Sermon Tone Analysis

Memorial Day

Today we commemorate the brave men and women who sacrificed their lives for our freedom.

It is important that we observe holidays like Memorial day lest people forget those who gave the ultimate sacrifice.

It is important that we remember what these men and women have done.

There are people in our midst who truly remember, they are those who actually fought in a war and survived.

Their lives were changed forever.

They still in a very vivid way, remember the ugliness and the cruelty of war and the trauma and the anguish of seeing their friends die..

Alex Ozols’ Testimony

Alex Ozols’ testimony..

Those who lived through the various wars remember in a very vivid way the trauma and the anguish of seeing their friends die

Young people, don’t ever forget that the freedom and even the luxury that you enjoy...

Memorials are also important in the Bible.

Background of the story of Joshua.. background..

Joshua

4 So Joshua called together the twelve men he had appointed from the Israelites, one from each tribe, 5 and said to them, “Go over before the ark of the Lord your God into the middle of the Jordan.

Each of you is to take up a stone on his shoulder, according to the number of the tribes of the Israelites, 6 to serve as a sign among you.

In the future, when your children ask you, ‘What do these stones mean?’ 7 tell them that the flow of the Jordan was cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord.

When it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off.

These stones are to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever.”

8 So the Israelites did as Joshua commanded them.

They took twelve stones from the middle of the Jordan, according to the number of the tribes of the Israelites, as the Lord had told Joshua; and they carried them over with them to their camp, where they put them down.9

Joshua set up the twelve stones that had been[a] in the middle of the Jordan at the spot where the priests who carried the ark of the covenant had stood.

And they are there to this day.

10 Now the priests who carried the ark remained standing in the middle of the Jordan until everything the Lord had commanded Joshua was done by the people, just as Moses had directed Joshua.

The people hurried over, 11 and as soon as all of them had crossed, the ark of the Lord and the priests came to the other side while the people watched.

12 The men of Reuben, Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh crossed over, ready for battle, in front of the Israelites, as Moses had directed them.

13 About forty thousand armed for battle crossed over before the Lord to the plains of Jericho for war.

14 That day the Lord exalted Joshua in the sight of all Israel; and they stood in awe of him all the days of his life, just as they had stood in awe of Moses.

15 Then the Lord said to Joshua, 16 “Command the priests carrying the ark of the covenant law to come up out of the Jordan.”

17 So Joshua commanded the priests, “Come up out of the Jordan.”

18 And the priests came up out of the river carrying the ark of the covenant of the Lord.

No sooner had they set their feet on the dry ground than the waters of the Jordan returned to their place and ran at flood stage as before.

19 On the tenth day of the first month the people went up from the Jordan and camped at Gilgal on the eastern border of Jericho.

20 And Joshua set up at Gilgal the twelve stones they had taken out of the Jordan.

21 He said to the Israelites, “In the future when your descendants ask their parents, ‘What do these stones mean?’ 22 tell them, ‘Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground.’

23 For the Lord your God dried up the Jordan before you until you had crossed over.

The Lord your God did to the Jordan what he had done to the Red Sea[b]when he dried it up before us until we had crossed over.

24 He did this so that all the peoples of the earth might know that the hand of the Lord is powerful and so that you might always fear the Lord your God.”

Joshua

Memorials

We have a responsibility to help the next generation remember God and His work.

What are other dates do we remember?

(birthdays, graduation, etc.)

The real point in all this is that we want to remember and we need to remember and that is why we want to capture the moment by keeping objects or mementos and by taking photographs, now in the digital world we can even easily take videos.

I remember when we have to take the film to be processed and developed but now in the digital age we can instantly capture moments in our lives.

Now, Our generation is witness to the rise of the social media phenomenon of Facebook.

I believe it became a hit not only because of the social component but also because of people’s desire to capture memories and connect to old ones.

That’s why we have two phenomenon within the Facebook phenomenon.

1. Capture new memories - this gave rise to the “Selfie”.

(explain) Where are the best places to take a selfie?

In front of a mirror, while in the car (I advise not when the car is moving!

Just don’t!),

I just saw the wildest selfie on top of a very high tower.

This is to capture new memories….

2. To connect to old memories – this also gave rise to another phenomenon, which is called “Throwback Thursday” , where a person finds a really old photograph and posts it online – the rules are – the photo should be at least five years old, should be posted on a Thursday for reasons I don’t know, and that the picture has to be interesting…

Some interesting comments people make on Throwback Thursday pictures..

- Guess which one is me

- Me 50 lbs ago

- I miss the full head of hair

- I can’t believe my parents were this good-looking

- Yikes!

Where is this sermon going… I’ll show you a connection in a moment.

I entitled my message today “Throwback Sunday : Remembering the Faithfulness of God”

THE TRUTH IS WE HUMAN BEINGS NEED MEMENTOS LIKE PHOTOGRAPHS OR DATES LIKE ANNIVERSARIES OR BIRTHDAYS IN ORDER TO REMEMBER MOMENTS OR MILESTONES IN OUR LIVES.

The truth is that God wants us to remember His faithfulness in our lives.

As we see from the story that we read from the bible that happened over 3000 years ago.

Many of you have heard of the Israelites crossing the Red sea miraculously.

How many of you know about a second miraculous crossing by the Israelites?

This was the crossing of the Jordan River.

Finally, after 40 years of coming out of Egypt, a new generation of Israel was entering the promised land.

Problem was to get from where they were in the east to Canaan, the promised land on the west, they had to cross the Jordan river.

The problem was compounded further as it is written in Joshua, in that the waters of the river are flooded that time of the year.

And then God did an amazing thing – the bible said that God stopped the waters of the Jordan River from upstream that it stood in a heap.

In

“So when the people broke camp to cross the Jordan, the priests carrying the ark of the covenant went ahead of them.

15 Now the Jordan is at flood stage all during harvest.

Yet as soon as the priests who carried the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water’s edge, 16 the water from upstream stopped flowing.”

Story of the twelve stones, where God commanded Joshua to choose twelve men each representing a tribe of Israel to take twelve stones from the Jordan river and make a memorial from these twelve stones.

TWELVE STONES.

Two reasons memorials are important:

TO COMMEMORATE

TO COMMUNICATE

1. TO COMMEMORATE

TO COMMEMORATE

We are by nature forgetful people, these milestones help us to remember and to be thankful.

Remembering is the first step to thanksgiving.

How many times have someone disappointed you because they seem to have forgotten what you have done for them?

People are ungrateful because they easily forget.

God calls us to remember the greatest sacrifice the world has ever known.

This is why we have the Lord’s supper.

This is my body which is broken for you .. do this in remembrance of me..

Cup..

In the story of Joshua,

We must reverse the tide of forgetfulness in the next generation.

We are by nature forgetful people, these milestones help us to remember and to be thankful.

Jos

Our remembrance becomes a signpost to a lost world.

We have a Christian memorial in the last supper

TO COMMUNICATE

2. TO COMMUNICATE