On 25th
September 1915, the first day of the fighting at the battle of Loos, Captain
Anketell Read of the First Battalion, The Northamptonshire Regiment, was killed
while leading his men in the most ferocious fighting. For his conspicuous
bravery and self-sacrifice, paying no regard to his own safety or well-being
but only to that of his soldiers, he was posthumously awarded the Victoria
Cross.
Three times winner of the Army and Navy Heavyweight Boxing Championship,
he was known as ‘Widowmaker’ for his devastating jab. He was by all accounts
the epitome of the chivalrous English gentleman and also a committed Christian,
admired and respected by all who knew him. On the headstone of his grave is a
brief but most interesting inscription: it reads as follows. ‘’He won because
he never recognised defeat. ‘Christ died for all.’’
Here then
was a man - a man of his time and culture sure enough - a man whose selfless
sense of duty towards those under his authority led him to put them before
himself: he fully understood the very best principle of leadership. On day one
when arriving at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst, we were presented with
a little red book entitled ‘Serve To Lead’. It is a book about and with
examples of leadership according to that very principle; the principle
practised by Read. It is an excellent and inspiring little book. Later in life
I made the naive mistake of recommending to my first bishop and Theological
College Principal that it really ought to be mandatory reading for all would-be
parish priests!
In Captain
Read then, we meet a man who was not only inspired to lay down his life for
those who followed him but who was deeply conscious of the far greater,
life-changing, sacrifice made by his Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ. Of course, his personal sacrifice that day
may have saved the lives of some or even many; but many, many more were killed.
Some will look back on that battle, on that war, and on the huge loss of life,
and say, quite rightly in so many ways, ‘what a terrible mistake; what a terrible
waste’; just as some today will raise similar concerns about our presence in
Afghanistan. Now I am not going to raise contentious political issues this
morning but I will ask you to consider and remember this: that the men at Loos
and in Afghanistan, whatever we feel about the rights or wrongs of both
engagements, hugely deserve our respect, our sympathy, and in the latter case,
our prayers.
In
remembering his sacrifice for his soldiers and his country, Reid’s parents
chose not to forget but to remind everyone who would see his headstone of the far greater sacrifice; the
sacrifice that had inspired their remarkable son: ‘Christ died for all.’
Each year we
remember and honour those, like Read, who gave their lives in order that we
might enjoy a freedom they thought worth fighting for. This service today is a
reminder to us and a challenge to, as the Prayer Book says, ‘use aright the time left to us here on earth,
to repent of our sins, of the evil we have done and the good we have not done.’
And so their
sacrifice leads us naturally, or ought to, to consider again the greatest
sacrifice ever made; the day when ‘Christ died for all’. It was the greatest
sacrifice ever made because it achieved some remarkable things; things no
ordinary human being could. Let us remind ourselves this morning of just three
of them; three that can alter radically the way a person views this life, views
others, and indeed views themself; three things that Captain Read’s sacrifice
could never achieve, though he himself had lived a life inspired by the knowledge
of them.
Those three
things, those three remarkable and life-changing things are these. First, in
voluntarily giving up his life, Jesus paid the moral debt we owe to God.
Secondly, he made our reconciliation with God possible. And, thirdly, he made
possible eternal life.
This moral
debt we owe God is perhaps these days even more contentious for some than the
idea that there is such a thing as eternal life. But if you are someone who
believes both in love and justice; indeed that a deep concern for justice is
actually an essential part of what it means to love if love is to have any
worthwhile meaning at all, then a perfectly loving God cannot simply turn a
blind eye to even the least of our injustices, be they sins of commission or
sins of omission – the evil we have done or the good we have not done.
Personally, I could not even begin to worship a God who simply turned a blind
eye or who acted like an indulgent old uncle.
But as we do
not have it within ourselves – no one does – to put ourselves right with God,
God chose, in one of his forms of being God, to take human form in the person
of Jesus and to pay our debt himself. This he did when he laid down his life on
the cross at Calvary. But in this case it was not just for the few who followed
him, it was for the sins of the whole world. In so doing, in paying the moral
debt that stood against our evil deeds and our failure to do good, he made it
possible for all who will accept in faith this sacrifice of his to be
reconciled to God. This is the second of the three remarkable things his
sacrifice achieved. He simply hangs on the cross there and asks us to trust
him. ‘It is finished’, he said. ‘I’ve done it for you and for the sins of the
whole world.’ But of course we have to trust and to show this by our attitude
to him and to others; we have to accept him as Saviour and Lord of our lives; we
have to demonstrate that the reconciliation is genuine.
Now what
people discover is that to be reconciled with God creates a newfound freedom; I
might almost say a carefree freedom, even in the face of danger and death.
Why?
Well, if we know that we have been forgiven for everything – whatever our track
record or character – by humbly accepting his offer; and if we know that we are
now reconciled to God entirely because of what he has done for us; and if we
know too that this life, whatever happens to us and however we go, is not the
end of existence because the one who reconciled us has also promised us eternal
life, then would that not be a very great weight off anyone’s mind?
But why did
Reid believe this? Why could he live as he lived? Why should anyone believe it?
The answer lies, I am sure, in verse 30 of our first reading this morning.
You
can see it there, very briefly, on your service sheet. ‘But God raised him from
the dead’. This is the cornerstone of Christian belief and the reason why we
can trust the person and the promises of Jesus. The evidence for the
resurrection is there for all to see but will never be sufficient for those who
choose not to see it or who simply do not care.
Jesus taught
explicitly that he had come to save sinners, to reconcile us to God, to free us
from our pride and sins, and to offer us eternal life. This he did by
sacrificing his life for us. Captain Reid’s sacrifice was a most heroic act of
selflessness; but his family and friends knew what, or rather who it was, had inspired
that sacrifice. ‘Christ died for all.’ Do you believe and trust in this, in
him? It is a question we must all of us ask ourselves – and give an answer.
No comments:
Post a Comment