Victims of War, Victims of Sin: A Christian Approach to Memorial Day
The Lord said to Cain, “Why are you angry? Why is your countenance fallen? If you do well, shall you not be accepted? But if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. It desires to dominate you, but you must rule over it.”
Cain told Abel his brother. And it came about, when they were in the field, that Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him.
The Lord said to Cain, “Where is Abel your brother?”
He said, “I do not know. Am I my brother’s keeper?”
And then He said, “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood is crying out to Me from the ground. Now you are cursed from the ground which opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand. From now on when you till the ground, it will not yield for you its best. You will be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth.”
(Genesis, 4:6-12, Modern English Version)
This week in churches throughout America, Christians are preparing to observe Memorial Day. Some will have special services, others will wait until Monday but all will in someway take a moment to remember the great sacrifices made by our brave American men and women in uniform to protect our freedoms. It's a time to be thankful, to be in awe. To hold these heroes before ourselves, our children and say "God bless our troops, and God bless America."
Except this is all wrong.
Today, I'd like to propose another way of observing Memorial Day, at least for Christians. Rather than seeing this day as one of honoring American Soldiers who died to protect us (a statement this frankly very debatable and dubious, especially in recent wars) let's take this upcoming Monday as an opportunity to acknowledge and consider the following three realities of our fallen world.
First, war is a result of sin. Let's not forget that. I know too many young Christian men who revere war and violence as some sort of good thing. If you disagree it's because you're weak and comprised by our feminized society. Um, no. You don't have to be effeminate to see that taking human life, under any circumstances, is a tragic deed. Necessary at times yes, but tragic just the same. Not only does Scripture forbid murder, but the punishment for this sin is the forfeiting of one's own life. Even here, this is not a punishment we should revel in. It's tragic all-around.
War is nothing more or less than humans killing other humans they don't know on a massive scale and for reasons that often are not their own. Is it necessary sometimes? Yes, God calls us to protect and provide for our families (1 Tim 5:8). We are not be pacifists, I believe, but are to abhor war as something that we have to live with because of sin, much like the thorns and thistles and the sweat that beset our efforts at working the ground.
But that does not give us the right to make war into some kind of glorious and honorable "manly" pastime. Frankly, this notion is more the mindset of the barbarian warrior and less that of the Christian. Every life lost on the field of battle is a tragedy because that life is imago dei underneath the corruption of sin. It is sin that drives men to the battlefield and sin that kills them there.
Second, the world is bigger than United States of America. More specifically, the Church is bigger than the United States of America. What kind of message do we send to our brothers and sisters in other nations of other nationalities when we have entire services dedicated to remembering those who died in American wars? Are we not making 'Murica part of our Christianity in an unhealthy way? I believe so. Especially because, as I just discussed, war effects all peoples or has effected all peoples. There is not a single place in this world where war has not been waged and blood shed at some point in the history of mankind. War is a shared tragedy.
Furthermore, are we honoring the American dead in every war America has waged? Because that gets us into some sticky questions. Do we remember those who died in the Imperialistic Mexican-American War? The Spanish-American War? How about all the conflicts with indigenous tribes? If make this a day to honor American soldiers who died in war without exception, we are not only dishonoring our brothers and sisters around the world, we are openly condoning the wickedness of imperialism.
Third and lastly, Memorial Day should be a day of remorse and repentance, not of false honor and patriotism. I am not thankful that men (and women) have lost their lives fighting for old glory, even in wars I believe were justified. That's irrelevant. I'm grieved that we live in a fallen world where war happens and where wives lose their husbands, children their fathers, parents their children, sisters their brothers and friends their friends. Every white cross cemetery of war dead is not a memorial to their bravery but to our depravity.
Now, I absolutely admire those died defending home and hearth (and I include any nation's dead to whom this applies) and I thank God for their willingness to withstand evil and to place themselves between their loved ones and danger. Jesus himself says that "Greater love has no man than this: that a man lay down his life for his friends" (John 15:13, MEV). But it is still the effect of sin that requires this sacrifice.
So this Memorial Day instead of displaying our patriotism cards, let's observe a moment of silence and grieve all the dead of war, in every land and throughout the ages who died as victims of the same sin that plagues us all. But through it all, remember also the Gospel, that Jesus Christ has won redemption for us and one day in the new heavens and new earth, all of those in Christ who perished on battlefields will walk again.
Thus says the Lord: I have returned to Zion and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem, and Jerusalem will be called a city of faithfulness and the mountain of the Lord of Hosts, the holy mountain.
Thus says the Lord of Hosts: Older men and women will again sit in the streets of Jerusalem, each having a staff in his hand because of advanced age. And the plazas of the city will be filled with young boys and girls playing in her open places.
Thus says the Lord of Hosts: If it is marvelous in the eyes of the remnant of this people in these days, will it also be marvelous in My eyes? says the Lord of Hosts.
Thus says the Lord of Hosts: I will deliver My people from the eastern lands and from the western lands. And I will bring them, and they will reside in Jerusalem, and they will be for Me as a people, and I will be for them as God, with faithfulness and righteousness.
(Zechariah 8:3-8, MEV)
