst war ever for Americans, but the
memory of how it ended is one of the best memories we can have.
General Lee on April 9, 1865 stood before General Grant to
surrender according to Grant's terms. The terms were generous,
for Lee's army was free to go home, stipulating only that they leave
their arms. Lee responded, "This will have a very happy effect on
my army." He then explained that the Confederate cavalrymen
and artillery men owned their own horses and inquired if they
might keep them. Grant recognized they would need their horse or
mule to work their little farm and so he granted this request plus a
supply of rations. This act of love toward the enemy was a major
step in uniting a severely divided people.
War is hell, but the memory of the heroic and loving acts of
many who died and who fought wars can possess the power to
make the present heavenly. The more I study war the more I hate
it, but, on the other hand, the more I love people, and the more I
have compassion for all people. Foolish people learn only from
their own experience, but wise people learn from the experience of
others. We do not have to make the same mistakes of previous
generations that led to war. We can, by the power of memory,
honor the heroic dead most of all by preventing the follies that
killed them.
Christians should be leaders in learning from history, because
the Bible was given to us by God that we might be just such
learners. Paul stressed this in Rom. 15:4, "For everything that was
written in the past was written to teach us, so that through
endurance and the encouragement of the Scriptures we might have
hope." Over and over again the Old Testament reveals the power
of God's memory. Salvation is based on God's remembering His
people and His promises. God remembered Noah, and God
remembered Abraham, and God remembered Rachel, and God
remembered His covenant with His people. If God never had a
Memorial Day in which He looked back and remembered His
promises the people of God would have ceased to exist. They have
been saved many times because of God's memory.
Ex. 6:5 is representative of numerous examples. It says, "And I
have also heard the groaning of the children of Israel whom the
Egyptians keep in bondage; and I have remembered my
covenant." That Memorial Day of God became a perpetual
Memorial Day for Israel because it became the day of their
deliverance out of Egypt. God's people are to perpetually
remember that God remembered them.
Memorial Day is to remember those who have died, but keep in
mind that it is also a day to remember the providence of God that
used the death of others as a basis for the life we now live. It is a
Thanksgiving Day for those who see that they only live because
God remembered and refused to let evil win and destroy the good.
In every crisis of history where evil threatens to conquer the world,
God and His providence comes to the rescue. Many good people
die, but God's people live on, and His kingdom presses on giving all
people the hope of eternal life in Jesus Christ.
Remember the Alamo, and remember Pearl Harbor, and
remember Iwo Jima, and remember all the heroic battles and
sacrifices, but above all, remember the God who remembers that
we are but dust, and yet provided a way for all men to have hope of
an eternal destiny where sin and all of its consequences will be
remembered no more.
An event happens only once in history, but in memory it can
happen over and over. The memory can give the event power
beyond what the event itself had. We can reflect on the sacrifices
of the past and be changed because of them. The memory has the
power to give the past event and impact in the present. It is my
means of the memory that the past still lives.
One of the most important things we need to remember is that
the millions who died for our freedom would have accomplished
nothing had it not been for the providence of God. The more you
study the wars of our history, the more you discover that they were
not won by man alone. No where is this more evident than in the
Revolutionary War.
The British sent an invading force of 55 thousand men to defeat
the American army. On one August morning in Brooklyn 15
thousand British and 5 thousand Hessian troops who were well
trained faced Washington's 8 thousand men half of whom were
untrained. Washington watched as one by one as his generals were
crushed. It was only a matter of hours and the Revolution would
be over, and he and his remaining troops would be dead or in
chains. But for some unknown reason the British general Howe
decided to wait until the next day. It was that mistake that
changed the history of our nation.
The next day the weather was not fit for a war. It was such a
dark and dreary day. It gave Washington an idea for the greatest
escape plan in American history. He decided to risk taking his
entire army off Brooklyn in small boats right under the noses of
the British. All night long skilled oarsman noiselessly rode the
troops a mile across the water. It was mission impossible, and yet
it was working. As dawn came the sky was clearing, and they were
far from finished. It was with great anxiety that they watched the
rising sun that would expose them and leave the remaining troops
at the mercy of the British. But to their amazement fog began to
rise off the river, and it kept them covered until the last boat with
Washington in it left. Then it lifted and the British ran to the shore
firing, but they were out of range.
Eight thousand men were saved from certain death or
imprisonment, and the American army was spared to fight another
day, and eventually drive the British out of our land. It was not
cost free, for 15 thousand Americans died that battle, but by the
providence of God their deaths were not in vain, for God spared
the rest of the army to go on to victory. The point is, when we
remember those who have died it borders on idolatry unless we
also remember the hand of God in giving us the victories that
preserve our liberties. No number of deaths could have given us
what we have without the hand of God in our history. Therefore,
let us look back and remember our heroic dead with a spirit of
thankfulness to God, and the kind of humility we see in George
Washington which he made clear in this prayer he wrote:
"O God, who art rich in mercy and plenteous in redemption,
mark not, I beseech Thee, what I have done amiss; remember
that I am but dust, and remit my transgressions,
negligences and ignorances, and cover them all with the
absolute obedience of Thy dear Son, that those sacrifices
which I have offered may be accepted by Thee, in and
for the sacrifice of Jesus Christ offered upon the cross for me."
Washington recognized that the greatest power of memory is
experience when we look beyond all that we have done, or all that
the heroes of history have done, to what God has done for us in
Jesus. There is no greater memory than to remember that it is His
death that gives value to all other deaths on our behalf. Every
Memorial Day is to be a day of thanksgiving to our Lord who
brings life out of death. Thank God for the power of memory, for
by it we can see abundant reasons to thank God for the past
sacrifices that have given us a great land for time, and a greater
yet for eternity
