Let Us Remember

This post was originally a homily I delivered at my local church.

My grandfather, who was injured in France in 1944.

On this Remembrance Day, we have a lot to think about. This has been a trying autumn for us. When Canada withdrew from Afghanistan we all hoped that we’d have a brief time to rest and recover. But the long list of countries embroiled in war has lengthened. As I write, Canadian warplanes are dropping bombs on ISIS as ISIS attempts to continue its brutal massacre in Iraq and Syria. And the strife was brought home last month with the murders of Corporal Nathan Cirillo and Warrant Officer Patrice Vincent.

Those of you who know me know that I just retired this past summer from 35 years in the Royal Canadian Air Force. Being in the military and also a practicing Christian, I spent many hours contemplating God’s direction concerning war.

But this is a matter that is important to all of us, not just combatants because we elect the Government that sent them overseas, and we pay taxes to buy their weapons. How can we make sense of all this? This is not a comfortable topic, but I’ll share some of my thoughts with you this morning.

Perhaps not coincidentally, each of the readings in the Anglican cycle for November 9th speak to warfare, but each in a different way.

The setting for the Old Testament reading (Joshua 24) is after the conquest of Canaan. The people of Israel were war-weary. The speaker is an elderly Joshua, the conquering general, near the end of his life. He describes all the wonderful things that God had done to bless and protect his people.

God also protects us: individually and as a nation. The instruments of this security are our soldiers, sailors, aviators and police. God is using our military as an instrument of his protection. While we may not feel safe at this particular moment, we need to trust that God has a plan and that tragic events have a purpose in our growth and God’s glory.

If you’re like me, you may tend to focus your faith and study on the Gospels and Epistles. But perhaps the tough-love books of the Old Testament can help us unravel and comprehend how loving our neighbour could possibly include going to war.

 

My friend Ning and me, in Bosnia in 2001.

We long for peace, but live in a fallen world. Sometimes we need to send our young men and women to war to confront evil directly.

On this Remembrance Day, let us pray for the safety of the soldiers currently in harm’s way at home and abroad; let us pray for healing for soldiers returning with wounds in body and spirit; let us pray for the families of our soldiers; and let us thank God for his protection.

The Psalm reading (Psalm 78) mentions “dark sayings” that we should “tell to our children, so that they should set their hope in God.”

Why would we want to distress our children with the dark things of the world? Well, it’s pretty inescapable these days. And if you think about it, that’s exactly what we do on Remembrance Day.

Of course we tailor the story line to the age of our kids. But we must never stop telling our children the stories they should know in order to be good citizens who can protect against future evils and direct our Government in decisions of war and diplomacy

These are stories of love; not in the romantic sense, like we see all the time in the movies, but in the deeper, sacrificial sense. (Students of the Bible may know the Greek word for this, agape.) We need to tell our young children that our grandparents, aunts and uncles love us so dearly that they are willing to face pain, fear and death to protect the powerless.

On this Remembrance Day, let us thank God for the loving sacrifice of those who gave themselves for us.

The third reading, from Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians (1 Thess 4), speaks of death, resurrection and triumph in the end times. We are told not to grieve for those who have died as if we have no hope.

This verse reminds me of the poem by Laurence Binyon:

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them.

So today's readings speak volumes:

• We need to be ready like the bridesmaids for whatever comes next, rather than allowing this to shatter our faith;
• As Paul urged the Thessalonians, we need to be confident in God’s justice and the resurrection of the victims;
• As the Psalmist commanded, we need to teach our children the deep meaning behind these murders; and
• Finally, though we are weary and angry at these atrocities, we need to pray for God to guide our nation away from vengeance and toward loving protection.

The lesson here is two-fold: we should not despair at fallen soldiers – always recalling the heavenly hope they have of resurrection; and we also should be grateful for the earthly hope that they earned through suffering and gave to us as our heritage of freedom, justice and love. Their act is a reflection of Christ, who also gave himself to free us from the power of evil.

On this Remembrance Day, let us pray for the souls of the fallen, that God may have mercy on them; and let us thank God for the blessings He has given us through their deaths.

And finally, we come to the Gospel lesson, from Matthew 25. Like the bridesmaids in Jesus’ parable, we too must be prepared. The world is a confusing place with great violence and uncertainty. Evil is roaring in the night preying on the desperate and vulnerable.

We must not let our lamp go out. And we must not run out of lamp oil. We need to be spiritually prepared for whatever may come.

So, what can we pull out of today’s readings to help understand the fear and pain we see?

Holy God, on this Remembrance Day, we strive to be your light in this fallen world. When we read the news we are tempted to despair; so we pray for understanding, hope and peace. When we consider what to do, we are tempted to anger; so we pray for wisdom, courage and compassion.