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Tonight is about the power of collective memory in Scripture, and it is— there are a lot of things about different types of memory. This is not about memory in the way that we normally talk about it, but I do want to start off thinking about memory in that traditional way. So we all know this story, so in your mind, pull back the scene of what happens with Peter the disciple the last night when he was with Jesus. And around the table, and Jesus is talking about these things, and the disciples aren't quite understanding. And, you know, it gets to— according to John, you've got the foot washing. Jesus gets down like a servant, starts washing their feet. Peter's the one, oh no, not my feet. And Jesus, well, if I can't wash your feet, you can't have any part of the kingdom shared with me. You know, oh, oh, well then wash all of me, right? So this is Peter, the typical person to go first. Speak up, even if he hasn't thought through what the whole thing he's gonna say is. But in that declaration, Peter makes a statement. Oh, you know, I will never leave you or forsake you. And Jesus says, well, surely as the cock crows 3 times tonight, you will deny me. Peter's thinking, no way, no way. So it's a few hours later, sometime later, when they're in the garden and the disciples are falling asleep, and Jesus is trying to get them to stay awake because he wants some company. But they can't, they can't help it. It's late. And then sure enough, then the guards come. There's an arrest that happens according to which gospel rendering you're reading. There's gonna be maybe a sword and an ear that gets cut off. And Jesus saying, put away your swords, no more of this. But Jesus is arrested. And it's then you get the scene, it's still night, still nightfall, and Jesus is being moved along and his disciples are just scared. scattered. And this narrator, and particularly in Matthew, just follows like a documentary cam, follows with Peter. And then a girl comes up to him and says, oh, I know you, you were with Peter. Oh no. And in Matthew 22— or excuse me, Matthew 26, we get 3 of those denials by Peter. And it happens— this is just hours after they were eating the Last Supper. They didn't call it that then, of course, but they were just together. They just had all these experiences, and Jesus had told them this was going to happen, but sure enough, fear takes over, and memory in our minds do a strange thing, and we can have these blocks of our memory that happen, or we just block things out that are hard to remember, or we don't want to remember. And then we get this at the end of Matthew 26. Now Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard. A servant girl came to him and said, you were with Jesus the Galilean. But he denied it before all of them, saying, I did not know what you were talking about. When he went out to the porch, another servant girl saw him, and she said to the bystanders, ooh, this man, he was with Jesus of Nazareth. And again Peter denied it with an oath, I swear, I do not know the man. After a little while the bystanders came up to Peter and said, certainly you are also one of them, for your accent betrays you. And then Peter began to curse and he swore an oath and he said, I do not know the man! At that moment the cock crowed, and then Peter remembered. And then Peter remembered what Jesus had said. It's strange how memory works. And in that story, you can— we can have all sorts of— we could spend the whole time talking about the symbolism of these imageries and why is it the cock crow? Why is that call of nature, that sound that usually is in the background, why is that the thing that prompts his memory and not anything else? But our memories are sometimes fickle, and a lot of times as adults we start talking about memory in terms of loss. memory loss, and we think about it as like a commodity or something that we just can't keep up with, or we're afraid we're gonna— oh, I don't know, my mind's slipping, I'm losing— and that's— and there's a real grief and a real physiological thing that's happening when we start to lose our cognitive abilities to remember. But that is not what we're talking about tonight, because what we're talking about tonight is something different. And a great example is when you You can think of someone who has lost a lot of their cognitive memory and function, and they can play— hear a hymn being played, and what can that person suddenly do? Sing every single word of a hymn. And that's the kind of memory that we're going to get at. Now that's a musical connection, but there's something with our collective memory in a network, a living collective memory that can have some of that same functioning power, and it can stick with us even when other parts of us, or some of us, start to forget parts of our past, things Jesus might have told us in our lives. And so tonight it's about collective memory in Scripture, and the power of that as a people of faith, and the purpose. What is it for? What do we do with it? So a couple of definitions. We have this idea of episodic memory. Which is, I think that was from the 19— well, it's decades ago, but episodic memory is this idea of how our minds store and recall information about specific events, or people, or places. It says, recent research shows that one's mind continuously organizes and reorganizes our episodic memories. We are, our minds are always at work, right? Our neuroplasticity, if you, Thought about some of that, how we can form new ways of doing things, but also we can— we kind of reformulate, re-remember former things, and that sometimes changes. The way we remember an event isn't the same across our life, and we know that as in families. If you ever go and gather back at a reunion and suddenly