What Will Be Our Legacy?

 Sometime in the Future

“Daddy, What’s a Statue?”

“I’m sorry honey. What did you say?”

“Statue. What is it?”

“Spell it for me.”

“S-T-A-T-U-E.”

He scratched his chin thoughtfully. “Oh. Statue! Well, Hon, years ago replicas of famous people like presidents and war heroes were built in public places. They were made of stone and they were constructed to look like that person. They were called statues.”

She wrinkled her brow. “Why did they build them?”

“Well, I guess these were people the country admired and respected. It was a way of honoring them and what they accomplished in their lives.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen one before.”

“That’s because they were all torn down years ago when I was about your age. I don’t think there are any statues now in America.”

“Why did they tear them down?”

So many questions. “I suppose they tore them down because people didn’t like what they represented.”

“But Daddy. You said people built them to honor them because of their accomplishments, right? How could they just destroy them like that?”

“I don’t know, Hon. I guess, er… people just changed their minds.” He offered.

She frowned. “That doesn’t make any sense! That just doesn’t seem right. Didn’t anyone try to stop them?”

“I guess not, Sweetie.” He leaned over and affectionately squeezed her hand. “You know. You’re pretty smart for an eight-year-old. What’s your interest in statues anyway?”

“It’s part of my American History class,” she said.  “And I’m eight and a half I’ll have you know.”

“Right. Eight and a half.”

“Daddy?”

“Yes, dear.”

“You remember when Grandpa died last winter?”

“Of course, I do.”

“We built that statue for him at the cemetery under the big trees.”

“No. That was a headstone. That’s different.”

“But if people changed their minds and decided they didn’t like Grandpa anymore, could they come and tear his headstone down too?”

He swallowed. “No Suzy. We would never allow that to happen,” he said, pondering her question.

She nodded and then placed her pen beside her book. After a moment of strained silence. “At the front of the church, there’s the big wooden cross.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Well, you told me the cross represents God’s sacrifice for us, and I’m wondering. What if people suddenly changed their minds about God? Is there anyone who would stop them from destroying our cross?”

The man felt his face flush and as he stared into his daughter’s innocent hazel eyes, he suddenly realized he couldn’t answer her question.

Fiction, or a Sign of Things to Come?

Close your eyes and visualize your life five years ago. Think of your family and friends and consider the things in this world that gave you pleasure. Ponder for a moment the dreams and aspirations you had for yourself and your children. Now open your eyes and look around you. Could you have envisioned what you see today?

We pull ourselves from the ashes of a global pandemic only to become paralyzed by violence and dissension that flood our cities like an angry river. Peaceful demonstrations to address inequality and injustice evolve into destruction and violence, while physical representations of our past are destroyed as if removing them could change the course of history. Innocent men and women of color are slain, and cries of pain, retribution, and sometimes even anarchy fill the air.

Culturally and morally, we have become two warring countries within one with little compromise to resolve our differences and no end to the turmoil in sight. The America we knew five years ago is buried beneath a mountain of hate and anger.

If you think the basic premises of our society have begun to crumble and fall, you are not alone. In the Old Testament, when King David was besieged by his enemies, he too felt his world collapsing around him. In the 11^th chapter of Psalms, he cries out to the Lord, “When the foundations are being destroyed what can the righteous do?”

God answers him. “The Lord tests the righteous, but his soul hates the wicked and those who love violence.” We have forgotten our God is One of peace and love. Violence is not God’s way, nor should it be the way of His people. It seems the blood spilled from the 600 thousand who lost their lives in the Civil War has taught us little about living together as one.

There is no doubt, change in our country is long overdue. There is too much anger and suffering among its people to remain as we are. But it is the manner we seek and implement justice and change that will speak to our morality and our very existence.

When historians look back at this era in our country, what will they think? Will we be known as the generation who squandered the opportunity to rise from a horrible pandemic, and instead chose to self-destruct in a flurry of partisanship and hate? Will they see us as the ones who discarded the basic principles of our Constitution in favor of lawlessness and violence? Or is it possible we will be remembered as the society who came together against great adversity and pain to overcome our differences peacefully, in God’s way?

Our Legacy?

Our legacy remains to be defined, but violence will only strengthen the wedge that divides us. Jesus speaks to us clearly in Matthew’s gospel when He told His apostles, “Put your sword back into its place. For all who take the sword will perish by the sword.” Perhaps we should consider His message as we go forward in our lives, seeking a peaceful resolution to our differences.

At the beginning of the fictional dialogue, an innocent child asks, “Could God be taken from our lives?”

To this hypothetical question, I would answer her. “Though the world we live in may sometimes feel un-God-like, He is always there with us. He is the air we breathe and the sun that shines. He is a part of us, and we are a part of Him. We are His children, and He will never ever leave us.”

“Fear not for I am with you. Be not dismayed for I am your God.” (Isaiah 41-10)

I ask that you join me in prayer for our country. I ask the Lord for healing and for our individual understanding of those who do not look or think as we do. I pray our country becomes immersed in a social and cultural Baptism, to wash away the pains and sins of the past so that we may move forward as one.

In chapter 13 of John’s gospel and again in the 15^th chapter, Jesus gave His disciples a new commandment. He told them, ’Love one another as I have loved you’.

If each of us, black or white, red state or blue, could take the first step toward that end. If we could just pause to listen to each other….