"The Wall and the Hill"

For me, a trip to Washington, D.C. is incomplete without a visit to the Wall. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial, informally known as “The Wall,” is starkly different physically from every other Memorial. Like Arlington National Cemetery, a command for quiet and respect silently but powerfully emanates, covering every visitor as they view the names. 58,307 names.

In Jan Scruggs book, “Writings on the Wall,” Vietnam veteran Rick Miller shares a personal and moving perspective that powerfully speaks to the cost of freedom.

“This is the final resting place for the spirits of my buddies, their names carved into rock. I’d like to say I don’t care where their bodies lie, …but can’t. This wall, this black granite, inscribed with endless names, is all that I have left of my Vietnam brothers – the ones who left their lives ‘over there.’

“I stare into the names through the blackness and see their faces – blank in death. Yet they are alive in spirit and as fresh in life as the day they left. My buddies are right before me screaming the silent closed-mouth scream of death. I stand before them and they stand before me, this black sheet of granite the great dividing wall between the coming-home-me and the coming-home-them.

“We touch hands through the Wall as touching through a glass window. I feel this tremendous energy pulling me into them and they to me. We remain silent buddies, respectful of the distance between us that can’t be broken. They are prisoners within the earth, behind this Wall of black granite. Silently, we commune.”

Independence Day celebrations often remind us of the colonial militia and the Battle at Bunker Hill, yet we must daily remember the sacrifice Jesus made on a hill called Calvary. How significant was His selfless act? The answer lies in John 15:13 (NIV): Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.

On July 4, remember the men and women who gave their lives for America and your freedom.

And remember the One who gave His life for your eternal freedom.

Dr. Van Richmond

Senior Pastor

Scenic View Baptist Church