In Remembrance Series

Title: In Remembrance

Theme: Remembering their Cost, For our Freedom

Topic: Memorial Day Reflections

Introduction: As I prepared this message there came to me the remembrance of that very special motor-cycle ride into the wonderful city of Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The very place of the Battle of Gettysburg. As we rode into the city, I could sense the great cost, the loss of sons, fathers and husbands, lives spent for the freedom's we enjoy today.

"Wikipedia tells us, "at Gettysburg the largest number of causalities were lost." The Battle of Gettysburg has often been 'described as the war's turning point.' Bruce Catton wrote, 'Little over 50,000 [men] had been killed... (Time Subscribe, Time Gettysburg, Turning Point of the Civil War) The battle fought on July 1-3, 1863, in hot summer time meant the men had to be buried quickly. The task of burying the thousands upon thousands fell upon Union forces and the citizens. One soldier recalled, "soldiers walking on the dead, [because there was no place to set a foot on the ground." (Time Subscribe, Time Gettysburg, Turning Point of the Civil War)

Today, the Gettysburg National Cemetery and Gettysburg National Military Park are maintained by the U.S. National Park Service as two of the nation's most revered historical landmarks. (Wikipedia, Battle of Gettysburg; Time Subscribe, Time Gettysburg, Turning Point of the Civil War)

President Lincoln in giving the Gettysburg Address said, "Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that a nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this..."

Proposition: I would propose to you that it is fitting and proper that we should remember those who gave their lives serving in the Armed forces!

Interrogative Sentence: Just how do we remember the fallen? Is it Biblical? Is it proper?

Transitional Sentence: Written documents on wars go all the way back to Biblical times. In the Word of God and in writings of historians. In the Bible, Numbers 21:14 tells us about a "Book of wars of the Lord." A text no-longer extant. (Merrill, E. H. (1985). Numbers. In J. F. Walvoord & R. B. Zuck (Eds.), The Bible Knowledge Commentary: An Exposition of the Scriptures (Vol. 1, p. 240). Wheaton, IL: Victor Books.) An ancient collection, probably about the days of the settlement in Canaan. Wars sacred and called for special consecration of the people of God. (Riggans, W. (1983). Numbers (pp. 160–161). Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press.) Not a lot is known about it, could have been a collection of poems and songs that would have been inspired by the excitement and triumph of the final march. (Thomas, W. (1910). Introductory Essay on the Authenticity and Authorship of the Book of Numbers. In H. D. M. Spence, Exell Joseph S. (Eds.), Numbers (p. 280). London; New York: Funk & Wagnalls Company. (Easton, M. G. (1893). In Easton’s Bible dictionary. New York: Harper & Brothers; Achtemeier, P. J., Harper & Row and Society of Biblical Literature. (1985). In Harper’s Bible dictionary (1st ed., p. 1119). San Francisco: Harper & Row;) The song written in Numbers 21:14 came out of the Book of Wars of the Lord. It is very likely, verses 17 and 18 were from the same book. (Cole, R. D. (2000). Numbers (Vol. 3B, p. 353). Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers.). 1 and 2 Samuel, tell the accounts of battles in the rising of king David (Nelson's New Illustrated Bible Commentary), who is in the direct birth lineage of Jesus Christ, who is the King of kings. (Acts 13:22-23)

Historically: There are the Books of the Maccabees, written in the period of about, 175 B.C to 135 B.C. Those books "give a special importance for the understanding the history of wars in that time period." (Drane, J. W. (2000). Introducing the Old Testament (Completely rev. and updated., p. 226). Oxford: Lion Publishing plc.) "The Maccabees wrote about major battles, like The Battle of Emmas (Northwest of Jerusalem) in 165 B.C. (Vos, H. F. (1999). Nelson’s new illustrated Bible manners & customs: how the people of the Bible really lived (pp. 376–377). Nashville, TN: T. Nelson)

Wikipedia has a long list of battle historians who wrote on wars. For example, Julius Caesar, The Gallic and Civil Wars. Their is the famous Ernest Hemingway, 20th century writer about war. Mr. Hemingway wrote:

"When you go to war as a boy you have a great illusion of immortality. Other people get killed; not you. . . . Then when you are badly wounded the first time you lose that illusion and you know it can happen to you. After being severely wounded two weeks before my nineteenth birthday I had a bad time - until I figured out that nothing could happen to me that had not happened to all men before me. Whatever I had to do, men had always done. If they had done it, then I could do it too. The best thing, was not to worry about it." (Thomas Putnam; Hemingway on War and Its Aftermath, Spring 2006, Val. 38, No 1)