Proclaimer Blog
How to remember
It’s been encouraging reading my friends’ reports of Remembrance Sunday and how this is fast becoming the major evangelistic guest event in their church – for many, they are more likely to have a full church on Remembrance Sunday than at Easter or Christmas Day. Go for it, brothers.
But it’s also worth remembering that for many, it’s not so simple. We have well over 50 nationalities in our church – active members – and the kind of jingoistic service that this particular Sunday can quickly become (need not, but often does) does not serve the gospel. We have those who lost relatives on losing sides in a world war. We have those who were forced to fight against their will. We have those who – whilst on a winning side – can hardly feel positive about the regime they were propping up (Stalin).
It’s good to remember – but, as with everything in church – we need to do it in a way that is appropriate and sensitive to those who belong and – to a lesser extent, maybe – to those who visit. I have to confess I have never found this easy – particularly because world wars (which, I think, fulfil the criteria for just wars) are markedly different from recent conflicts. Often, in Remembrance Sunday jargon, these are all lumped together.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not trying to be a November 11 humbug. I just contend it needs a little thinking through for careful Christians. Chez nous, we prayed in our mission slot for Germany. And we had a short quote from Prince Philip Kiril the great great grandson on Kaiser Wilhelm II – a Lutheran pastor, referring to 1914:
“The German people had to carry the price and there was much worse coming when the monarchy was gone – you know all of that, there’s no need for a history lesson now. There has been much lost in Germany and throughout the world and it would take too long to go through all of this and ask for forgiveness. But we have a God who can do something with our ruins. And I became a pastor because I have a strong hope that he can do something with the German people; many of them are far from God. Please pray for Germany whenever you think of them or of me. That’s what’s on my heart.” Watch the full interview from this year’s Alpha conference here.
Above all, of course, we want to remember Christ – and this needs to be at the heart of every Remembrance Sunday, however it is conducted.