Something to Remember 5/28/44
Scripture: Joshua 4
Text: Joshua 4: 21,22a; “And he spake unto the children of Israel, saying, When your children shall ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean these stones? Then shall ye let your children know .....”
That is one of the characteristics which has perpetuated the Jewish people through the centuries. Hebrews have remembered, and taught their children. They have remembered the slow, sometimes painful, always marvelous, way in which the will and the doings of God have become known to their fathers and to themselves. They have even made a ceremony of answering a child’s question - wherein the youngest member of a family asks the meaning of an occasion and the father, or head of the household, answers with an explanation of the meaning. The heritage, the history, the experience, the faith of the fathers is kept alive because they are remembered, and told again by the sons and their sons.
Memorials were definite. If a Jacob, traveling to a far country, had a transforming dream, he marked the spot with stones the next morning, that he might know forever afterward where the glimpse of the eternal came to him, and that he and others might remember it vividly.
That which was to be remembered was often very definite as well. Here is the story of how the children of Israel under the leadership of Joshua, crossed the bed of the Jordan river, without getting their feet wet. The crossing was important to them. They were carrying with them the ark, most precious symbol of their faith. It was carried before the people, whom Joshua had commanded to follow it. The way ahead lay into enemy territory - territory that was to become their home after long years of exile and servitude in a foreign land.
When the ark and the people had crossed over, in a way that seemed to them miraculous, they set up a marker, a memorial shaft, made of 12 stones - one for each tribe. At the sight of it, all should be reminded of the aid, beyond themselves, which came to them when they had needed it. It was a memorial of gratitude; a memorial of recognition of God’s power; a memorial of what they believed to be the right and the strength of their own cause.
We, too, have our memorial reminders - many of them. Every marker, head stone, or statue that is placed over the last resting place of a departed loved one is such a reminder of everything that was dear, good splendid about his or her character. Two days from now we shall especially remind ourselves, on Memorial Day, of the valor of those who have defended us as a nation through the history of our young, growing country. Each cross, at home and abroad, that marks their sacrifice ought to be a reminder to profound gratitude and an equal determination to continue a land of responsible freedom.
Our nation’s capital is full of stones that are memorial reminders to the people of this land. Some of you have seen the city and some of its memorials. I have seen a few.
The splendid dome of the Capitol building seems to be one. You see it and you want to draw nearer. I suppose the approaches to it are guarded now in a time of warfare. But in times of peace it is a symbol of that liberty sought by common people everywhere. No forbidding guard commands you to stay at a distance. It is as though you and I were invited to come under that dome, and to see representative government at work with our own eyes. It belongs not to an alien monarch, but to us as sovereign people. Instead of guard, there is here and there a guide to show us about.
Under that dome, we are reminded of the great statesmen,
law-makers, patriots, reformers of our history, wherever they may have lived
and worked in the country. Many of them
are represented there in bronze, looking down upon us as we go about the
building. And one glance at the statue
recalls the immortal quality of the life.
Perhaps one hears again the passionate, immortal words of Patrick Henry
- “Give me liberty, or give me death.”
In another part of the city is a splendid shaft rising straight, simple, severe, confident, clean, toward the sky - a memorial to one who is called “Father of his country.” Here is no ornament, no flourish, no ornate display. It is simple, determined integrity. It memorializes a man who struggled for right, led his fellow patriots in the struggle, depended on a God of righteousness, stayed at vigilant work to preserve the right. The Washington monument isn’t just a place from which to take a curious tourist’s view. It is a reminder of things strong and precious to the patriot.
In still another place in the city is a very different heap of stones. Roofed over and supported by splendid columns, there sits within a noble figure. The Washington monument recalls a gentleman, landed, well-to-do, a slave owner, a man who would be a nobleman in some other-than-democratic country. But here, equally great in the hearts of his countrymen, is a very common man, a man of poverty, of delicious humor and great sorrow, homely and kindly, bony and determined - Lincoln, the emancipator of those who were forced so low in the social scale that they had no rights nor liberty - Lincoln, whose integrity was set upon holding together the union; Lincoln, who is beloved by common folk here and everywhere.
Set into the stones around that great pensive figure are words from his simple great utterances, expressing thoughts that are immortal. The agony of a nation grown sick within itself, struggling for recovery and health and continued hope, lies in his heart and shows through the lines of his face. “With malice toward none, with charity toward all, let us strive for the right.”
