Yesterday I went on about memorials and our innate need to place markers of remembrance. It reminds me of the second verse of John Wyeth's song "Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing" when it says "Here I raise my Ebenezer, hither by thy help I come, and I hope by thy good pleasure, safely to arrive at home." Some people think he's making a reference to Ebenezer Scrooge, but an ebenezer is a marker - a pile of rocks - a monument - or for you hikers, a cairn. A marker to help us find the way.
Most of you know that I work with a study abroad program held in Jerusalem. We are very careful to always call the country The Holy Land, because for all the differences of the people who live there, they can all agree that the land is, indeed, holy. You can't throw a rock without it landing on a spot where something historically significant happened. There are shrines and monuments and churches and synagogues and mosques and markers dotting the land in memory of a person, a people, or an event that should not be forgotten. It is literally holy land.
Aren't our lives equally holy? Aren't our people and our life events equally unforgettable? I think the answer is yes. I believe that is why we place markers. We raise ebenezers. As we remember our people, we also find our way.
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