The Importance of Remembering

Memorial Day Sermon  •  Sermon  •  Submitted
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Introduction

For some this weekend is the official start of summer. School, in the midst of a crazy COVID year, came to an end this past week. Our high school students graduated Friday night, and we have come to this Memorial Day Weekend ready to experience summer now in a different way. We are relieved from restrictions we have had and we are slowly moving forward. Just maybe we can celebrate the season that we love of long sunny days, outdoor activities and even perhaps a trip to the beach. Maybe that is the meaning of your Memorial Day. I want to encourage you to think with me this morning a bit more about Memorial Day than just being the official start of summer.
Freedom is not free. It never has been nor will it ever be. Freedom always come with a price. We are reminded this weekend that we can have cookouts, travel to the beach, spend time on a lake or river because of the men and women that gave their all in protecting the freedom of this great country. We should never forget the lives of those exemplified by the numbers portrayed in the video we watched. Each number has a name. Each name was a son or daughter. Each son or daughter was a creation of God Almighty. Each creation of God Almighty had a purpose. We should never forget.
Today, we celebrate the purpose of God by remembering.
1 Thessalonians 1:3 NIV84
We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.
In context, this cause for remembering in this verse is actually named later on in this book.
1 Thessalonians 3:6 NIV84
But Timothy has just now come to us from you and has brought good news about your faith and love. He has told us that you always have pleasant memories of us and that you long to see us, just as we also long to see you.
Timothy came to the apostles with a good report of what had happened. Our country is pausing over the course of this weekend to remember the good report that men and women from all walks of life, all faiths, all backgrounds and how they gave their all for the country in which they loved enough for which to die.
The criteria for remembering is so that they story can be told. In the case of our scripture today, it is “before our God and Father” in which it is remembered. It is an act of worship. Remembering the lives of heroes that have paid the ultimate price is not an act of worship but an act of remembering. We should never worship our country and remember our God, but we should worship our God and remember the gift He has given us in this great land we call America. Lord, forgive us when we fail to do that! Everything we need to do we need to do before our God and Father.
Job 33:12 NIV84
“But I tell you, in this you are not right, for God is greater than man.
We should never do anything, especially in remembering, that would not be considered an act of worship before God first!
When we fail to do this, there becomes a crisis of remembering. We see that in our country just now as we see the cookouts are more important that the numbers and names that gave their all in order that we might have a cookout. We forget to be like young Timothy and share the ways that we have seen the work that has taken place and the lives that have been changed. We tend to pass over the sacrifice as bask in the glory.
Psalm 103:2 NIV84
Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits—
The cause, the criteria, and the crisis of remembering define for us the WHY to remember. Paul, however, goes on in this one verse to remind us what we should remember.

Work Produced by Faith

“We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith...”
What a power-packed phrase that is! Your work produced by faith.
Ephesians 2:8 NIV84
For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—
Our salvation comes by faith and not by works, but our work is produced by faith. Our fallen heroes that gave their all had a faith in the democracy for which they gave their life. Our faith as Christians comes about as the result of our conversion experience. We must recognize that apart from Christ, we are nothing, but with Christ we are everything!
2 Thessalonians 1:11 NIV84
With this in mind, we constantly pray for you, that our God may count you worthy of his calling, and that by his power he may fulfill every good purpose of yours and every act prompted by your faith.
Everything we do should be done because of our faith. We should be law abiding citizens in our community and country. We should be honest and have the integrity to show our witness for Christ. Our work should be produced by faith first of all because of our conversion. Remember that we indeed were lost but now we are found. We were blind but now we see. Our conversion has changed us from the inside out.
Our work produced by faith also comes about because of our conviction.
Romans 1:16 NIV84
I am not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.
We should be producing works by our faith because of the conviction and truth we have in and of the gospel. We should never be ashamed. Can you imagine being the person going into a battle ashamed for the flag in which they fight? It would not make sense that someone would risk his or her life for something they do not feel strong about or are not convicted to do so. Will someone remember you before our God and Father because of your work produced by faith? You will not only remember your conversion with conviction, you will be committed in carrying it out.
Our world is full of churches that have uncommitted members. There are folks that will attend church on Sunday and maybe participate, but most likely will sit there with arms folded saying, “Go ahead, I dare you to bless me!” They leave the church service just as uncommitted as when they walked in to that service. Until we as a church become folks that are committed to do work produced by faith, we will still never fulfill the great commission we have been called to do.
Matthew 28:18–20 NIV84
Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
Is your work producing faith?
If your work is producing faith, then I guarantee you that you labor is prompted by love.

