| Good morning everyone, Our theme for this month: “Writing and Reading” Our Bible verse for today: “Write in a book all the words I have spoken to you.” Jeremiah 30:2 (NIV) Our thought for today: “Write something for history” Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn was a famous Russian novelist in the mid-to-late 1900s. He was a Christian and a captain in the Soviet army who made the mistake of saying something critical about Joseph Stalin in a private letter, which was then opened and read by government censors. As a result, he was stripped of his military rank and sentenced to eight years in a Soviet gulag (prison camp). The conditions were hideous and inhumane, and Solzhenitsyn suffered terribly. During those years in the gulag Solzhenitsyn decided that the world needed to know about the terrible injustices of the gulag system, so he secretly wrote about it, smuggling his notes out of the gulag when he could. Ultimately his writings became the core for two of his best-selling books, “One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich” and “The Gulag Archipelago”. As he was originally writing about those experiences, Solzhenitsyn was certain he would never live to see them published. He believed he was writing for history and that he himself wouldn’t live to see it. (He was wrong. He did live. He ended up surviving prison and immigrating to the West. He died in 2008). The point is that Solzhenitsyn wrote for history. There were things that he wanted people to be aware of and to remember. That’s a pretty good reason to write. However, you don’t have to be a famous Russian dissident to have something worthy of writing about and preserving. When our grandson was born, Linda and I wrote him a long letter, put it in a time capsule along with family pictures and other memorabilia, and put it away for him to read, perhaps twenty years from now. The Bible is of course the greatest example of important and worthy information that has been recorded in writing and preserved for history. Thank God that it has been! Solzhenitsyn’s books have been a gift to history as well, just for different reasons. Hopefully someday Oliver will appreciate and even cherish the letter Linda and I left for him. I have friends who had a beloved relative from a previous generation who made an entry in her personal journal almost every day of her life, and then left those journals for her family to read after her death. The entries were just of everyday activities, family events, and special moments, but the family sure was grateful to be able to read them after she was gone. What precious memories! I encourage you to give some thought to writing for history. People fifty years from now might be inspired and touched by what you had to say. Or, maybe they’ll just get a good laugh. Either way, why not leave them a note? Write something for history. God bless, Pastor Jim |
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