you're telling stories and the stories don't match up, and it's almost like there's 4 versions of the gospel. Wait a minute! No, you didn't, sir. You didn't bring the— that wasn't you, that was me. Oh no, that wasn't me, that was— you know, these kind of arguments break out in these families because people remember differently. This episodic memory, it changes, and it's about more than ourselves. It's not just about what we remember than what we learned, it's what we experienced. Now there's this idea of collective memory, and the person Maurice Halbwachs, And I'm sure I'm mispronouncing that. In 1941, who is the founder of collective memory studies, this idea of a reconstruction of a past that adapts the image of historical facts to the beliefs and spiritual needs of the present. This is the part I want us to think about. It's how our collective memory can help us connect to one another and all of our spiritual ancestors. connects us with them, people we never met, people who lived long ago in conditions and places that are nothing like Asheville in 2026. But we connect with them through this idea of collective memory. And a lot of that is from the words of Scripture because it's a living story we take and it shapes us. And our Bible study teachers taught us this, or our parents or our grandparents. We've heard these stories and we've been grafted on. And it changes us when we can remember it. So here's the— we're gonna go to a lot of Scripture, and I'm gonna try to cite several passages and try not to talk too quickly, but we're gonna try to get through this whole handout tonight. The first thing that's important to know is that in terms of when we hear the word remember in the Bible, and particularly in the Old Testament, The Hebrew word is zakar, and it means— and I remember learning this— that to remember in Scripture in the Old Testament was not about this, oh, I remember that, as if it brings some nostalgia. That is not the point of memory in the Old Testament. It's not to help us become more nostalgic for the future. Oh, wasn't that nice? To remember is to do something. To remember is to do. Remember is a verb. And when I learned that, it changed my whole way of reading. And especially when you think about what is that commandment that starts with the word remember? The third one, it's the longest one of all the 10. Remember the Sabbath. And it's not about remember it. Oh yeah, I remember it. And move on. Remember it and keep it holy. That means the whole day. That means the whole day you are acting on the memory of what the Sabbath is, what it's for, who it's for. To remember is to do. We get this in several passages, and the Scriptures are pretty prescriptive to the Israelites about how they can help themselves remember. Because we will tend to forget when left to our own devices. So in Numbers 15, this idea of memory in a garment, and you can follow along, you see the verses there. This is Numbers 15:37-41. The Lord spoke to Moses, speak to the Israelites, tell them to make fringes on the corners of their garments throughout their generations and to put a blue cord on the fringe at each corner. You have the fringe so that when you see it, you will remember all the commandments of the Lord and do them, and follow not the lust of your own heart or your own eyes. So you shall remember and do all my commandments, and you shall be holy to the Lord your God. I am the Lord your God who brought you up out of the land of Egypt to be your God. I am the Lord your God. You shall see it, you shall feel it, and when you do, you shall remember and you shall do. There it is right there. And if you ever come across the streets of someone— Hasidic Jews still practice this. Other types of people of faith will have these garments they wear that have this, and you might think about it similarly in a prayer bead, like a Yeah, prayer bead that people might be fidgeting with as a way to do this tactile thing. But here's this in Numbers about a garment we wear, and it helps us remember. In Exodus 13, we get the idea of memory in a practice, and we'll just recall this one because this is something that as Christians, we hopefully remember this story. Then Moses said to the people in Exodus 13, remember this day on which you came out of Egypt. out of the house of slavery, because the Lord brought you up from there by the strength of God's own hand, no leavened bread shall you eat. Unleavened bread shall be eaten for 7 days, but for 7 days no leavened bread shall be seen in your possession, and no leaven shall be seen among you in all the territory. You shall tell your child on that day, it is because of what the Lord did for me when I came up out of Egypt. It shall be for you a sign on your hand and as a reminder on your forehead, so that the teaching of the Lord may be on your lips. With a strong hand the Lord brought you up out of Egypt. You shall keep this ordinance at its proper time from year to year. The Feast of Unleavened Bread, which is what Jesus was sharing with His disciples, which we have transformed through Christ into what we call communion. It's a practice. Memory in a practice. And then we get this idea of that this story is told in each new generation. And when you do that, it's not the Lord who brought them up. You know that one of the most repeated lines in the Old Testament about God is, I'm the God who brought you up. But God didn't bring all these readers up out of Egypt. He brought their ancestors. So wouldn't you think God would have said, I'm the one who brought them up out of Egypt? But no, it doesn't say that. It always says, I brought you up. And the key here is remembering that in Scripture, this idea of collective memory is those stories are connected to our present right now. God didn't bring them up out