Thought of the Day: A Higher Calling

Yesterday marked the anniversary of D-Day. It also marked the anniversary of a great speech in memory of the tremendous sacrifice on that day.

As part of his speech on "the boys of Pointe du Hoc" (the Rangers who scaled sheer face cliffs on the beaches of Normandy against withering direct fire), President Reagan made these poignant remarks:

Forty summers have passed since the battle that you fought here. You were young the day you took these cliffs; some of you were hardly more than boys, with the deepest joys of life before you. Yet you risked everything here. Why? Why did you do it? What impelled you to put aside the instinct for self-preservation and risk your lives to take these cliffs? What inspired all the men of the armies that met here? We look at you, and somehow we know the answer. It was faith and belief. It was loyalty and love.

The men of Normandy had faith that what they were doing was right, faith that they fought for all humanity, faith that a just God would grant them mercy on this beachhead, or on the next. It was the deep knowledge -- and pray God we have not lost it -- that there is a profound moral difference between the use of force for liberation and the use of force for conquest. You were here to liberate, not to conquer, and so you and those others did not doubt your cause. And you were right not to doubt.

You all knew that some things are worth dying for. One's country is worth dying for, and democracy is worth dying for, because it's the most deeply honorable form of government ever devised by man. All of you loved liberty. All of you were willing to fight tyranny, and you knew the people of your countries were behind you.

Read more: http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2013/06/06/the_boys_of_pointe_du_hoc_96877.html#ixzz2VXa8ONRn 

Recently, I talked with our battle staff about "extra-personal identity." In the past century we have seen two corresponding trends: the decline of the "spiritual furniture" that previous generations leaned upon, and the rise of the self-esteem movement, which made each of us the center of our own universe, and the world around us exists to serve our needs. How have these two trends worked out? Well, we each left the seclusion of our childhood and entered the real world, finding it unable to fulfill our needs and our own psyche damaged because we weren't ready for reality.

It is time to go back to hanging our identity on something beyond our own experiences and feelings of self-worth. Our feelings will inevitably betray us. We must look beyond ourselves. President Reagan rolled out some of the old "furniture" in this speech--ideals, country, God. These are things that stand over and above and call us to self-denying sacrifice when we'd otherwise simply cater to our own needs.

With Jesus Christ as our Savior from sin, we have the opportunity to be "new creations" with "our lives hidden with Christ in God." Is it time to take that vacant space in your life and roll in the furniture?