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Bulletin 147 Date : 9th Nov 2008
… and a time to die

Listening to an armed forces chaplain reflecting upon Remembrance Sunday it struck me how significant this time of year is for people of faith and no faith in terms of reflecting upon our mortality. He said that hardened soldiers, when out in the battle zone, will regularly attend a Sunday Service but when they return to civilian life, they stop going also lose their focus on religious things. It’s at times when life could be snatched away from us that we reflect upon its significance and what lies beyond. No wonder Jesus warned against storing up treasure in this life and focusing only on the ‘here and now’ as if that is the only reality. No wonder so many are indifferent to the gospel when they are planning their summer holidays and enjoying life at the leisure centre. It’s an unwelcome intrusion to those things which are important to them.

It is no coincidence that the New Testament focuses as much on the death of Jesus as it does on his life. Half of Mark’s Gospel talks about Jesus’ final days on earth as he prepares for, and endures a cruel death. At the heart of the church’s teaching are our beliefs in the ‘atonement’ – our attempt to understand the question ‘why did Jesus die?’ At one level, the atonement does not answer that question at all but answer another question – ‘what is the meaning and significance of the death of Jesus?’ Jesus died because of the barbaric treatment handed out by the authorities and because no human being can withstand crucifixion. But that, in itself, does not tell the whole story, nor does it explain why millions of people across the globe place their trust in him as the ‘Risen Lord’.

And this is why Remembrance Sunday is so important. Thousands will be meeting at war memorials or in churches to remember people who lost, or more correctly, sacrificed their lives in the wars which still plague us today. They may not be so concerned about the manner in which these people died, as that would be horrific and beyond the experience of most of us. Instead they will want to reflect upon two things. Firstly that these people and the sacrifice they made are not forgotten, by us or by God, and secondly that it was not in vain. So many of those whose names will be read out, died in their late teens or early twenties with much of their life still before them and unfulfilled.

We have a splendid liquidambar tree in our garden which, every year, displays green leaves in summer which turn to bright red at this time of year before falling into the ground, producing rich soil for the next generation of leaves the following spring. I sometimes use these leaves in services to urge people to reflect upon their own life – especially that we all one day will fall into the ground and hopefully add goodness into the soil of future generations.

I often reflect upon those famous words from Ecclesiastes 3 – ‘A Time for Everything’. Of particular importance are the words,

A time to be born and a time to die
A time for war and a time for peace
A time to be silent and a time to speak

Drop thy still dews of quietness,
Till all our strivings cease;
Take from our souls the strain and stress,
And let our ordered lives confess,
The beauty of thy peace.

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807 – 1892)