Remember the days of old;
consider the generations long past.
—Deuteronomy 32:7
In the eleventh chapter of Hebrews the writer reels off a memory-jogging list of names whose work on earth had ended.
Chapter 12 begins, “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses … let us run with perseverance the race marked out before us.”
Those witnesses—“a sky full of eyes” someone tagged them—are now spectators, watching those who carry on where they left off. They who fought in the arena yesterday take their seats to check out those of us who are fighting there today. Having done their part, they now watch to see how we do ours.
When Napoleon pointed to the pyramids and said, “Soldiers, forty centuries look down upon you!” he was challenging them to honor the past by making sure it had a future.
You are the living link to the past.