The Lincoln memorial is not just a pretty piece of carving. Its stone means something tremendous that we must remember and tell our children!
The stones of other structures at the capital city have meaning not always associated with memorials - government buildings - the Post Office Department, the Department of Commerce, the Department of Labor, the Department of the Interior, the Department of Agriculture, the Treasury Department, the War and Navy Departments, the Department of Justice. Each houses an activity, but each is a symbol of something to remember. Within, people work at desks and filing cabinets. “What mean these stones?” Here are places where our nation’s power is harnessed and effectively directed, so that our nation may continue to thrive, and that “government of the people, for the people, and by the people” shall continue on the earth.
Over here is the Federal Reserve Bank. “What mean these stones?” Wealth of a nation hoarded up in safety? Not at all! Power of a nation - strength for its economic life! A credit system; money at work.
What money - the stored and transformed and transmissible energy of man - can do! Build schools, churches, hospitals; bring comfort and peace to men; save and strengthen the victims of man’s warring. What harm it can do, too. Defeat and break down moral standards and moral codes, pamper selfish vanities, kill and destroy.
Someone has tried to express some of the truth about money in these verses:
Dug from the mountainside, Washed in the glen,
Servant am I, Or the master of men.
Earn me, I bless you; Steal me, I curse you;
Grip me and hold me, A fiend shall possess you.
Lie for me, die for me, Covet me, take me;
Angel or devil, I am what you make me.”
Look about the capital city now and count church spires. Never mind the number - where are they? What do they mean?
For that matter, what mean the places of worship in every town --- in our city? It is the privilege of this congregation to worship in a splendid building of stone and of strong oak. “What mean these stones” and these timbers? Here they have been laid by skilled workmen and loyal men and women of the faith. Do they serve their purpose? What is their purpose? Do people gather here to worship God and depart each week to serve Him only? Do these stones beckon people to find light and peace and understanding; to find guidance and courage and faith?
Here, now and again, a wedding march swells and then stills, and eager eyes turn toward a minister as he solemnizes their desire to be joined together in the very sight of God.
Here come parents with their babies to be dedicated to God before the congregation. Here are little ones not out of the cradle enrolled in a school they are yet too young to understand, but where they will one day be taught the faith of the fathers.
Here we recognize the achievements and hopes of our youth as their graduations mark their progress.
Here, in loving memorial, people partake of simple bits of food and drink and as oft as they do it remember one who asked for this living memorial.
Here a family looks up, from its sorrow, to the comfort and hope promised in those mysteriously reassuring words, “I am the resurrection and the life: he that believeth in me ... shall live.” [John 11: 25].
What mean these stones? Not just a roof - a shelter from storm or heat or snow. Not alone a gathering place for like-minded sociability. Not just something useful and practical; property of a corporation legally entitled to hold it.
These stones are a memorial to the faith of men and women; an invitation and a reminder to all to worship the Most High; an urge to welcome the stranger, to instruct the seeker, to teach the children, to admonish the wayward, to encourage the sincere. These stones are a reminder that man does not live by stones nor by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth from God. [Deuteronomy 8: 3; Matthew 4: 4]. They are a reminder that we do not live unto ourselves, that we live inseparably and inescapably with others and that we must learn to do it harmoniously and helpfully - for if we do not, the devil’s own destruction takes us.
Here among these well-laid stones, we remember the passing events that are woven into the eternal.
1) Today, we honor a large group of our own members who have completed at least 12 years of training in the schools of a free land and are being graduated this week.
2) Today we remember that 115 men and women have gone from our church family to defend the nation in the armed forces while those remaining work at home in the defense. And we remember that one has given his life in the line of duty.
3) Today we remember that the enthusiastic fire of the gospel entered into the hearts of Christ’s waiting disciples at Pentecost more than 1900 years ago. And we pray for a continuance of that radiant fire in our lives today.
4) Today we remember the continuing needs of those victims of war and the services of those who minister to them in body and spirit. We continue our prayer for them and our offerings to aid them.
“What mean these stones?” These stones, like all others builded by men, mean something to remember. So let it be then. Amen.
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Delivered in Wisconsin Rapids, May 28, 1944.