Greater love has no man than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends (John 15:13).

Monday is Memorial Day in the United States. Originally this day was called Decoration Day. This name came from the early tradition of decorating graves with flowers, wreaths, and flags in honor of those who lost their lives fighting for this nation. We will all pause from our regular routines to remember those who made the ultimate sacrifice. There will be pomp and circumstance at various cemeteries where veterans are buried. We will eat and celebrate and then go back to living our “normal” lives. In doing so, we will miss the significance of this day.

Memorial Day is about sacrifice. It is about bravery. It is about love. It is about being willing to die so that others might live. Our veterans deserve all the recognition we can give, but no one exemplifies pure sacrifice more clearly than Christ himself. He who had no sin, took our sin upon himself, suffered on the Cross, and then gave up his life, so that we might live. In return we live life today, not for ourselves but for him. It is our way of saying, “Thank you.”

So, on Memorial Day, in addition to laying flowers, wreathes, and flags on the graves of veterans, let us find practical ways of continuously saying “Thank you for your sacrifice,” by committing to living lives that are dedicated to preserving the peace that these brave men and women fought for, so courageously, and let us honor our living veterans in meaningful and sacrificial ways for the unpayable debt we owe.

But why wait till next Monday? Let us begin today, and then, every day, for in so doing we will be ultimately honoring Jesus Christ. What are you willing to give up (lay down) for the sake of this hard-earned peace?