of Egypt. God brought us up. God brought us up out of Egypt. That is a thing that is unique about this type of memory. We are sharing memories that we didn't experience, but that's the power of it. It's a story we hear again and again. We tell every younger generation every time we eat— and we'll get to this at the end— the Lord's Supper. It's not about what Jesus did just to them, the disciples. It's about Jesus's presence with us. So this is this power of collective memory. Now, years ago— years ago, excuse me, a few weeks ago, in one of his sermons, I think one of his first sermons back, Mac mentioned a couple movies from the '80s. I am a child of the '80s, and looking around, I think most people in this room were alive in the '80s. That's the 1980s. There are a couple people in this room who are like, is that the 1900s you're talking about? I see you. I see you. And that's— just stay with me because you know this reference. And the reference is The Goonies. And I don't know, Mac later said, I'm not sure why I didn't reference The Goonies. I was like, yeah, me either, because you missed a great part. There's a great line in The Goonies, and it's when they're down there below and they've just found their escape hatch, basically, to leave the area. They've been treasure hunting. And suddenly though, one of the ones, the guy that has the inhaler, Mikey, he has this speech. And I watched it again on YouTube today. And it's— his speech is all about, guys, this is our time. This is our time. Our parents are up there because they're like below in this cave where they happen to find a boat and gold and all the things you find when you're a kid. And you're exploring and you avoid the murderers who are upstairs and you get down and all that, all the things The Goonies offer us. He's like, up there is our parents' time, but down here it's our time. And then he says they find these bones of this ancient pirate, and they said, this is Chester Copperpot. We are connected to him. And his whole thing was that, look, we're doing the same thing Chester Copperpot did, but he did it and now we're doing it. And he's making this connection of time, and he's claiming, hey, look, let's not leave this space Because right now, this is a moment in time for us. This is our time. So the wisdom of The Goonies can speak to us. This is our time. And if you look at the backdrop of that movie, it's written in a time in that, in that scene when they're anxious. All of them think that their homes are going to be destroyed and they're going to have to move. And this is the end of their community. And everything that they see above in the main world is changing and they can't see Stop it. Does any of that sound familiar? Things are changing outside. We can't stop it. Oh my gosh, it's not going to be the same. But in here, it's our time. And then lastly, we got memory and a commandment. And I've already referenced this, and that's in Exodus 20, which of course repeats later. But in Exodus 20, remember the Sabbath day and keep it holy. It's— you have to keep the 2 things together. To remember is to do. So, to remember is to do, and every time we remember, we are doing something that God does. Because who also remembers in Scripture? God. We don't have time to get into the theological discussions about God forgetting, But that is interesting. But tonight, question, when's the first time we get the words, God remembered? Anybody remember what story that might have been from? What the backdrop is? It's in Genesis. The flood. The flood. Eric got it. It's the flood. It's been raining and raining 40 days, and then it says, but God remembered. Remembered in Genesis 8, and then the rain stopped. It wasn't just that God remembered and thought, hmm, you know what, maybe I'll stop this. It's that to remember for God is to do something about it. The second time is when God remembers Abraham and his nephew Lot, and this is after all the destruction of Sodom, and they are wandering. fleeing, not sure where to go. And it says, and God remembered them and the covenant God made, and God provides a way for them. And the 3rd time in Genesis that happens, God remembers Rachel. And what happens to Rachel? Rachel conceives and 9 months later gives birth to Joseph. So to remember, when God remembers, God does something. That's important. Because in the prayers of remembrance, which is one of the ways in Scripture when we— if you do a word search for remember, and you'll come up with a lot of these Psalms, these prayers. And in Psalm 42, I want to read this corporate liturgy because we can imagine this was written— this was in the context of worship, just like what we might hear on Sunday. This is what they would hear on their Sabbath. And Psalm 42:4-5, these things I remember, says the psalmist, as I pour out my soul, how I went with the throng and led them in a procession to the house of God with glad shouts and songs of thanksgiving, a multitude keeping festival. Why are you so downcast, O my soul, and why are you so disquieted within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise him again, my God and my help. The psalmist is remembering. These things I remember, how I used to do these great big worship services. You can imagine people of faith thinking back to these moments when they've had these stirring worship services or camp experiences or some kind of thing when there was a joyous celebration and everybody was giving praise to God, and it was all okay. But in this moment, things are not okay, and no one else is around. So the power of this moment in Scripture is the power to pray to God to do 2 things. First of all, to call myself to remember. These things I remember. And then it's like I'm talking to myself. Soul, why are you so downcast? Why are you so downcast? God