I remember some young soldiers. Keen, full of bravado. Cowlicks barely tamed, acne still embarrassing. One young friend, a reservist I’ll call Hal, came back from overseas outwardly unscathed; full of curiosity about the cultures and people he’d encountered.
He came over for a visit. Sat beside an oak cabinet in our living room. Looked around as though seeing it for the first time and thinking thoughts still new to him.
“Hey, Mrs. G! Did ‘ya know I met some people who worship chickens? Chickens! Rocks, too. They’d likely worship this furniture! What’s that all about?” He said it so comically we all laughed.
I remember another soldier. Tall. Bright. Toughened by his recent peacekeeping mission. “I didn’t have to kill anyone,” he said, “but I could have. There was one time when we came pretty close.”
“Could you really?” His new hard edge concerned me.
“Oh, yeah. We were completely trained. And I’d ‘a done it without blinking. I mean, when it’s either them or me, how much choice is there? You do whatcha have ta, ya know. You do what you have to.”
You do what you have to.
I don’t understand most things about war. But I understand and accept that human freedom is always bought with a terrible price. And that no matter how technologically advanced the war machine, how many fighter jets or advanced drones we employ, it’s still human blood that pays the tab.
I hate it all. And I hate that in 2015, the tally of losses continues, both at home and overseas.
But I also remember that about two thousand years ago, another young soldier went to war. To a place so different from his own he had to change his very shape to fit in. Jesus, God’s son, did what he didn’t have to do: willingly became human, departed heaven and entered the beautiful earth he had created. Where, as they do today, the most troublesome wars raged not on its soil, but in the hearts of the people who walked it. People God loved.
I remember too, especially in November, the month of prayer for the Persecuted Church, that in parts of the world today, terrorists kill Christ-followers. Some die on crosses, like he did. Their blood spills for love of their Lord, as his blood spilled for the love of them. For Jesus came not to keep peace, but to bring peace. Inner peace. Peace that equips and braces believers to stand for truth, and to die for it with hope in their hearts and, many times, a song on their lips. Believing that as resurrection took place for Christ, it will also for them, in God’s time.
No poppies bloom at the foot of Christ’s cross. But for those who choose to follow him, to live and perhaps die for him, life will blossom for eternity. As you remember and honour the brave soldiers of our country, those who have died and those who still serve, remember that too.
