Grace Church-Burlington

"The purpose of all war is ultimately peace." Augustine

While for many of us, it’s just a three day weekend, Memorial Day is also one of our national holidays. It’s always observed on the last Monday of May. It used to be known as Decoration Day and commemorates U.S. men and women who died while in the military service. First enacted to honor Union soldiers of the American Civil War, it was expanded after World War I to include American casualties of any war or military action.

Though there is a news report nearly every day about the war in both Iraq and Afghanistan, at the same time it seems almost unreal. Maybe we’ve become desensitized...maybe we’ve become too familiar...maybe we’re so preoccupied with so many other things that it just drops off our mental screens. Currently, we have several young people from the Grace Church family serving our country in our nation’s armed forces. Nationally, there are nearly 200,000 young men and women serving our country in either Afghanistan or Iraq, not to mention all of those who serve in this country and in other places around the globe.

What is a Just War? It’s one that is defined as providing a proportionate response to evil, to protect non-combatants, among other considerations. Today, our military men and women around the world are fighting to resist evil. Seeking to resist and rid the world of Islamo-fascism—by just means—is a good and loving act. This willingness to sacrifice on behalf of our neighbors is why military service is considered such a high calling for Christians—and part of what makes just wars just.

Thomas Aquinas in the Summa Theologica puts his discussion of just war in his chapter on charity—the love of God and neighbor. John Calvin agreed; he called soldiering justly a "God-like act," because "it imitates God’s restraining evil out of love for His creatures." A world in which free nations refuse to fight just wars would be a world where evil is unchecked and where the strong would be free to prey on the weak, as we are now seeing in Darfur.

Our soldiers’ willingness to defend the defenseless around the world makes me proud to be an American. Their willingness to lay down their lives is a reflection of how the Christian worldview has influenced our society. The behavior of the vast majority of our soldiers echoes the values and valor of previous generations of soldiers that we remember on Memorial Day. As the late historian Stephen Ambrose so memorably put it, reflecting on World War II, "The most terrifying sight to most civilians was a squad of armed teenage boys in uniform." Whether it was the Red Army in Warsaw, the Japanese in Manila, or the Germans in Holland, this sight meant trouble. There was one exception. "Everywhere in the world," Ambrose wrote, "the sight of a twelve-man squad of GIs brought joy to people’s hearts." Why? "Because the sight of those American kids meant cigarettes, candy, c-rations, and freedom. They had come not to conquer or terrorize but to liberate."

This is why our soldiers are in the Middle East today: not as conquerors, but as liberators. And ordinary citizens in those countries know that when they see American soldiers, they are not seeing those who will torture and rape and steal, but they are seeing those who will share their food and water with a hungry child.

Whether you agree with our involvement is incidental. What is an undebatable fact is that we have young soldiers who are putting their lives on the line to protect the freedom that we so cherish here in America and make it possible that other nations can also have it. In our church family, we have several Veterans who have also served our country and put their lives on the line to protect our freedom. We need to remember the sacrifice that they have made. They are worthy of our respect, honor and gratitude.

Recently, I received an e-mail from one of our young people who is serving our country in the Armed Forces. It brought tears to my eyes. This young man was able to recently lead one of his fellow soldiers to the Lord and he is involved in a cross-cultural Bible study. He’s serving the Lord while serving our country.

So this weekend, do enjoy the extra day off. Yet, please take a few minutes to pause and praise the Lord that you were born in America. Thank Him for the many soldiers who through our history have been willing to make the ultimate sacrifice so that we could freely worship our God. Then, pray for our young people who are serving our Lord and our country in our nation’s military. Maybe drop them an e-mail and let them know that you are thinking of them, that you are thankful for them, and that you’re praying for them.

Jesus said, "Greater love has no man than this, that [he] lay down his life for his friends." This Memorial Day let’s remember the sacrifices of all those soldiers of the past and let’s pray for those who are still in the field, laying down their lives for each other, for us, and for the freedom of strangers. It’s just a very Christian thing to do.