will remember me. Hope in God. I will praise God again. The other way is thinking about— is asking for God to remember us. And that is a very common theme in the Psalms, for God to remember us. You've got a citation there from Job. There are a lot of prayers in Job pleading for God to remember, and God doesn't remember in the terms of what Job wants. Because God doesn't do the thing Job wants. The suffering continues. And sometimes just because you make the prayer doesn't mean it fixes it. But that is the expectation. When someone in Scripture says, God, will you remember me? The idea is not that God has a good warm fuzzy thought about us, it's that God does something about our life. Psalm 137 is a perfect example of this. By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down and there we wept. When we remembered Zion, where's Babylon? Far from Zion. Babylon is where they got— they were taken away. They were taken out of their homeland. Think about right now people who had to leave their homeland because of violence. People who, when they look at pictures of where they're from, it's been bombed. It's been— there's nothing there. Think about those situations in Russia and Ukraine, the West Bank, Middle East, places in Africa. Think about even our dear friends in Cuba. And yes, there might not have been bombs that have gone off, but to walk those streets, to remember what life was just like and how it's changed so much. And the psalmist continues. On the willows there we hung up our harps, for there our captors asked us for songs, and our tormentors asked us for joy and mirth, saying, sing us one of the songs of Zion! How could we sing the Lord's song in a foreign land? If I forget you, O Jerusalem, let my right hand wither; let my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you. If I do not set Jerusalem above my highest joy. And then the psalmist prays, Remember, O Lord, against the Edomites on the day of Jerusalem's fall, how they said, tear it down! O daughter Babylon, you devastator, happy shall they be who pay you back what you have done to us. The prayer here is, God, do you remember? what those enemies did? Because if you do, you should be punishing them. The psalmist doesn't want peace for their enemies. The psalmist wants vengeance, but knows wise enough that vengeance is the Lord's, not ours. So the psalmist isn't trying to plot an uprising. The psalmist is just trying to state that I can't sing the same joyful song. I can't sing, how great is our God, or holy, holy, holy, when I'm in a foreign land and I'm being oppressed. And this is why, for those who've gotten to go to Cuba or other places who— where you've seen people of faith living in dire situations, those people who can still pray and sing and testify and laugh, well, those are people that we should pay attention to because they've been able to make it past Psalm 137. And that's hard. And I'm not sure if I could ever get out of that if I were in that situation. So these are prayers of remembrance. Now I want us to think about then, what about us as Christians? What types of holders do we have? None of you, I don't think, have the blue fringes on your garments. None of you have tassels where you're remembering what God told you to. So why is that? Because we don't have to. We didn't do that. We didn't. We left that. We didn't want to. We wanted more fashion choice than that. Even our stoles. Our pastors don't have those blue little fringes and cords. Our choir members don't have those. Okay, so then what do we have? I want to offer that the Gospels can be seen as sites of cultural memory. And here I want you to hold that thought, and then I want you to think about local, local things and national news. So what used to be at the top of our downtown, the high point where they used to sell all the cattle and all that stuff? What was the— what was the big monument there? The Vance Monument. The Vance Monument. It's not there anymore. So at some point, that was— it wasn't always there, of course, but at some point that was added for what reason? Remembrance. For remembrance, to commemorate, and to commemorate a story of a certain person in a certain way, right? A certain version of a story. And it happened all over our country. We have— anywhere you go, you can find sites, places that have been commemorated. buildings or signs erected, plaques. In more recent times, I've enjoyed with our Peacemakers team, several years ago we went and saw, they put up new signs of memory. Do we remember what we went and visited years ago? The sites of the known lynchings. The sites of the known lynchings. Have y'all, anybody, who else in here has seen the sites of the known lynchings in Buncombe County? There are 3 of them up in Buncombe County, and it's, and it's, they They were erected 2019, 2018, before COVID And they're the one that's one down by the river. And there's another one that's in Triangle Park. And then there's another one right in the edge of Pack Square. Interestingly enough, catty-corner from where our church used to be. And the lynching on that day happened on a Sunday. And when I was with the youth and we did the little calendar search, what day of the week was this day in history? We were like, oh my gosh, what does that mean? What did our spiritual ancestors do? Did they know about it? Did they protest? Did they show up? We don't know. The good, the bad side of our history. Lynching plaques are not— have not been around a long time because it doesn't show a good side of our history, but it shows a true side of history. And then in recent years, we're seeing lots of these memorials that went up that showed a slanted view of history, some of them come down because people are saying, well, we got problems with that. So in our country, we are