INTRODUCTION. In 1867 some deeply caring women of Columbus, Mississippi, decorated not only the graves of their own dead who had given their lives in the great Civil War which had just ended, but also the graves of the Northern soldiers who were buried there.
This extremely noble act inspired others do to the same, and the annual custom eventually became our nation-wide Memorial Day. It has become a beautiful day of tribute, celebrated with music, parades, speeches, and the decorating of the graves of those who have died in the wars of our nation. It has become an effective way of helping us remember those who have made it possible for us to be where we are and have what we have today -- those who have paid the supreme sacrifice.
Where I live the local TV station presents daily honors to our fallen heroes of the war in Iraq. Our Newspaper the San Antonio Express-News has a daily section giving out the names of those who have died in this war. I see decals shaped like ribbons on the rear of almost every vehicle honoring our soldiers both living and dead. I believe that it is only natural that we say thank you to the men and women who have placed their very lives in harms way in order that we would continue to be a free nation.
I. THE NATURAL EXPERIENCE OF MAN. Humanity can almost be said to be divided into classes: those who live the full, rich life, and those who die to make the full life possible for others. It remains to this very day one of our most tragic facts of reality that some of us must be sacrificed for the rest of us.
It was true with WWI, it was true with WWII, it was true with the Korean War, it was true with the Viet-Nam War, and it was true with the struggle in America during the Civil Rights Era of the 50’s and 60’s. People died for people, Dr. Martin Luther King, jr. took an assassins bullet (I believe that this was an organized assassination) he died on behalf of the oppressed. I remember him saying,"If a man doesn’t have anything he is willing to die for, then he isn’t fit to live" Memorial Day reminds us this historical principle that some of us must be sacrificed for the rest of us. None of us would doubt for a moment that American is the great nation that it is because so many gave their lives to make it possible.
Yes! If blood had not been shed in all the previous wars, those protestors in the streets of America may not of have the right to protest the recent war in Iraq, and Viet-Nam before that. I often wondered what would of happened to America had Hitler gotten his way and ruled the world from his Nazi Germany? I guarantee there would not be the freedom of protest, at least not as it is today. But because blood was shed, we have the freedoms we have today.
American warriors from every branch have given their lives for our land, our liberty, and our health. God bless those pioneers who have sacrificed the security of homeland to crave an empire out of the vast wilderness of America. May we never forget that first group of patriots, who poorly clothed and half-starved, untrained and badly equipped, faced death in order to secure for us a nation. The scientist and inventors who braved the odds of nature and forged a giant industrial revolution had their share of martyrs and heroes who gave themselves that others may have a better life.
Now I’m reminded that Osama bin Laden, preached this concept to his followers. The concept of dying for what you believe in, however, his belief is rooted in hate and evil. His belief is from the very bowels of hell, and the doctrine of demons. His belief kept him in hiding, his belief ushers his followers to eternal in hell rather than the paradise they are told about. But our (America’s) belief is rooted in and on the principles and example of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
II. THE SUPREME EXAMPLE OF JESUS. In out text, Jesus was being discussed by chief priests and Pharisees who were almost panicky because Jesus just kept working miracles (verse 47). They were afraid that the Jewish people were going to turn in mass to Jesus as Messiah and King. If this should happen, they knew, that it would appear as a political revolution to Rome and cause the destruction of Israel (verse 48). Caiaphas, who officially the high priest in Rome’s eye, rebuked them for their ignorance in practical affairs such as this (verse 49). He declared blatantly and callously "that it is expedient for us, that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation perish not (verse 50).
Caiaphas was specking consciously of the political problem Jesus presented. Yet the words which he spoke were strangely not just related to his conscious purpose, nor did they even come from him in the first place ("And this he spake not of himself"). Even though Caiaphas was a disreputable and weak puppet priest, he still was Israel’s spiritual leader, and God’s spirit was prophesying through his lips the glorious fact of Christ’s vicarious death on the cross for the sins of the world (verse 51 and 52).
