Then they raised over him a great heap of stones, still there to this day. So the LORD turned from the fierceness of His anger. Therefore the name of that place has been called the Valley of Achor to this day.
[Joshua 7:26]
Successes are not the only things that can teach. If this is true, memorials of past failures serve a purpose too—just like this opening verse speaking of the memorial of Achan. It’s a memorial worth remembering because it reminded those who saw it of the severity of sin and the reality of God’s holiness. These are two things definitely worth remembering and one of them is most certainly a failure.
Could this be the very reason the old saying is still known today, “A wise man learns from his own mistakes, but a wiser from those of others?” Take note of who is absent from this well-known quip—those who remove the mistakes of others because they think themselves wise.
Memorials, despite their original purpose of construction, do not always promote a belief in a positive way, but they always have the potential to teach a lesson. A lesson that can only be taught when its reason is clear for all to see.
Well-known movie director Steven Spielberg recently remarked when asked about his updated edits of his 1982 hit film, E.T.: "That was a mistake. I never should have done that. ‘E.T.’ is a product of its era. No film should be revised based on the lenses we now are, either voluntarily, or being forced to peer through.”[1] When posed a following question regarding the recent edits to Roald Dahl’s novel, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Spielberg joked, “Nobody should ever attempt to take the chocolate out of Willy Wonka! Ever!” On a more serious note, Spielberg concluded, “For me, it is sacrosanct. It’s our history, it’s our cultural heritage. I do not believe in censorship in that way.”
To impulsively demolish the memorials of the past, from the written word to films to sculptures in a park, that no longer fit with modern thought is nothing but short-sighted. For though they may stand against the lessons already known today, they are being removed before they can teach those same lessons to those who will need them tomorrow. Unless we truly believe we have learned these lessons apart from the failures and mistakes of those who have come before us, we should be careful when choosing to overturn one stone laid upon another.
Sure, there is a chance that someone sees the memorial and misconstrues its present reasoning. They might seek to emulate the “product of its era” because they falsely believe that is what it takes to be memorialized in society even today. But this fault does not lie solely in the memorial teaching the lesson but more so in the misunderstanding of the one learning from it.
A lesson can never be deemed “unhelpful” or “untrue” simply because one of its professed pupils abuses and misuses it. If this were the case, everything that is true today will be labeled as false tomorrow because who among us can control how 8 billion people interpret something?
In a world of cancel culture, may we seek to change the narrative. We do this, not by canceling everything that pains us and stains our history, but through a willingness to teach the lessons that those negatives in our past—from Achan’s sin to the Civil War— stand to remind us of. For it is then, and only then, that we acknowledge both the failures of those who came before us, the potential for failure in those who come behind us, and, in doing these things, we even expose that same possibility in our own hearts as well.
This is a reminder that we all stand in need of whether we care to admit it or not.
It is a reminder that stands as a memorial for us all—not in the shape of a specific person or group but formed in the shape of humility.
May that be a memorial we never seek to remove.
Or a lesson we never seek to cancel.
When I consider the scars in my own life—both figurative and literal—I see memorials of failure. I see a scar on my left knee where I failed to land properly after jumping off a hill at a summer camp in North Carolina. This failure resulted in a torn ACL and reconstructive surgery in 9th grade. I find it interesting how many times I recount this story to my own children when the weather warms up and I can wear shorts again revealing the obvious scar. What if I had a chance to remove it, would I?
As many times as I have told my children this story, they have yet to jump off a hill and land improperly. This could simply be a coincidence, but it could also be a lesson learned from someone else’s mistake—mine. Which of these it is, I’m not sure, but would I rather them learn this lesson from me or from a similar mistake of their own? As any parent would, I say, “Let the memorial remain if I can keep it from being the latter.”
It has famously been said, “Those who do not know the past are condemned to repeat it.” I wonder what one will say a hundred years from now about those who did not know the past because one generation decided to remove it.
11 Now all these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages have come. 12 Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.
[1Corinthians 10:11-12]
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