reckoning with some of the decisions that were made in earlier times to commemorate things in a certain way. But the point of it is, though, when you go to that site now, do you still feel the presence of that? If you lived here long enough, I bet you remember. I mean, you remember it. So even though it's not physically present, does it still have a weight? Yes. It still has a power. And that's the thing about monuments. So that's one example. Another example, right now there is a court, a case headed to the Supreme Court. about putting up signs in public schools. What are those signs? The idea is that they would hold the 10 Commandments. Well, I know you— some of you might not know what state this is coming from. It'd be hard to guess. But this is a thing our country is going to be talking about. Our Supreme Court will be ruling on at some point in the future. And the whole idea is, can you put a religious— a permanent religious sign in a designated public learning space? Is that okay, or is that crossing the lines of separation of church and state? And if it's okay for the Ten Commandments, does that mean it'd be okay for something from the New Testament and something from the Quran and something from other sacred books? So this idea of sites of cultural memory. And a lot of our nation and our civic— or our societies are talking about these physical things. But think about the Gospels. They're not a physical thing, but they are living stories. So think about the Gospels as sites of cultural memories. I referenced earlier that if you go to a family reunion and you start telling stories, you might have different versions. Well, in some ways, that's what the Gospels are, right? They're all I was with the youth recently when Will had to be out of town, and he's been talking with our youth on Sunday mornings about the Gospels. And, you know, these days youth don't— they might not be as biblically literate as a lot of you were growing up. So this— the first question was, well, how many Gospels are there? And many of them said eventually 4. And I said, no, you're all wrong. I don't know if any of you would have said 4, but I might— I didn't ask you because I don't want to put you on the spot and tell you you're wrong. But there's not 4 gospels. There's one gospel, right? The Gospel of Jesus Christ according to 4 communities. So it's the Gospel of Jesus according to Matthew, and the Gospel of Jesus according to Mark, and according— but obviously it's wordy, so a lot of times we say the Gospel of Luke, and it's fine. But the idea to remember is that it's one, one incarnation, one God, one experience, one life that came and changed this world, and then we remember it in different ways and how it's remembered. And it's not that one is right and one is wrong, it's just their living culture, their living collective memories. And the people of Mark, it was for those people, and there's still a great beauty and wisdom out of that. And then many years later, when the John, uh, that was written, it was in a very different context. So it's very different, but it's also very beautiful and full of wisdom. They're all living sites, living sites of cultural memory. Now, in John, with the last gospel accord— last gospel account that was written, we do get this what I'll call breaking the fourth wall. And this is where, you know, um, it's important to remember that these words are not the direct words. They're words about the words. They're memories of the words about the memories of the words. It's this continual loop of layers of memory. In John 2:13, the Passover of the Jews was near, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple, Jesus found people selling cattle, sheep, and doves, and the moneychangers seated at their tables. Making a whip of cords, Jesus drove all of them out of the temple, both the sheep and the cattle. He also poured out the coins of the moneychangers and overturned the tables. To those who were selling the doves, he said, take these things out of here. Stop making my Father's house a marketplace. His disciples remembered that it was written, zeal for your house will consume me. Did you hear that? His disciples remembered. So now you stop the narrative and you're cutting away and you're adding a little narration. His disciples remembered this later. So it's being told in real time. We're getting that the things happening were not understood in real time. The Jews then said to him, what sign can you show us for doing this? Jesus answered them, destroy this temple and in 3 days I will raise it up. The Jews then said, this temple has been under construction for 46 years and you will raise it up in 3 days? But Jesus was speaking of the temple of his body. After he was raised up from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this, and then they believed the Scripture and the word that Jesus had spoken. When did they believe? Long after. But see the power of collective memory? It changed the way the disciples understood Jesus's own actions. They were storytelling about the remember-whens, you know, like when you get together with your friends, remember when? Remember this time? Remember we did this thing? And at one of those gatherings, they remembered his words and then something clicked. And that memory unlocked a new way of understanding and seeing who Jesus was and what their calling was. So this idea of breaking the fourth wall that, you know, on screen you're watching something and you see these It's all the stage, but we're supposed to act like this is not a wall. But in this moment of Scripture, we get the narrator turning and telling us, the reader. And yes, was he telling us this year? No, he was telling us way back then. But remember, we're supposed to graft ourselves onto these memories. So he was