Show us your unfailing love, Lord, and grant us your salvation.
I will listen to what God the Lord says;
he promises peace to his people, his faithful servants— but let them not turn to folly.
Surely his salvation is near those who fear him, that his glory may dwell in our land.”
(Psalm 85:7-9 NIV)
I was reading a blog entry from Dr. Carol Reynolds, a renowned music history professor and educator in Western culture, and came across this exhortation: “We don’t know when the current fever for destroying our culture [sic] heritage will abate. Some of us may not live to see sanity restored. But for those laboring quietly, diligently for the renewal of education and the preservation of cultural history, do not waver. Take ownership of our cultural and artistic treasures. Whether we preserve them in the corners of our homes or are called to set them out for all to see, we cannot lose confidence in their strength, value, or efficacy.” * (emphasis added)
You, also, may agree that it’s hard to see an end to the cultural insanity and societal upheaval we are currently experiencing. Centuries of “cultural and artistic treasures” that have served as reminders of our heritage and symbols of lofty ideals are being reduced in or even removed from our public square. Figures of the past are being judged through a “post-modern” lens that does not understand the people being judged. For instance, schools named for the general who won the American Revolution and our first president are being renamed because this military and civic leader was also a slave owner – a common characteristic of men of his social strata in that day. The many sacrifices and contributions George Washington made so that our nation could be birthed, freed from aristocratic tyranny of the mother country, and then stabilized as a country are ignored and his sins focused upon. I, personally, think it is extremely dangerous to judge someone of the past based on the assumptions of the present. Eventually, our current “present” will be the future’s “past” and we, too, will be judged. (“Judge not, lest ye be judged.”) I expect (hope!) that when today’s cultural upheaval settles out, respect will be restored for the very human and complex people who helped to build the messy and beautiful nation we have. I hope.
In the meantime, we must do what we can to preserve our heritage and culture. Buy and preserve all the history books and movies you can, especially those which were published in decades past, whose texts do not denigrate our nation. Study and learn about the complicated, courageous people who came before us and helped to create this country. Then teach the original – and godly – ideals of those people to your children and grandchildren, friends, and anyone else who will listen. Educate yourself and others about our culture – music, entertainment, education, struggles, sins – the whole glorious but messy story. And encourage young people to take up the baton of genuine understanding of our nation, its history and heritage, and its arts so that they, too, can educate the next generations. Eventually (hopefully!), the extremes of craziness in our current culture will level out to a more balanced place and we who have stored up these treasures will be able to showcase them and explain their value.
You probably remember the story of Ezra in the Old Testament. He was a priest and scribe who led a large group of Israelites from captivity in the Persian empire back to Jerusalem. After first the Babylonian conquerers and then the Persian occupiers, Israel and Jerusalem were no longer anything close to the glory they had had under Kings David and Solomon. The walls of Jerusalem had been destroyed, the Temple was destroyed, and the people’s understanding and memory of Torah (the Law of the Lord) was severely malnourished. But the scrolls with the Torah had recently been recovered and so Ezra sought to educate the people.
“And all the people gathered as one person at the public square which was in front of the Water Gate, and they asked Ezra the scribe to bring the Book of the Law of Moses which the Lord had given to Israel. Then Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly of men, women, and all who could listen with understanding, on the first day of the seventh month. And he read from it before the public square which was in front of the Water Gate, from early morning until midday, in the presence of men and women, those who could understand; and all the people were attentive to the Book of the Law.” (Nehemiah 8:1-3 NASB)
As a result and under God’s direction, Ezra and the governor Nehemiah led the Israelites in the reunification of the people, the rebuilding of the Temple, and, most importantly, a spiritual renewal which included the celebration of the holy festivals that God had ordained. The restored reading of the Law became part of the education of the former exiles and helped to refresh their spiritual heritage. God proved his faithfulness as the prophecies were fulfilled and God’s people once again turned toward Him.
Our cultural “laws” and our Judeo-Christian heritage has seemingly been conquered by invaders who seek to destroy it. But God is faithful to help us preserve that culture to pass down to future generations. So, in the meantime, “…for those laboring quietly, diligently for the renewal of education and the preservation of cultural history, do not waver.” Continue laboring quietly and diligently for the renewal of our nation. Continue learning so that you can teach, even if you do not consider yourself a teacher. Continue laboring so that our educational and cultural systems are not ruined by narrow, judgmental mindset. Continue collecting so the value of our past is preserved and passed on to future generations. Continue seeking out like-minded persons for accountability and encouragement. Continue persevering in prayer for our nation. Continue to pray against the folly in our nation and that we would turn back to God’s glory.
