A thought for our Remembrance Sunday Service

When all else has gone there is always hope. When we hit rock bottom, there is always hope. When we can see no light at the end of the tunnel, there is always hope. Hope is the one think that we can be assured of because very often it is the only thing that is left when we feel that all hope has gone, which seems a real contradiction.

Today we are honouring the memory of the millions of men and women who answered the call of their country to fight against evil and oppression. Who fought to liberate innocent men, women, and children, caught up in conflicts whose agendas were against human rights, racially motivated or politically expedient.

From the First World War, we hear so many poignant stories of young men, barely adults (and sometimes not even that) taking up arms, marching away from their homes and villages, dreaming of being heroes and finding themselves in what might be described as the depths of hell on the Western Front.

From the Second World War, with more sophisticated weaponry, aviators took to the skies, using their planes like the infantry had used swords and bayonets in dog fights. Flying long range missions to drop bombs on strategic targets to try and disrupt and demoralise those targeted. Until the ultimate weapon of destruction was unleashed.

From more recent conflicts, in Afghanistan and the Middle East, trying to establish basic human rights for young men and in particular young women and today we find ourselves living in a world where once more innocent children and civilians are living in fear for their lives, for their families and for the future.

Wars are designed to spread fear, to crush resistance and to demonstrate both physical and psychological power, but the one thing they can never defeat is the hope of peace and restoration.

Today men and women of all faiths and none in our armed services, answer the call to bring about peace in the face of war and terror. They are willing to sacrifice their lives, if necessary; but as Christians we have the ultimate hope through the sacrificial death and resurrection of Jesus, that even death will not be the end.

For the Thessalonians, Paul was reassuring them that they should not be grieving deaths in their community without hope. If this life is all we have, then its end in death produces considerable grief. However, Paul says that if you believe that Jesus died and was raised (the basic Christian affirmation the Thessalonians had accepted), then you can also believe that God will raise our loved ones. Those who also believed in the death and resurrection of Christ are caught up into his eternal life.

Paul refers to Jesus’ own words, that the Son of Man will return in the clouds with the angels gathering the elect from the four corners of the earth to meet him and at this point the dead and the living will be gathered as one.

This is the hope that trumps all other hopes.

However, later this morning we will gather together to remember all those who have died in war and conflicts, those of our families and the unknown soldiers, sailors, and aviators. To honour their memory. Those long dead and those killed in more recent clashes.

We will remember that: ‘they shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old; age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.’

But above we will pray for peace to be the hope of all nations, that there will be no more killing of innocent civilians and children, that we respect the sanctity of human life because our common belief is that all life is precious to God and in him is our greatest hope.

Amen

Based on 1 Thessalonians 4:13-18