not just telling them, he's telling us. These are stories for us. So we have levels and layers of understanding around the event of the cross. We know the disciples did not understand it right away. It took years to make memory or to make meaning out of it, and it took a community. It's interesting how that happens in our own shared life. The stories we tell right now about Helene have a certain clarity of things we see now that we definitely did not see then, because then you're just reacting. You're just responding. You don't have time to think. When you go through trauma, you go through trauma. You get through it. You don't even always remember when you have a loss of a loved one what is transpiring. I know that in my own life, right? When grief happens up close, you might forget whole chunks of time. And later you start telling stories, or people tell stories, and then it might bring some clarity about things that happened, and you might realize a thing that you didn't even realize. That's how grief is funny in the way it affects our memory. But that's the power of collective memory. And when we have a few weeks from now, when we're gathering for All Saints and we have that really holy, sacred time of calling out the names of loved ones, this church knew and still knows and holds their memory close. There is a power in that. And it's not a thing that you should just do once. And that's why, for those who are new, every year at All Saints we have candles all around the church. The idea is that you come in and you light a candle for someone else of memory that you're holding, and you can speak their name aloud. And we trust there's a power in that. Can you do that in your own home? Yes. But is there something else about doing that in a community of faith? Yes. Yes. That is the kind of memory we're talking about. It's something that doesn't quite make sense. It's not a 1+ 1= 2. It's not linear. There's a theologian named Miroslav Volf who wrote this book, The End of Memory, and he wrote this, and I'm going to kind of wrap up here. I see the memory of the cross as the regulative meta-memory that situates all of our remembering and shapes it. So I think it ought to shape the recollections and memories of the church itself. To remember well for the church means to remember not just one's own beautiful and glorious past, but also the ugly sides of history. The cross invites us to remember all sides of our past. This is unique for Christians. To take on the cross as a symbol of our faith which is— which was the sign of defeat. That is a Christian thing, a Christian thing to raise up and worship the God who was sacrificed, who lost, who was killed at the hands of the state. But that invites us to think honestly about our own history as a church, as a family, as a human. We don't have to whitewash. We don't have to, you know, smooth over or try to like cover up the things we did because The cross invites us to be honest. We bring our brokenness. Peter denied Jesus 3 times the same night, but Jesus didn't cut Peter out, and Jesus doesn't cut us out. So that's the other part of memory. Left to our own devices, we would probably want to remember things in a polished way. I don't remember it that way. You'll hear politicians saying things all the time. I don't remember that. You know, that's, uh, no, No, no, no, I remember it differently. But in Christians, as Christians, we don't have to remember in ways that aren't true. We can be more vulnerable, not to take advantage of each other and not in ways that are manipulative, but in ways that are in this trusted community of faith that can unlock a power of forgiveness, of healing. Now lastly, our choir folks have to go, but we have to know the gifts of remembrance. We have the cross as our sign, our symbol, but as Christians, our main practice, our dominant site of cultural memory, is the table. It's in the corner over here. The table. That is where we remember. Every time we take communion, we remember. That is how we keep remembering Christ's story. The cross is a great symbol, but the practice is what will help us. We don't wear fringes on our garments. We don't have mezuzahs. Is that what it's called? Mezuzahs. Mezuzahs, yeah. Mezuzahs are a little like the words of the first 10 Commandments that you put on the outsides of your door, inside of your doorpost. We don't have those things typically, and many of us might not have prayer beads or these, but we have a a living practice of communion. And every time we do it, we say, as Jesus said, do this in remembrance of me. That's what we just heard a couple weeks ago in all these different languages, that profound power of hearing it. All of us get to do this in remembrance of Christ. That is how we are called to remember. So memory is in the sacraments of communion. And lastly, memory is in the sacraments of baptism. So we have practice of Via Charis here, and we have a shared rule of life. And what is the first rule of life that we have? The first word spoken? To remember. To remember. Remember you are a beloved child of God. Our very first rule in the rule of life is to remember, and we wrote that because we knew that to remember is to do. It's not It's not about sentimentality. It's not about, remember, you're beautiful and wonderful and God loves you and just stay right there. No, no, no. It's to remember that and do something and live accordingly. Live as a beloved child of God because that's who you are. And it's how you see yourself, how you should see everyone else. So this gift of memory is a thing that we can remind each other again and again, every time we celebrate communion, every time we witness a baptism. But every time we just remember that we are beloved children of God, we are practicing our faith. Thanks be to God.