Remember

Today is 11th November 101 years ago at 11am on the 11th day of the 11th month the guns on the western front became silent, peace had come and the 11th November has become Remembrance Day. Instituted as Armistice Day in 1919 to commemorate the Armistice that ended WW1 and changed to Remembrance Day after 1945 created to remember the cost of so many in all wars. 

As we seem increasingly drawn to remember the past, and while in every sense it is a national day, it is also a very personal day. As a young man I recall being marched to church where the two minutes silence seemed interminable and as children we had no idea what we were supposed to remember. My only personal knowledge of the first world war was of my grandfather who rarely spoke of what his involvement was and all we learned from him was he seemed to spend his time in the army in Egypt where the suffering for him and his compatriots amounted to the heat, the sand, the dust and the flies. He really seemed to have no idea what he was doing there. Yet it did leave a mark on him for the rest of his life. Remembrance is really personal, the problem I had was that I had nothing or no one who had died to focus my remembering on what was I supposed to remember? My thoughts go to my grandfather who live through WW1, but who with with the dreadful memories and consequences.

Remembrance links us with a past. It links us with all that is signifiant events of the past. It links us to a reality we can identify with.

A Christians we mark as an act of remembrance every time we break bread and share the wine at the Lords Table, maybe know more widely as Communion. This was an instruction that Jesus gave and it gives us the opportunity to focus our thinking on him and what he achieved for me and for all who by faith accept it was a sacrifice for them. It is that personal relationship that makes the remembering real. 

Luke his gospel records the event  Jesus ‘took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to them, saying, ‘This is my body given for you; do this in remembrance of me.’ In the same way, after the supper he took the cup, saying, ‘This cup is the new covenant in my blood, which is poured out for you’

Jesus taught his followers this is a simple act of remembrance. The life of one man that was violently killed not for anything he had done, but that others can be free, to take the penalty that is due to me and all who believe because of my sin.

We value and appreciate that many have suffered and died in war, many suffer and die violently often for no reason of their own. Those who have suffered in war have done so for the benefit of others. My grand parents lost friends in WW1, my mother had friends and neighbours whose parents died to suffered greatly in WW2. It is right that we remember that and do not take it lightly, but only one man, innocent of all wrong, died for all people who have lived and will live.

Jesus said,’ My command is this: love each other as I have loved you. ¹³ Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.’

May our act or remembrance today enable us to be thankful to God for all who have sacrificed their life for others and the personal memories we may take time for, and especially the one who gave his life for everyone as we gather around the Lords table.