Labor Prompted by Love

Did you notice how Paul laid that our for us here? The word labor here is from the Greek word kopos. It means to laboriously toil, to have unceasing hardship and born for love’s sake. The Jewish tradition was to work for others in helping with charity, to visit and care for those in need, to provide comfort, care and protection.
James 2:26 NIV84
As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.
In other words, your labor prompted by love should show some fruitfulness. One of my favorite expressions that Gordon Noble uses is, “I am not judging I am just a fruit inspector!” Your labor prompted by love should produce some fruit. If you remember, any type of fruit will have seeds designed in it to reproduce. We should remember those heroes before us that loved their families, their country, and most of all their God that they would be willing to die. That in itself should produce fruitfulness in our lives that we might show our faithfulness.
Labor prompted by love comes from faithfulness. It is from the faithfulness we have for our God that we carry out our labor.
1 Thessalonians 2:9 NIV84
Surely you remember, brothers, our toil and hardship; we worked night and day in order not to be a burden to anyone while we preached the gospel of God to you.
This does not come from a love that is erotic or even brotherly, but it comes from a love that seeks to give. This agape love is from God who loves not because people are worthy of it, but because He is just that kind of God. It is His nature to love.
1 John 4:8 NIV84
Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
Our labor is prompted by love because God first loved us.
Theologian Leon Morris wrote, “Either we yield to the divine agape love to be transformed by it, to be remade in the divine image, to see people in a measure as God sees us, or we don’t. If we do not, there lies our condemnation. However, if we do give in to the divine agape love, we are transformed by the power of God.’
I cannot think of a more tenuous labor than that of a Savior that loved me so much that He forgave me of all my past, present and future junk. The forgiveness of my sins and your sins ought to compel us to work to the end of which we are called. The forgiveness of my sins and your sins our to make our labor be prompted by love.
Colossians 1:13–14 NIV84
For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.
Your work should be produced by faith and your labor prompted by love. Those actions in turn will give us endurance inspired by hope.

Endurance Inspired by Hope

The word for endurance is from the Greek word hypomone. It signifies steadfastness. It is not laying down and passively waiting but actively enduring and acting with purpose. This endurance inspired by hope produces patience.
Romans 8:25 NIV84
But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.
We have an endurance inspired by Hope that is exemplified through patience. This patience allows us to persevere. Our hope we have received is stimulated by those heroes of the faith that have gone before us. This weekend we need to remember not only the service men and women that sacrificed their lives for our freedom, but we also need to remember those heroes of our faith that have shown us the way. Their example helps us persevere.
Hebrews 12:1 NIV84
Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.
Our endurance inspired by hope also sets for us a posture in which we must take. How many times when you were growing up did someone say to you, “Make sure you have good posture?” I remember that I was told to stand up straight and tall. From the perspective of this verse we are looking at today, our endurance inspired by hope helps to stand on the word of God and His promises. It helps us to go the straight way because of the assurance it gives us!
1 Thessalonians 1:3 NIV84
We continually remember before our God and Father your work produced by faith, your labor prompted by love, and your endurance inspired by hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.
Our work produced by faith, our labor prompted by love and our endurance inspired by hope all point us to the work of the Lord Jesus Christ.
John 15:13 NIV84
Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.
His body was broken for us.
His blood was shed for us.
On this Memorial Day, let us never forget the ultimate sacrifice of the One who gave His all and then rose victoriously from the grave so sinners like you and me could be made whole, set free, and live victoriously forever more Amen.
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