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Remembrance Sunday

 1 Thessalonians 4

13 Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope. 14 For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him. 15 According to the Lord’s word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. 16 For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. 17 After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. 18 Therefore encourage one another with these words.

The idea began by chance.

Padre David Railton, British army chaplain in the First World War, happened upon a recent grave marked by a rough cross. This, in and of itself, was not unusual, but written on the cross, in pencil, were the words “An Unknown British Soldier.” From that moment, and the impression it made, came the idea of gathering the remains of an unknown soldier from a battlefield in France and burying that soldier “amongst the kings” in Westminster Abbey.*

In 1920, the Dean of Westminster and the Prime Minister agreed that this would be an ideal way to honour those lost in the Great War. Remains were exhumed on the 7th of November for transfer to London, resting first within the ancient citadel at Boulogne. On the morning of the 10th, the casket was led in procession to the harbour, accompanied by a thousand schoolchildren and a division of French troops.

At noon, the casket was carried aboard the HMS Verdun, and departed Boulogne with a flotilla of six destroyers. Arriving at Dover, the unknown soldier was transferred by rail to Victoria Station, platform 8, and remained overnight. A small plaque between platforms 8 and 9 continues to mark the spot, and a service is held there each year on the 10th of November.

“Immense and silent crowds” met the procession as the casket moved through London to the Abbey. When entering the Abbey, the casket was flanked by an honour guard of one hundred recipients of the Victoria Cross. The guests of honour for the ceremony were nearly one hundred women, “chosen because they had each lost their husband and all their sons in the war.”

Soil was brought from each of the main battlefields, and covered with a silk pall, with the casket atop. When finally lowered beneath the floor of the Abbey, a large slab of black Belgian marble was laid, with the inscription, “Beneath this stone rests the body of a British warrior, unknown by name or rank, brought from France to lie among the most illustrious of the land.” It remains the only marker on which visitors are forbidden to walk.

The idea that began at Westminster Abbey was mirrored in France and other Commonwealth countries. It signaled that commemoration was no longer for the great and the good alone, but for ordinary citizen soldiers, working men and women who gave the most in war. It was an attempt to honour loss on an unimaginable scale, and it remains the most stirring monument in the great Abbey.

Brothers and sisters, we do not want you to be uninformed about those who sleep in death, so that you do not grieve like the rest of mankind, who have no hope. For we believe that Jesus died and rose again, and so we believe that God will bring with Jesus those who have fallen asleep in him.

Like those who mourned the missing from France and Belgium, believers in the early church were confronted by uncertainty in the midst of grief. They believed that death would not visit them before Christ returned, leaving them with a vexing problem. The march of mortality returned, and trumpet blast had not sounded. What will happen to the dead, they asked, if Jesus returns for the living? Will the dead be overlooked on that great and glorious day? St. Paul said “no.”

…we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left until the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first.

Only then, Paul insists, will the living be “caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air.” We hear these words—remarkable words—yet our modern minds push back. Less than a generation passed from Jesus’ promise to the letter Paul wrote, and two thousand years on, the question only grows. Is it a reasonable hope, this promised return and the consummation of all things? Is it even desirable, when so many believers have used the endtimes as an excuse to ignore problems here on earth?

This last suggestion, a longing for escape, ignores the primary desire found in Jesus’ own words: “thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” We cannot know if this long-imagined terminal point will come to pass, we can only surrender to the mystery—and trust the promise of a new heaven and a new earth. We may or may not be the generation that meets the Lord in the air, but we can rest in the knowledge that “in Christ all will be made alive.” (1 Cor 15)**

Much of what we do in this place becomes a mirror on our lives. We are encouraged to remember our baptism and give thanks. We witness vows that loving couples make and we recommit to our own vows. We listen to the words of the eulogist and wonder what will be said of us, at our own service of thanksgiving. We hear stories of sacrifice in war and we wonder what we would have done—or what we will still do—to safeguard the freedoms we enjoy. The dead in Christ surround us, calling us forward, encouraging us to be agents of mercy and peace. We give thanks for the foundation they laid, the service they rendered, and the love they shared. And we give thanks that those who are unknown, are always known to God. Amen.

*The Unknown Warrior, Wikipedia

**This quote is also inscribed on the Abbey maker

posted by michael jacob kooiman @ 2:06 PM