God,
Thank you for the rich heritages you have placed within this nation and within each of us. Thank you for the many men and women whose courage, character, and strength helped to form this nation – imperfect and messy though it was and is – and whose lives can be an example for us and for our future. In this day and age we pray you would protect and preserve your people as they navigate this era. Help us to mindfully pray for and diligently steward our culture and nation. Help us to learn, teach, and preserve her history so we can pass along what you have planted within her. Help us not to judge but to be merciful to those around us, to people in the past, and to people in the future. Give us the faith and courage of men like Ezra and Nehemiah as we seek spiritual renewal and cultural reformation in our day and society. Show us your unfailing love, Lord, and grant us your salvation. We will listen to what you say and not turn to folly. We believe your salvation is near those who fear you, and we pray that your glory may dwell in our land. We ask these in the name of Christ, Amen.
“Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful. Do not judge, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn, and you will not be condemned. Forgive, and you will be forgiven…For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” (Luke 6:36-38 NIV)
“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.” (Matthew 7:1-5 NIV)
“Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress. Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.” (1 Timothy 4:15-16 NIV)
*https://www.professorcarol.com/2022/09/08/the-rightful-ownership-of-art/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=the-rightful-ownership-of-art
(Here’s an extended quote from that article:)
“Here in America, we have had (in the past) a good sense of preserving our artistic heritage, especially in our East Coast cities. Our most esteemed cultural institutions were built by families who devoted enormous private resources to do this, establishing galleries and museums, orchestras and theaters. These institutions, alas, tend to be taken for granted today. Fundraising for them gets ever harder. There is diminishing appreciation for the fact that individuals brought them into being. We had no kings, emperors, or archbishops to do the job.
“Yet, here we are, whipped up by academics and ideologically inflamed citizens into a frenzy of stripping our cities, our campuses, and our public institutions of their past. There are individual situations, I acknowledge, where specific names and images need to be reconsidered, reconfigured, or possibly even removed. But those circumstances are rare.
“Instead, total swaths of our historical culture are being ripped away in a manner so thoughtless as to have been inconceivable just years ago. With every monument toppled or name stripped, a chunk of our history disappears. Time is supposed to be the arbiter of how history is written, not a ravenous committee of professors and politically driven activists.
“Of course, individual works of art are vulnerable too. In fact, one argument (historically) for having masterworks in private hands relates to the probability that they will be better protected from ideological wrath. It pains me to see awkwardly worded placards slapped up next to the identity tags on paintings and sculptures in today’s museums (in Europe as well as America). These placards, in essence, preach sermons reinterpreting items created three, four, even five centuries ago. They apply language and ideas that no artist of the time would recognize or understand. I most recently saw this phenomenon among Renaissance treasures at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam. If it were not so damaging, it would be laughable.
“Still the passage of time has a way of winning the argument. Vividly I remember being in Moscow a couple of years after the so-called Fall of Communism. Churches were reopening lickety-split. Books long purged could be found in the shops. The old names of streets and institutions were being restored. Monuments toppled by the Bolsheviks were being recast.
“I knew this all to be true, of course, from reading about it. Still, encountering it in person was something else. I’ll never forget the physical shock of bumping into the pedestal of a newly cast bronze of a Romanov tsar while backing up to photograph a favorite view. “Where did he come from?” I uttered in surprise. “He didn’t use to be here!”
“Actually, he did use to be there—right there, until his statue was melted down after 1917. When the Bolsheviks forced their violent ideology onto the citizenry, everything was done to quash nine-hundred years of tsarist heritage (not to mention more than nine-hundred years of Christian history). With a new light illuminating the Russian world, the past was being rebirthed. It had won its battle through patience.
“We don’t know when the current fever for destroying our culture heritage will abate. Some of us may not live to see sanity restored. But for those laboring quietly, diligently for the renewal of education and the preservation of cultural history, do not waver. Take ownership of our cultural and artistic treasures. Whether we preserve them in the corners of our homes or are called to set them out for all to see, we cannot lose confidence in their strength, value, or efficacy.” – Dr. Carol Reynolds
(originally published September 10, 2022)