Today is Memorial Day, a time to remember all those who paid the ultimate price in defending our great nation. Sadly, for far too many Americans, it is a day that merely marks the beginning of summer and the end of a three-day weekend. What does Memorial Day represent for you?
This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. (1 John 3:16)
There is no greater demonstration of love than to lay your life down for another. The freedom we enjoy in this country is not free! It came at great cost to a great many. All those who served paid some — and some paid all — so that we might live in the greatest country on earth. Our military men and women and their families bore a great cost in order for every U.S. citizen to enjoy life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
How thankful are you for that freedom today? The famed American jurist Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. said this during a Memorial Day speech given in 1884, prior to his appointment to the United States Supreme Court:
Our dead brothers still live for us, and bid us think of life, not death—of life to which in their youth they lent the passion and joy of the spring. As I listen, the great chorus of life and joy begins again, and amid the awful orchestra of seen and unseen powers and destinies of good and evil, our trumpets sound once more a note of daring, hope, and will.
Holmes was saying that those men and women who paid the ultimate price for our freedom would want us to focus on the results of their sacrifice — life — and live life to the fullest. This is the best way to honor their sacrifice. This is especially true for those who profess Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. Jesus laid down his life for us, and He has called us to live a life of abundance for the glory of the Almighty.
I came that they might have life and have it more abundantly. (John 10:10)
Are you currently living an abundant life for the glory of God? God never called you to muddle around on the mudflats of life. God has called each believer to soar on wings like eagles and pour ourselves out for something bigger than a life marked by self-survival, self-centeredness, and self-fulfillment. And we have been given this great calling and privilege because Jesus willingly laid His life down for us.
God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)
It is right this day to give thanks to God for every man and woman who has ever served this great nation, and in particular for those brave American soldiers,sailors and airmen who gave their lives for our freedom. If you have the opportunity to thank an active duty member of the armed forces or a veteran in person, by all means, do it! Yet behind this great temporal blessing is an even greater eternal blessing that we will receive because of the ultimate price Jesus Christ paid on our behalf on a cross on the hill known as the Skull.
This is the Gospel. This is grace for your race. NEVER FORGET THAT…AMEN!
Grace for the Race 