...Moses built an altar and called the name of it Jehovahnissi: For he said, Because the LORD hath sworn that the LORD will have war with Amalek from generation to generation.

Israel Must Remember The Battle

God told Moses to write about this event, this battle in a book. Isn’t it amazing that you hold a copy of that book in your hand today? Think about it for a moment. Do you carry around a copy of the Battle of Thermopylae, or Gettysburg or Hamburger Hill? No, you can’t count the internet on your smart phone.  Yet we do carry the book that Moses wrote and the battle that we just read about. That is by the power of God and his preservation of His Word.

God wanted the nation of Israel to remember what had been done to win the battle. He wanted especially wanted Joshua, the leader of the next generation, to remember those who fought beside him, to remember God’s power, remember God’s people and to remember the unmerciful enemy that God would promised he would ultimately destroy.

Moses did as God said and wrote it down in the book, he also built an altar of remembrance that day. He called the name of that memorial Jehovahnissi, which means the Lord Our Banner. A reminder of Moses raising his rod on high, finding the power of God through prayer and of Joshua and the army winning the battle under the banner of God.

To Moses and Joshua that day God was their battle flag. This memorial was to remind them that they fight under the power and to the glory of God. They move, march and win under God’s colors and as His people.

In ancient times the battle flag was the way armies communicated and identified themselves. The battle flag was vitally important, and the honor of the soldiers was directly tied to their colors. The battle flag was always protected by a flag bearer and by an honor guard who in the midst of all the battles had only one job, protect the flag at all costs.  There was no greater loss and no greater shame for a company of soldiers than to lose their colors.

We Must Remember

Memorials are all around us and yet too often we fail to remember why they were built. Today in our nation many memorials are being destroyed. Don’t misunderstand me, long before they were tearing down the Confederate memorials they were tearing down the Christian memorials. Crosses, Bibles, plaques that were erected to honor heroes and the God they believed in were being systematically removed from public view. Remember, the enemy despises any reminder of God in our nation or schools.  

But it is not just the secular arenas where memorials are being removed. Baptist Churches are removing the name of Baptist. Some Christians meeting together don’t even bother with the name church anymore. Have they forgotten those who dedicated their lives, sacrificed their future and even died that we might have the Gospel of Jesus Christ? Have we forgotten those who have held the banner of Christian and Baptist throughout the centuries?

Do we know the names of any of the people who were the church of Jesus before they were called Baptist? Have you read their stories, studied their lives and wept over their deaths? Do we remember the Paulicians, the Waldensians, or the Anabaptists?

If we have forgotten, is there any hope of winning the battles we fight now or in the future?

If we have forgotten them, forgotten the ones who fought to bring us God’s word in our language, the ones who died rather than accept the heresies of domination of the state church, will it be long before we forget the God under whose banner they fought?

Jesus warned the church in Sardis in Revelation 3:3 Remember therefore how thou hast received and heard, and hold fast, and repent. If therefore thou shalt not watch, I will come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee.

Is that not exactly what we are seeing today in so many who call themselves Christian but do not stand for the truth that Christ taught? There is no chance to turn back the tide of sin and immorality in our communities and in our country without remembering the banner of God under which we fight under. There is no hope of turning back the invasion of apathy and immorality unless we once remember and once again raise high our battle flag.