Honoring, remembering, and celebrating are as fundamental to humanity as breathing. Memorial Day is designed to honor the fallen, those who gave it all for the freedoms Americans enjoy.
God established “feast” days for the children of Israel. The purpose of these days is to honor, remember, and celebrate. To honor means to respect and esteem. It is a recognition of a deed well-done. To remember means to bring to mind, usually something from the past. To celebrate means a happy gathering to enjoy something.
Both the Biblical feasts and Memorial Day are essential because of what we are to honor, remember, and celebrate. Sadly some seek to alter our past and dishonor past heroes, forget the things they have done (especially the wrong things), and celebrate that we are not like them.
This is wrong for several reasons. To begin with, you will repeat the mistakes of the past if you do not remember them. Your past is an undeniable part of your present. You are not as likely to repeat it if you learn from it.
Secondly, you dishonor the heroic deeds of imperfect people. Jesus said it best when he addressed the religious leaders who wanted to stone (an acceptable custom at the time) the woman caught in adultery. He challenged them by saying if you are without any sin, please throw the first stone. (What a shot in the gut that was!)
Thirdly, when you attempt to alter the past, you spin the truth of the past to push an agenda for the present. Once you slide down that slippery slope, the door is open for the next generations to do the same, completely destroying the past’s truth.
The same is true when you attempt to eliminate the past. This is why the feasts were and remain so important. The deeds of God in the past provide hope for the acts of God in the future. The Apostle Peter summed this up when he addressed the “return-of-Jesus” skeptics by saying they are willfully ignorant of God’s past accomplishments.
Humanity is at a crossroads with both human history and God’s history. This is an adversarial plan designed to discredit God. If you say there is no God, you will believe the “spin” these people are heralding as truth. If you say you are hurt, my God, you will be sympathetic to their lies. If you have a close personal relationship with God, you will understand their attempts to spin a new truth by discrediting the past and realize that they need to be avoided.
Memorial Day 2022 could be the most significant holiday of the year. If humanity believes the lie, remembering, honoring, and celebrating take on a new meaning—a spun-truth-to-fuel-an-agenda meaning. If humanity can see through the lies and truly celebrate the past, then, perhaps, hope remains for America.