Deuteronomy 27:2 “And it shall be on the day when ye shall pass over Jordan unto the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee, that thou shalt set thee up great stones, and plaster them with plaster:”
A little over a year ago, Dan Woolley nearly died in Hotel Montana. The hotel is not in the state of Montana; it is actually located in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, site of the terrible earthquake in January 2010. Dan Woolley is best known for the blood-stained notes he wrote to his family while trapped in the rubble of Hotel Montana after the earthquake. Though he did survive, he had written those letters because he wanted to leave something that would outlive himself.
Like the story of Dan Woolley, we are reminded in Deuteronomy 27 of the importance of leaving what is important to those who will follow us. We should leave truths that will outlive us and that will guide the lives of those who come after us. What will your kids remember? What will the people you have influenced know was important in your life?
In our day, people are writing more than ever by writing less. Whether you text, tweet, email, or post on your “wall,” you are leaving something behind. What does your writing say about what is important and valued to you? I am not opposed to texting, tweeting, or posting on walls; in fact, I text quite often myself. The danger of writing in a medium that is not designed to be permanent (but is) is that you neglect writing anything that is worth remembering. Would you want every text message you sent yesterday to be written down in a book and published? Most likely not! I know I wouldn’t! The point is, don’t lose sight of the fact that you are leaving something to those who will follow you.
I recently heard about a hot-selling series of novels in Japan that are written and compiled by a number of authors who texted the entire series. The very language and narrative are totally different than a traditional novel because a group of twenty-year-olds compiled the story one text at a time. That may seem like a quirky trend of the age in which we live; but if you are not careful, you will live an entire life and have said nothing worth remembering. You don’t want to do that!
The children of Israel erected an altar covered in plaster to remember what God had said and done. You might want to consider recording in a more permanent way what you are orally telling your kids now. What people remember you for will not be any better than what you record. What are you recording? Know what the Bible says, be determined to live it, and then pass it on to people over whom you have influence. Make sure what you are doing is right and worth remembering, and then make sure to write it “for the record”!