In 2010, Thomas Grip, Jens Nilsson and Mikael Hedberg created a survival video game called Amnesia: The Dark Descent, based on the story of a person named Daniel who wakes up in a haunted castle. He can’t remember anything from the past, but he must explore the castle where darkness, monsters and haunting flashbacks make his journey a horrible nightmare. I have not played the game, nor do I recommend it, but the game provides a perfect backdrop to what is happening in our country today.
In a sense, America is suffering from amnesia. We have forgotten our roots and what has made us great. We do not remember the origins of our holidays. We only remember the date and the weekend of entertainment they provide.
We celebrate, but often we don’t know why. Christmas has become all about the man in the red suit and less about the Christ child’s birth. Halloween has become a time for celebrating the hideous and less about All Saints Day where all the martyrs and dead saints were to be remembered for their magnanimous deeds. Saint Patrick’s Day has been reduced to “pinch day” and leprechauns, not about the saint who proclaimed the gospel using a shamrock as his teaching tool. Thanksgiving has become “Turkey Day,” not about the Pilgrims who starved through the winter and sacrificed all for religious freedom. The Fourth of July has become a revelry of fireworks and picnics, with few remembering what the Declaration of Independence really means. We have traded our Judeo-Christian traditions for uncharted territory, for unknown outcomes which could be destructive to our civilization. We have forgotten the tragic lessons from our history and the price that was paid to gain and maintain our liberty and independence.
All the holidays were once considered holy days – days to remember events and people who made a difference. These remembrance days used to connect people to their roots and inspire them to greater service. It used to help them remember the sacrifices and the price that was paid by a few to bless the masses. The stories of Abraham Lincoln and George Washington were household names and connected our memories to the past. We knew why we celebrate Presidents’ Day. Today, even some college students don’t remember what those two men did for civilization.
The Bible is another tool that once connected members of society. We understood each other because we understood the Bible. Everyone knew the story of David and Goliath, the story of Joseph and his coat of many colors. We knew about Abraham and Isaac and the plight of the children of Israel. Even a small child could tell you those stories because the stories were household conversations, not just mentioned on Sunday.
I wonder how many children of our modern world could tell you who Moses was, let alone the children of Israel. Just think of the lessons that are lost because we don’t teach our children about the Bible anymore. David and Goliath, a story about courage and standing one against insurmountable odds, has relevance today. The story of Joseph is a tender story about forgiveness and reunion. The story of Moses is a story about freedom and the price that must be paid for it. It is also a story of the 40-year trial of a people who needed to purge a slavery mentality from their system in order for their children to understand freedom and the power of agency. So much is lost when we forget the power of the Bible. As we forget those stories, Christ and His teachings become a legend as unreal as Camelot.
When I was in college, I read many of the great literary classics. Canterbury Tales, Paradise Lost, The Complete Works of Shakespeare and a host of other books, all of which referenced the Bible. Students used to understand the symbolism of these great works because they understood the Bible. I wonder now how students of our modern world, who have not studied the Bible, can make connections in those great works. They are great stories and the writing is wonderful, but without the subtext of the Bible, they are just stories.
If not the holidays and the Bible, what connects our society today? The media. The media has replaced our heroic Bible characters with such mythical characters as the Marvels, Aquaman, Spiderman, Batman and other fantasy characters who play the same game, just in different costumes. Nearly everyone knows who these characters are and what they stand for. The dinner table (if there are dinner table conversations without smartphone interjections) is about what movie the family just watched or what movie will be playing at the local theatre or on the television.
Earl Nightingale, an American author, radio broadcaster and motivational speaker of the 1950s, said, “We become what we think about.”
If he is right, our society is on the slippery slope of amnesia with regard to our Christian heritage. We are forgetting the very things that have made us great as a nation.
Alexis de Tocqueville in the 1800s observed, “Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because America is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.”
We are forgetting the reasons for our traditions and unwittingly replacing them with the slogans of secular society. Our holidays are no longer holy days. They are days for buying and selling the ideas and philosophies of the world. Eat, drink and have fun, for tomorrow we die – and he who dies with the most toys wins.
Reagan said, “Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We don’t pass it to our children in their bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected and handed down for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.”
I would say Christianity is never more than one generation away from extinction. We don’t pass Christianity to our children in their bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected and handed down for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years trying to tell our children that Christianity is synonymous with freedom. There will be no freedom without Christ. He is the God of this nation, and He alone can save us from the bondage we are unwittingly choosing.
Moses led the children of Israel from political bondage under Pharaoh where they had served for centuries. They saw the miracles Moses performed by the hand of God. They called Moses their deliverer, but they were not converted. The minute Moses was out of their sight, they made a golden calf to worship. They forgot the miracles and the hand of God in their lives. Their hearts and minds returned to Egypt. If they could have physically returned to Egypt, they would have.
Our children must have their own conversion story. They must have their own burning bush experience. They cannot depend on our testimony or our miracles. They must learn to have their own. We must teach them how. We must teach them to pray and get answers for themselves. We must teach them to remember. It is so easy to forget. Remembering is what the early Christians hoped would happen with the holidays. They wanted us to remember sacred people and events to bring us closer as God’s people.
If we don’t teach our children to remember there is real meaning in each holy day and give them a firm grounding in the Bible, we are abdicating the sacred privilege of instructing our children to the whims of the world. The world will boldly teach them Egypt is a wonderful place, the golden calf is the sole purpose of life, holidays have nothing to do with holy and that God is a figment of a delusional older generation. If the world is successful in her teaching, our children and children’s children will see a 40-year or a 400-year journey in the proverbial wilderness as beasts of bondage where freedom and Christianity are only beautiful dreams of yesterday.
