“PLEASE REMEMBER ME”
Luke 23:39-43; 1 Corinthians 11:23-26
Jesus and a convicted criminal had something in common. They shared a final plea: “Please Remember Me!” This message is about our need to be remembered, and a reminder that remembering Jesus is at the heart of our Christian faith.
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I love history. Sometimes that takes me to old cemeteries where I like to read the names and dates etched on the headstones of people who lived hundreds of years ago. Most were ordinary people like you and me. The names and dates on their headstones are all we have to remember them by. Once in an old Boston cemetery I came across a headstone so weathered that the name and dates were completely worn away. There was no way to know who was buried in that plot, or when they lived. A sense of sadness came over me. I mourned the loss of that unknown person’s identity. There is something in each of us that says, “When I’m gone, please remember me! That plea is made by people everywhere.
When an old building in Poland was being torn down about ten years ago, a bottle was discovered in one of its walls. Inside the bottle was a scrap of paper with a list of names. Beside each name was a series of numbers indicating they were prisoners. The Auschwitz concentration camp was nearby. These men were a work party sent from that camp. They found a piece of paper on which they wrote their names, prisoner identification numbers and home towns. Then they put the paper in a bottle and hid the bottle in the wall where it remained until it was found decades later.
That act was a desperate cry to the world, “Please remember us!”
January 27, 2020 marked the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. The suffering and cruel death of its victims was solemnly remembered. 1.3 million people of Jewish descent were sent there during WW2. 1.1 million of them were worked to death, starved to death, or exterminated in gas chambers. They didn’t have an opportunity to leave us a message in a bottle. Most of the victims were buried in unmarked mass graves in the hope that they would be forever forgotten.
Forgetting is easy. It doesn’t take effort. Forgetting is also dangerous. When there is no memory, history’s most important lessons are lost. The horrors of Auschwitz were a lifetime ago. As that generation of survivors passes away, their collective plea is, “Please Remember us!” But fewer and fewer of us remember or care about the past.
In a recent poll, 41 percent of respondents did not know what Auschwitz was. We are told, “Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat its mistakes.” Remembering is the only way we will we be saved from our past folly. Remembering is hard. It requires tireless, continuous, intentional action. But the time and effort is worth it. Faithful remembering lays the foundation for a better future.
Remembering is the heart of our Christian Faith. Christianity is all about remembering Jesus—remembering who he was and why he gave his life for us. On the eve of his death Jesus said to those who loved him, “Please remember me.” He invited them to his Table. He gave them bread and a cup to remember him by. Every time we eat the Lord’s Supper we proclaim the saving power of Jesus’ death until his kingdom comes. Around the Lord’s Table the power of Jesus’ spirit comes into our lives, and goes with us from here so others can see his life in ours. That’s how it works, and it begins here. We eat and drink together. We remember together. We pray together. Then we leave here empowered as ambassadors and ministers of the Christ who remembers us.
When a nameless criminal was dying on a cross, he cried out to Jesus, “Please remember me!” When he died his body was tossed in an unmarked grave, according to Roman practice.. There was nothing to remember him by. He was soon forgotten by the world. But, he was not forgotten by Jesus, who said to him, “Today you will be with me in paradise.” You will eat with me at my table in my kingdom.
We have gathered today in answer to Jesus’ final plea—“Remember me.”
When we remember Jesus, Jesus remembers us.