{"id":5458,"date":"2026-05-25T08:47:32","date_gmt":"2026-05-25T12:47:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/?p=5458"},"modified":"2026-05-25T08:47:32","modified_gmt":"2026-05-25T12:47:32","slug":"the-turning-point","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2026\/05\/25\/the-turning-point\/","title":{"rendered":"The Turning Point"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast<\/em>,\u00a0click here<\/a>
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With the Civil War now 160 years in the rear-view mirror, historians continue to debate the point at which the Union prevailed.
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When was the high-water mark of the Confederacy? At what moment in what battle were the South\u2019s hopes, realistically, finally thwarted?\u00a0
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No consensus has emerged. But the epic three-day conflict of July 1-3, 1863, has always been a strong candidate.
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A few weeks earlier, Robert E. Lee had boldly led his Army of Virginia into Northern territory. If he could win a decisive battle in the Pennsylvania countryside, the way might be open to Washington, D.C. He could use the leverage of his recent victories to sue for peace, thereby delivering to the Confederacy its dream of independence.
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A lot was at stake when North and South collided just outside the hamlet of Gettysburg.
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The Rebels were victorious on July 1. By the middle of July 2, Lee\u2019s troops were poised to strike at the very center of the Union\u2019s overextended line. All they needed was an opening.
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Suddenly, an opening appeared.
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It was the gift of Daniel E. Sickles, a \u201cpolitical general\u201d singularly unqualified to lead men into battle. Sickles was a New York City lawmaker with a stark raving appetite to make a name for himself, even if that meant radical insubordination.
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While commanding the II Corps of the Army of the Potomac, Sickles was ordered to hold the all-important center of the Northern line.
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Unfortunately, he had ideas of his own.
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Sickles rashly ordered his troops to advance about one mile forward to a wheatfield and an adjoining peach orchard \u2013 two sites that quickly attained battlefield infamy. Unprotected, he and his men were assaulted from multiple directions.\u00a0
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They never had a chance.\u00a0The II Corps suffered heavy casualties. The general himself lost a leg to a cannonball.
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Years later, every principal general who fought at Gettysburg was memorialized with a statue somewhere on the grounds.\u00a0Except Sickles.\u00a0When asked about the absence of a memorial with his name on it, he said, \u201cThe entire battlefield is a memorial to Dan Sickles.\u201d\u00a0
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OK, then<\/em>.
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It quickly became clear that the center of the Union line had been left wide open. Some 1,200 to 1,300 Confederate soldiers, presented with an opportunity for an extraordinary breakthrough, surged forward.\u00a0
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Only one Union regiment was in place to stop them \u2013 the 262 men of the 1st<\/sup> Minnesota.
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When ordered to plug the gap, they did so. As one historian put it, \u201cnot a man wavered.\u201d
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What followed were 15 minutes of hell.
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When the regimental color bearer was shot and dropped the flag, another soldier tossed aside his gun and picked it up. Then he went down. In all, the colors were lost and recovered by Minnesotans five times. Of the 262 men who entered the fray, 215 were either killed or wounded. The casualty rate of 82% was the highest for any regiment in a single engagement during the war. Every field commander was lost. Only 47 men were left unscathed.
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Minutes later, Union reinforcements arrived on the scene. The line was saved. When the fighting at Gettysburg ended the following day, the Confederates had been dealt a blow from which they never fully recovered.
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It\u2019s reasonable to conclude that one of the reasons there is only one America today instead of two is that the 1st<\/sup> Minnesota chose to hold the Union line \u2013 even as its members were fully aware that such a decision would cost many of them their lives.
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It was a turning point \u2013 and perhaps the<\/em> turning point of the War Between the States.
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It\u2019s not nearly so difficult to identify spiritual history\u2019s primary turning point.
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As Jesus approached his death on the cross he said,\u201d No one can take my life from me. I sacrifice it voluntarily. For I have the authority to lay it down when I want to and also to take it up again\u201d (John 10:18). At the very heart of God\u2019s plan for humanity is Jesus\u2019 extraordinary decision to \u201chold the line\u201d against sin and death \u2013 willingly taking upon himself the worst that sin and death could hurl against him.
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During his final extended conversation with his disciples \u2013 the night before he died \u2013 Jesus also said this: \u201cThere is no greater love than to lay down one\u2019s life for one\u2019s friends\u201d (John 15:13).
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By that, he made it clear that his disciples were more than just underlings or servants. They were his friends. And we ourselves \u2013 as friends of Jesus and friends of each other \u2013 may also be called one day to lay down our lives as expressions of \u201cno greater love.\u201d\u00a0
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On this Memorial Day, we pause to remember such sacrifices.
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We offer thanks that there have been men and women willing to stand in the gap to help secure our nation\u2019s freedom.
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And we thank God the Father that God the Son was able and willing to win the battle that has forever secured our spiritual freedom.\u00a0
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May that realization become a turning point in our own lives this day.
\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast,\u00a0click here\u00a0\u00a0With the Civil War now 160 years in the rear-view mirror, historians continue to debate the point at which the Union prevailed.\u00a0When was the high-water mark of the Confederacy? At what moment in what battle were the South\u2019s hopes, realistically, finally thwarted?\u00a0\u00a0No consensus has emerged. But the epic three-day conflict of July… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5459,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[742,248,208],"class_list":["post-5458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-civil-war","tag-memorial-day","tag-sacrifice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5458"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5458\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5460,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5458\/revisions\/5460"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5459"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}