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In
Canada, November 11 is commemorated as Remembrance Day. The eleventh hour of
the eleventh day of the eleventh month has been a meeting point for millions of
people since the end of World War One. Each year’s remembrance includes honoring
those of our citizens who have fought in the subsequent wars up to the present
time.
Meeting
at our local Cenotaph has a double meaning for me. The most obvious is that we
acknowledge the human sacrifice involved in war. We honor those who died in
battle, along with the veterans who live to tell the stories. There is
something very sobering about knowing that people died to improve or preserve
the freedoms of those who live.
Which
brings me to the second meaning of Remembrance Day. On our Merritt Cenotaph,
there is an inscription that reads, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a
man lay down his life for his friends.” This is right after the personal acknowledgement
of the people from our community, “who died that we might live.”
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What
makes it so doubly significant to meet at the Merritt Cenotaph is that the commemoration
of those who died in service to our country is a small reflection of the One
who died in service to our planet. The words that bring Merrittonians together
year after year are those of Jesus the Christ. He died the most sacrificial
death the world has ever known, for the benefit of the greatest number of
people who could ever be saved.
In
some of the movie footage and photos from the World Wars, knowing the outcome
of battles that young men were heading into gives an almost eerie feel to the look
of foreboding on their faces. They knew they would all fight, and they knew
that some would not make it out alive, they just didn’t know who would fall,
and who would survive.
The
words that Jesus spoke were uttered on the night before he laid down his life.[1] He knew it was coming. He knew he alone could do it. While two
other men would die at the same time, both would die as the judgment against
their crimes. Jesus alone would die for the crimes of others.
The
wonderful exchange that took place in the death of Jesus Christ is described
like this, “For our sake he made him to
be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of
God.”[2] Jesus did not die for people who were free, but people who were the
POW’s of sin.[3] He did not die for people who were on his side, who were in his
kingdom of righteousness.[4] Rather, he died for those who were his enemies, living outside his
kingdom.[5]
The
gift God has given us in his Son has another distinctive element. Not only is Jesus
the only person who has ever laid down his life as the innocent one for the
many guilty, but our remembrance of Jesus is not only the commemoration of one
who died. It is also the celebration of one who lives.
Jesus’
death stands out as the only death that was redemptive, that was the paying of
a ransom price to deliver sinners out of death. “For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to
give his life as a ransom for many.”[6] However, it also stands out as the death that ends in life, not
only for those who are the beneficiaries of his death, but for Jesus who was
himself raised from the dead.[7]
As
a little brother to Jesus Christ,[8] I can appreciate those people who serve and have served our country
in life and in death. The two Canadian soldiers killed on Canadian soil within
weeks of this Remembrance Day commemoration leave us with very fresh emotions
of the ugliness of violence and hatred around the world.
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However,
I cannot look at any self-sacrifice without seeing Jesus leading the way in the
most gracious, loving, powerful, life-giving, sacrifice the world has and will
ever know. What was true of Jesus the day he died, is true of him to this day, “He is the propitiation for our sins, and
not for ours only but also for the sins of the whole world.”[9]
It
is because of this that his little brothers have this hope (no matter what is
happening to our Canadian freedoms), “For
if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son,
much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.”[10]Jesus is the greatest expression of one who “died that we might
live.” The best way to commemorate and celebrate this gift is to live in him.
© 2014 Monte Vigh ~ Box 517,
Merritt, BC, Canada, V1K 1B8 ~ in2freedom@gmail.com
Unless otherwise noted,
Scriptures are from the English Standard Version (The Holy Bible, English
Standard Version Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a division of Good
News Publishers.)
[1]
John 15:13
[2]
II Corinthians 5:21
[3]
Romans 3:23 (Read the whole of Romans 3:1-31 to see how no one was on Jesus’
side); Romans 6:23
[4]
Romans 3:10
[5]
Ephesians 2:1-3
[6]
Mark 10:45
[7]
Romans 6:9
[8]
Hebrews 2:11
[9]
I John 2:2 (Propitiation refers to the act of one person bearing the wrath
deserved by or aimed at another. In war, soldiers bear the wrath of the enemy
in order to save their family and friends from facing that wrath. In Jesus’
case, he bore the wrath of God against our sin in order to deliver us from that
much-deserved wrath.)
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