No Greater Love Memorial Day May 26, 2013 Trinity United Methodist Church John 15:9-17 In our nation, where history is often overshadowed by current happenings, it is good that we set aside a couple days each year to stop and remember those persons and events that have kept our country standing on a foundation of freedom and democracy. Memorial Day is a day that is particularly riveting because it is filled with so many memories especially for our veterans. One of the most famous memories from World War II is displayed in the photo of five marines raising an American flag following a victory on the island of Iwo Jima. The young man in the center of the picture was John Bradley. After the war, Bradley moved back to Antigo, Wisconsin, married his high school sweetheart and raised a family. Although John Bradley received the Navy Cross for saving a fellow soldier s life he preferred not to talk about the war. And he refused to accept the hero designation that others tried to force on him. One of the few comments that Bradley ever made about the war was directed to his young son James. In response to James remark about his dad being a hero, John Bradley replied, The heroes of Iwo Jima are the guys who didn t come back. So today we honor the John Bradleys of our nation, those of you who have served, but especially we honor the men and women who didn t come back. These are the ones who in President Lincoln s words in the Gettysburg Address gave the last full measure of devotion. My personal memories of Memorial Day have to do with marching in the high school band right behind the color guard as we paraded up the street to our small cemetery in St. Joe where we gathered around the war monument and listened to speeches from some of our local dignitaries. It s those Norman Rockwell type of experiences that bring back warm memories for me about Memorial Day. I remember those services as being reverent and dignified.
But thinking back on Bradley s and Lincoln s statements Memorial Day is sometimes an uncomfortable holiday. For one thing it brings back to some of our minds the horrors of war. But there is something else. Not only are we confronted with the ultimate sacrifice that many men and women made, we are confronted with our response to those sacrifices. This whole concept of anyone making sacrifices for us, much less dying for us, makes some of us feel uneasy. If we recognize their sacrifices then we must feel gratitude and humility. Also, confronting their heroism forces us to stop and examine our own lives and ask some sobering questions. Are we living a life worth dying for? What noble causes do we believe are worth dying for? And the hardest question -------- would we be willing to do the same? This whole issue is more compelling at this time because many of us are praying for specific men and women who are presently fighting for freedom in Afghanistan or in other hot places in the world. Some of us can put faces to those who have been willing to return to a war zone perhaps several times and risk their lives for a cause they believe in. So Jesus words are very pointed beginning in verse 12 of our text when He says, This is my commandment that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. Jesus in this passage tells His people that He does not call them slaves or servants any more; He now calls them friends. This would have been an amazing statement for those men and women to hear from Jesus lips for the first time. And are we able to understand the potential in this statement? His statement implies an intimacy with God that was not possible before the coming of Jesus and the coming of the Holy Spirit who we talked about last week. Now Jesus could become our best friend. Have each of us been able to enter into that kind of relationship with Jesus? Do we savor that friendship? But here s something else pretty neat. When Jesus said, Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends, we immediately
understand that Jesus was including Himself --------- how He as our friend laid down His life for us. The Bible makes it clear that Jesus knew what He was doing when He allowed Himself to be crucified. He could have called 10,000 angels to rescue Him ---------- ------ but He didn t. His sacrifice for us was a choice and it stands as the greatest act of love in history. Jesus was the Person who laid down His life for His friends. The uncomfortable part of this act is that there is an implication in this passage that we are to follow Jesus example and be willing to do what Jesus did. Not many of us here today have an opportunity to lay down our life for a brother or sister. Hopefully we have supported our family members or friends or maybe we have even defended our friends, but for most of us to put our life on the line for someone else is uncharted territory. Some exceptions would be the firefighters or the law enforcement officers in our midst and of course the men and women in the military. And let s not forget the teachers in the Oklahoma Tornados who threw their bodies over children to protect them from the debris thrown around from the storm. Those were heroes too who were willing to lay down their lives for others. The folks who have gone where most of us have never gone in terms of risking their lives for others are to be commended. Again that is why we having Memorial Day ------- to recognize some very amazing people. But how would the rest of us respond if we were asked to lay down our life for our brother or sister? These words haunt us, Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. Former Secretary of State, Colin Powell, tells in his autobiography of an incident during Desert Storm that deeply affected him. Newscaster, Sam Donaldson, was interviewing a young American private. How do you think the battle will go? Are you afraid?
The private replied, We ll do OK -------- I m not afraid because I m with my family. As he said this he motioned toward the other soldiers sitting nearby. One of the soldiers called out, Tell him again. He didn t hear you! With even more confidence in his voice the young man said, This is my family and we ll take care of each other. Do you think that soldier would be willing to lay down his life for his family? I believe he would. Because he loved them and because he knew they loved him, he had the courage and commitment to do anything to look after them. I wonder? Do we in the Christian community have that kind of compassion and concern for each other? Do we have that kind of love? Can we point to any member of our church and say, That s my family and we take care of each other. Is that the way we are? I want to offer an idea at this point. There are different ways of laying down our lives for our friends than being willing to die for them. We may never have the opportunity to die for them, but we can care for them during their time of need. We can lay down our lives by being available to them ------- by being servants to them. We can lay down our lives for them by supporting them during difficult times in their lives -------- by extending our life to them, when no one else seems to care about them --------- by giving the gift of time when we don t seem to have any time to give. Sacrificial love has the power to change not only our church, but our entire community. What the love spills over we will be unstoppable. Those around us observing our love for each other should have to say, There s something different about those people. I don t know what they are connected to but I want what they ve got. That s what is it like to become a contagious congregation. What s the motivation for getting us there? We can t get there unless we first lay down our life for Jesus ------ that s means sacrificing our life in favor of the life of Christ within us.
The follower of Christ named Paul in Galatians 2:20 says, I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. He gave His life for us -------- we now give our life for Him -------- so that we now can give our life for others. Are you living for Jesus? Are you living for others? I invite you to do so today. In India there is a cemetery where the bodies of American soldiers are buried. Over the entrance to the cemetery are these words, Tell Them We Gave Our Today s For Their Tomorrows. Let s never forget that our tomorrow s were bought with a price. Freedom isn t free. There is no way we can adequately say Thank You to them or to their families today who are risking their young men and women in our service. One small gesture of appreciation we can express is to never let Memorial Day become just another meaningless holiday that only marks the exodus of spring and the entrance of summer. We come together as the Christian community to remember.