By Jason Schifo
Memorial Day, is set aside on the last Monday of May, today, to honor all the men and women who have died while serving in our military. It originated after the Civil War, which ended in the spring of 1865, and claimed more lives than any conflict in U.S. history up to that point, and thus required the establishment of the first of our national cemeteries.
By the late 1860s, Americans in various cities and towns had begun holding special ceremonies in the spring to remember these fallen soldiers, going out to the cemetaries, gathering together to pray and pay our respects for their sacrifice. Originally known as Decoration Day, it became an official federal holiday in 1971.
Unofficially, Memorial Day, a day set aside to remember those he gave their lives for the sake of freedom, also marks the beginning of the summer season. It is in this tension that our forgetfulness begins to creep in.
A veteran of the first World War said in 1913, “there is a tendency to forget the purpose of Memorial Day and make it a day for games, races and revelry, instead of a day of memory and tears.” Even then there was a sense that the meaningfulness of Memorial Day was slipping through the American conscience.
One constant truth that I have found in my nearly 50 years of life is that the things that I fail to remember, is often what I tend to repeat. Do you have the same experience? Woody Allen famously said, and it has stuck with me, “The reason history repeats itself, is because I didn’t remember the first time around.”
On Memorial Day we celebrate our freedom, but often we have a tendancy to enjoy the fruit of these freedoms and forget the reason for our freedom. Freedom isn’t free, and it always has a cost and a price. Freedom only appears to be free when you fail to remember what it cost.
As Winston Churchill famously said: “A nation that forgets its heroes will itself soon be forgotten itself.” In this case the cost was the lives of brave men and women across time.
So my question for you today is this:
Without the formal gatherings to remember, which have been cancelled due to the pandemic, will you be intentional to take time inbetween the burgers, bratwursts and watermelon, to thank God for the men and women who paid the ultimate price for freedom?
If we are not intentional to acknowledge, to remember the reason we enjoy these freedoms we will find ourselves not only falling into the trap of believing freedom is free, but in the process will forget who we are as a nation.
In the Bible, Joshua 3:1-3, tells us the story of the Israelites on their way from slavery to freedom, and into the Promised Land. Joshua tells us that when they came to the Jordan river, they lodged there before passing through the river with God’s divine help.
After this miracle Joshua sent a representative from each of the Twelve Tribes to take a stone from the river bed where they had just crossed, and set up a memorial, as a remembrance of what God accomplished for His people on that day. Those stones served the people of Israel in two ways.
First and formost, it reminded them of their being led from slavery to freedom. Second, it reminds us that we forget far too easy, and are in need of memorials to serve as reminders.
But the most important lesson regarding reminders comes in Joshua chapter 4, verses 6-7 which says, “When your children ask in time to come, ‘What do those stones mean to you?’ then you shall tell them…”
The purpose of the memorial stones was not just to serve as a reminder, but also as an opportunity to tell a story. The passage impresses upon us that this memorial will cause the children to ask, “What do these stones mean to you?”
If we do not take this time to remember, the children will not ask “why?”, and we inturn will not have the oportunity to tell, and forgotten among the generations will be the very reason for the freedoms we so enjoy.
This is why over the last eight years I have made it a point to bring my children to the annual Memorial Day gatherings here in Mahomet. I believe they need to shake the hands of brave men and women, thank them for their service, all the while paying honor to those who sacrificed their lives for the sake of freedom.
I remember a number of years ago my son had the honor of meeting Art Leeneerman, one of the last remaining survivors of the 1945 USS Indianapolis tragedy. To this day we still talk about the experiences that Art shared with us, and as we remember my other son, Samuel, asks about Art. We can’t forget Art because we have chosen to tell his story; we have chosen to remember.
To each and every one of you, from servicemen to spouses, sons and daughters, everyone who has served and supported, I give you my thanks today!
Our kids had the same opportunity to spend time with Mr Leenerman. He welcomed us into his apt at the Glenwood one evening when we out there for a visit. He talked to the kids for over an hour, showed them pictures and books. What a gift to have that memory of him. I am going to take this as an opportunity to remind them of that visit and those verses. We attend the memorial service at Riverside each year. It was a loss not being able to do that this year, but we did still go there, as did many others. Thank you to those who put out the flags.