Jesus is our supreme example of those who are willing to die in order that others may live. He had to die in order that we could live. Someone had to reveal tangibly and humanly how far God is willing to go in His identification with man. Someone had to show how much dark sin God is ready to forgive. And Jesus became the sacrificed One. Just think how He loved life, how every blade of grass and pedal of a rose vibrated with life when He touched it. Think of His marvelous power over the universe He had created, and His pleasure at being able to control it.
Think of His compassionate love for people and His voluntary involvement in their every problem. when we think how much He must have wanted to keep living, and what a great life He had to offer a sick world, we stand amazed at His willingness to be a sacrifice for us. It always seems that those who have the most to live for are often the quickest to give up their lives. The most alert, sensitive, talented, and promising are usually the first to voluteer for the front line duty. Our local police comes to mind, they enter the police force knowing fully that everyday they report for work could be their last, yet they do it for the service of others.
Jesus wanted to keep living, don’t you remember His prayer in the garden of Gethsemane? He asked God to remove the cup, "..O my Father,if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will but as thou will" (Matt. 26: 39b). Jesus bore the weight of His own cup of suffering, in confronting death He turned to God, and here we see the human nature and will of Jesus, He was as much flesh as any man, and so he begged God to chose another way other than the cup, if possible. However, Jesus knew that ultimately it is God’s Will that will be done. Jesus knew full well of a higher calling, in fact, we all have a higher calling. A calling that does require a sacrifice.
III. THE HIGH CALLING OF CHRISTIANITY. The call of Christianity means no more to many than a call to higher morality, or a call to organized religious activity. Jesus never issued such calls, His call was clearly a call from and to Calvary: "If any man will come after me let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me" (Matt. 16: 24). The disciples knew that when a man decided to "take up his cross," he was not simply bearing a burden, he was dying for a cause. Matthew suffered matrydom by being slain with a sword at a distant city of Ethiopia. Luke was hanged upon an olive tree in the land of Greece. John was put in a caldron of boiling oil, but escaped death in a miraculous manner, and was afterwards branded at Patmos, Peter was crucified at Rome with his head downward.
James the Greater, was beheaded at Jerusalem and James the less, was thrown from a lofty pinnacle of the temple, and then beaten to death with a fuller’s club. Nathaniel was flayed alive, Andrew was bound to a cross, and while he hung on the cross he kept preaching to his persecutors until he died. Thomas was run through the body with a lance at Coromandel in the East Indies, Jude was shot to death with arrows.
Matthias was first stoned and then beheaded, Barnabus of the Gentiles was stoned to death at Salonica. Paul, after various tortures and persecutions, was at length beheaded at Rome by the Emperor Nero. For almost three hundred years Christianity was a forbidden thing. Christians were publicly whipped, dragged by their heels through the streets until their brains ran out. Their limbs were torn off, their ears and noses were cut off, and their eyes were dug out with sharp sticks or burned out with hot irons.
That was not all, sharp knives were run under their finger nails. Melted lead was poured over their bodies. They were drowned, beheaded, crucified, ground between stones, torn by wild beasts, smothered in lime kilns, scraped to death by sharp shells, and killed all day long. But as horrible as these events were, they all served a purpose. You see when we confess to be Christian, we need not take it lightly because to be Christian is to be Like Christ. And to willing to endure those things that Christ endured. He shed His precious blood in order that millions of His followers may have life. Not just life on this earth, but eternal life with Him in heaven.
CONCLUSION. All of us are not called upon to die heroically or sacrificially. Those soldiers who lost their lives in the war fighting for us were called upon to serve this country, and in the process they paid the ultimate sacrifice. And we owe them a debt of graditute, on this coming Memorial Day. Let us come together in prayer for all the bereaved families today, let us continue to pray for our President.
I believe, he has many more difficult decisons to make in the days to come. Let us together look to Jesus, in order that our land be healed. We need a healing from the Lord, we need to return to be the praying nation we once were. May God bless America.
