Remembered or Not

 DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO LUKE

REMEMBERED OR NOT

Luke 11:44

44 "Woe to you, because you are like unmarked graves, which men walk over without knowing it." 

Once again, Matthew’s account is a little different regarding these graves. Jesus called the Pharisees whitewashed tombs, nice and clean on the outside, but dead man’s bones on the inside. Yet in Luke’s account, Jesus said they were like unmarked graves which no one would know their grave is there and thus walk over without knowing. What does that mean? It doesn’t sound like whitewashed tombs at all. We cannot be sure how the graves or sepulchers could be walked over without knowing it. The Greek word used here for graves is mneemeion, which is meant any visible object for preserving or recalling the memory of any person or thing. However, in the scriptures, it is a Sepulchre, which we think as a hole carved out of a hillside, much like the one Jesus was laid in with a stone rolled over the entrance. We do remember when we were in Israel, the gravesites within what appeared as a cemetery, looked like concrete boxes above ground. These would be easily whitewashed. However, if the grave was a cave of like these concrete boxes, it would be difficult to walk over them without knowing they were there. Besides, how can one walk over a hillside tomb? These words of Jesus have to be seen as metaphorical but what was his meaning. How could someone even walk over a Pharisee? However, if they were unmarked, nothing available to preserve them or recall their memory, then perhaps their lives were meaningless. All their  efforts to find righteousness in observing the law meant nothing, they would end up not being remembered by God. Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord. Will enter the kingdom of heaven”. He went on to explain about the men who told him they had prophesied in his name and had driven out demons in his name, but he told them plainly, “I never knew you, away from, you evildoers!” perhaps the Pharisees fit somewhat in that category, although they never did anything in the name of Jesus, but there will be those whose names will not be known anymore by God. There will be those who will not get a new name written on a white stone that only Jesus knows. The Pharisees knew the law but did not know who Jesus truly was, so if someone does not know the name of Jesus, or who Jesus is, and does not put his words into practice it is possible their names will not be remembered by God. However, praise His Holy Name, we know who Jesus is, and have accepted him as our Lord and Savior, He knows our name as it is written down in the Book of Life, and one day Jesus will call out our name and tell us to come into his rest. But those, like the Pharisees who refuse Jesus as the Savior of the world, will not be remembered, for their names have already been deleted or blotted out. They will simply be walked over, looked over, with nothing to preserve them, or to recall their memory.