By Jack Wyman

Stories.

They shape our lives.

They inspire, educate, motivate, and illustrate. They clarify and entertain. They enrich and sanctify our memories.

Stories stay with us—often for a lifetime.

The first stories I remember were told me by my father. He talked to me about what it was like to be a teenager in the Marines during World War II. He told me about boot camp on Parris Island. He told me about his fear, struggle, and close calls on Iwo Jima. The fierceness of the fighting, the sights he saw, the bloodshed and death that encompassed him, the friends he lost.

I remember the time I accompanied Dad to the national World War II monument at Arlington. He gazed in tears at the huge and majestic statue of the flag-raising on Iwo. He had seen the flag when it first flew atop Mount Suribachi in February, 1945.

Now, on this day of emotion-filled remembrance, wearing his bright red Fourth Marine Division jacket, he was talking with captivated young Marines who were on duty at the monument.

My wife and mother were standing with me at some distance, allowing Dad to enjoy his moment of glory. A man with two young boys stood watching next to us. “Who’s that man the Marines are speaking with?” he asked me. “He fought on Iwo Jima,” I replied. “Really?” the father said in wonder. “Do you think we could get a picture with him?” he asked. “Sure.”

Standing at the base of the monument, the dad and his two sons proudly got their photo taken with the equally proud and delighted veteran. It seemed to me akin to what it might have been like to have one’s photo taken with an aging confederate or union veteran at Gettysburg.

History. Patriotism. Sacrifice. Service. Courage. Nobility.

America. Freedom. My dad’s stories made him a hero to me, and me a patriot.

Stories of our past connect us to the present, and point us toward the future. They form generational passages. The Israelites were acutely aware of these important linkages. Their oral tradition was careful, rigorous, and glorious. It was central to the education of their young.

The Jewish people truly believed the past was prologue. For their children, there could be no full understanding of their special place in the world without an appreciation of their rich heritage, proving them to be the chosen people of God.

“I will teach you hidden lessons from our past,” wrote the psalmist, “stories we have heard and known, stories our ancestors handed down to us. We will not hide these truths from our children.”

With the glory came the duty. To teach the truth. To teach it joyfully and boldly.

“We will tell the next generation about the glorious deeds of the Lord, about his power and his mighty wonders” (Psalm 78: 2-4). The psalmist stresses the importance of this generational transfer of knowledge and hope, “so the next generation might know them—even the children not yet born—and they in turn will teach their own children.”

To what end?

“So each generation should set its hope anew on God, not forgetting his glorious miracles and obeying his commands” (Psalm 78: 6-7). History was important. Tradition, ideals, values, and responsibility—all these mattered to the people of Israel. They were determined to teach these principles and virtues to their children—and to see them taught to each succeeding generation.

Today, America stands in the midst of an unprecedented crisis of knowledge.

Recent test scores clearly show American students are declining in their understanding of history and civics. We are failing to properly educate our future citizens.

We are not telling our children the important stories that define America’s unique greatness. We are not passing on the timeless values and high principles upon which this nation was founded, and which have sustained, united, and preserved us as a free people for nearly 250 years.

Too many of us are focused on the next election and ignoring the next generation. We’re playing political checkers, when we should be playing chess. In this, let us admit the truth: we are failing our country, we are failing our children, we are failing our future, we are failing freedom itself.

We are today so deeply and bitterly divided because we have forgotten, neglected or rejected those shared ideals and truths that have guided us as a nation. The increasing apathy and cynicism of the young is a grievous consequence. 

Thomas Jefferson warned us that no people can expect to remain both ignorant and free. We need not resign ourselves to such a fate.

I’m honored to serve as Vice President of Advancement for Freedoms Foundation at Valley Forge. Started by General Dwight Eisenhower and business leaders like E.F. Hutton in 1949, Freedoms Foundation has been reaching thousands of students and teachers with the great and exciting story of America—its founding beliefs and ideals, our Constitution, Declaration of Independence, and the Bill of Rights.

We teach young Americans not only their rights of citizenship, but also their responsibilities. We show them how to engage in public discourse with civility and respect.

As we remember those men and women who laid down their lives for the cause of America and for freedom around the world, I’d invite you to visit our website at www.freedomsfoundation.org. Learn about our exciting, interactive programs and why four days at Valley Forge, the cradle of American democracy, is a life-changing experience—for both students and teachers.

Consider a gift online. In honor of those who gave their last full measure of devotion. And as an investment in your children and grandchildren—an investment in the future of the country you and I love and cherish.

A nation God has blessed and protected.

Nothing matters more than preparing the next generation of leaders to preserve and advance freedom. Of passing on to them the stories of American greatness, that they too will teach them to their children.

“That these dead shall not have died in vain. That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”—Abraham Lincoln, November 19, 1863, Gettysburg, PA.

To order Jack Wyman’s book, “Everything Else: Stories of Life, Faith and Our World”, go to amazon.com, Christian Book Distributors or barnesandnoble.com. It is also available on Kindle and eBooks.

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