Going Into Battle

Going Into Battle

ME

Not too long ago, when HBO had a free weekend I watched a war movie called Hacksaw Ridge. The movie is about Desmond Doss. Desmond wanted to help with the war, but he would not kill anyone, he wanted to be a medic and help the wounded. The movie is based on a true story. It’s hard to believe that someone would want to go into war without a gun to protect himself, but this is what Private Doss did.

Matter of fact he had to fight for the ability to do so. He was almost sent to military prison because he would not touch a gun during his training. However at his court martial he was granted to the right to be a medic and to go into battle without a gun.

I’m pretty sure some here have seen this movie so you know what I’m talking about. But the reason the movie is titled Hacksaw Ridge is because in order to go into battle the soldiers had to climb this big cliff to go up onto the ridge to fight the enemy. The had a huge rope ladder on the cliff so the soldiers could climb up.

I remember thinking as I was watching this movie how hard it would be to climb that ladder and go into battle. But how much harder it would be to continue engage the enemy when your brothers in arms all around you are getting shot and blown up. But that is what they did.

All over the battle field men were shot, men were blown up. The enemy kept coming at them and the soldiers pressed forward into battle. All the while Private Doss was attending to the wounded. For the soldiers fighting the battle there was nothing more important than defeating the enemy and for Private Doss there was nothing more important that saving the wounded.

In the movie the soldiers retreat and return down the ladder back to their camp. But Private Doss stays up on the ridge all night helping the wounded. He drags the wounded back to the cliff and one by one he lowers the wounded down the cliff with a rope. He does this even at the threat of his own life because of the enemy.

When I thought Private Doss would be done getting the wounded, lowering them down the cliff and would return himself, I saw him praying. Just one more, God just let me get one more. He gets one more and then prays again and gets another one and this happened with many more men.

When I was done watching the movie I thought this is the best war movie that I had ever seen. But it also left an impression on me and that was of determination and of obedience to our convictions. The soldiers were determined to defeat the enemy at all cost and Private Doss was determined at all cost to save the soldiers who had gone into battle. Not only that but he remained true to his conviction not to pick up a gun against anyone.

WE

I wonder have we ever had determination and conviction like they had in our lives? Have we ever fought that hard to win the battles in our life? We certainly have to fight hard when we battle life threatening health issues. I battled last year and so far have won the battle. I hope I never have to battle like that again, but what I have will never go away so if my method of winning the battle no longer works then I will have to fight hard again.

I know that others have had battles with cancer, heart disease, heart failure, and so on. Some have had accidents at work or in cars, or motorcycles and have found themselves fighting for their lives. And when those things happen to us we step up and we face the battle head on. Most of us face the battle with our trusted doctors and nurses at our side battling with us.

And we trust them, we listen to their advice, we heed their instruction. We make it to our doctors appointments, we spend the time in the hospitals when we need to, we let them do surgery on us to hopefully make us better. Sometimes, like I did, feel like we are ginny pigs and they are just guessing on what will make us better. But we still battle, because our lives are at stake.

It’s something we see before us and we can’t let the enemy, which is death, defeat us. Sometimes there are astronomical odds of wining, but we still battle.

GOD

I want to read you a portion of a story out of the Old Testament this morning. It’s is actually more than just a story because it’s a true story. Let’s turn to 1 Samuel chapter 14. Now let me set the stage for the story. The armies of Israel and the Philistines were set to go into battle.