REMEMBRANCE SUNDAY 13TH NOVEMBER 2022
SENTENCE FROM SCRIPTURE – “ You are my helper and deliverer.”
OPENING HYMN
GREETING
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Amen.
COLLECT FOR PURITY
Almighty God, to whom all hearts are open,
all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hidden:
cleanse the thoughts of our hearts
by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit,
that we may perfectly love you,
and worthily magnify your holy name;
through Christ our Lord. Amen.
SUMMARY OF THE LAW
Our Lord Jesus Christ said:
The first commandment is this:
“Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is the only Lord.
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,
with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength.”
The second is this: “Love your neighbour as yourself.”
There is no other commandment greater than these.
Amen. Lord, have mercy.
CONFESSION
God is love and we are God’s children.
There is no room for fear in love.
We love because God loved us first.
Let us confess our sins in penitence and faith.
God our Father, we confess to you
and to our fellow members in the Body of Christ
that we have sinned in thought, word and deed,
and in what we have failed to do.
We are truly sorry.
Forgive us our sins,
and deliver us from the power of evil,
for the sake of your Son
who died for us, Jesus Christ, our Lord.
ABSOLUTION
God, who is both power and love,
forgive you and free you from your sins,
heal and strengthen you by the Holy Spirit,
and raise you to new life in Christ our Lord. Amen.
GLORIA by Sue St Joseph
COLLECT
O God, whose will it is
to hold heaven and earth in a single peace:
let the design of great love
shine on the waste of our wraths and sorrows;
and give peace to your Church, peace among the nations,
peace in our homes, and peace in our hearts,
through Jesus Christ our Lord,
who lives and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, world without end. Amen
PROCLAIMING & RECEIVING GOD’S WORD
FIRST READING JOB 19:21-27 read by Kay Solaja
Have pity on me, have pity on me, O you my friends,
for the hand of God has touched me!
Why do you, like God, pursue me,
never satisfied with my flesh?
“O that my words were written down!
O that they were inscribed in a book!
O that with an iron pen and with lead
they were engraved on a rock forever!
For I know that my Redeemer lives,
and that at the last he will stand upon the earth;
and after my skin has been thus destroyed,
then in my flesh I shall see God,
whom I shall see on my side,
and my eyes shall behold, and not another.
My heart faints within me!
SECOND READING 1 Corinthians 15: 51-57 read by Kate Lidwell
Listen, I will tell you a mystery! We will not all die, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For this perishable body must put on imperishability, and this mortal body must put on immortality. When this perishable body puts on imperishability, and this mortal body puts on immortality, then the saying that is written will be fulfilled:
“Death has been swallowed up in victory.”
“Where, O death, is your victory?
Where, O death, is your sting?”
The sting of death is sin, and the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.
GRADUAL HYMN
GOSPEL READING John 6: 37-40 read by Rev James Clark Maxwell
Hear the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to St John chapter 6 beginning at verse 37
Glory to Christ our Saviour
Everything that the Father gives me will come to me, and anyone who comes to me I will never drive away; for I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that I should lose nothing of all that he has given me, but raise it up on the last day. This is indeed the will of my Father, that all who see the Son and believe in him may have eternal life; and I will raise them up on the last day.”
Give thanks to the Lord for his glorious gospel.
Praise to Christ our Lord
SERMON
It is 104 years since the Armistice was signed at the end of the First World War, and 102 years since the Cenotaph was unveiled and the Unknown Warrior was buried in Westminster Abbey.
These things are part of history, but for millions of people since then war has not been history but a part of their lives. There have been various wars in recent years- to mention a few- the Vietnam war, the Gulf war, the Falkland war, Afghanistan war, the Iraq war and the latest the Russian-Ukrainian war.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is the largest conventional military attack since World War II. Russia has lost as many as 25,000 soldiers in its invasion of Ukraine, with tens of thousands more injured, according to UK and US estimates. In Ukraine, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights verified a total of 6,430 civilian deaths as of October 30, 2022, and 402 of them were children.
No- one can measure the grief, pain, suffering and stress that the people of Ukraine are currently experiencing. We are blessed to have several Ukrainian families here in our church. Over the weeks we have got to know them and love them dearly. We join with them in praying for the safety and protection of their family members in Ukraine. We long like them for the cessation of the war and for the establishment of peace and stability.
So, days like today, Remembrance Sunday are highly significant. It is eternally important that we remind ourselves of the dreadful cost of war. Huge numbers of people have been killed in warfare. The numbers killed in the two great conflicts of the twentieth century really are horrifying. Our best estimates suggest that between 15 and 19 million people died in the First World War, with a further 23 million wounded military personnel. And if that is shocking, an estimated 70-85 million people died in the Second World War – about 3% of the 1940 population. If the scale of the historical loss is shocking, we are also called to remember those who currently serve in our armed forces, and those who are veterans of more recent conflicts.
Today is surely a day to express our gratitude for that selfless service, and to remember all whose family members never returned home, and for whom no body was ever found.
For them and for others the grave of the unknown soldier in Westminster abbey speaks into their situation. The unknown Soldier could represent all those soldiers, seamen and airmen, who gave their lives. It was the Revd David Railton, who was given leave of absence to serve as a chaplain on the Western front. He did so with distinction, and was awarded the Military cross for saving an officer and two men under heavy fire.
One evening, as he returned from conducting a service for a fallen friend in Armetieres in France, he passed a small garden in the corner of which was a grave marked by a simple wooden cross. Written on it, in pencil, were the words “An Unknown British Soldier on the Black Watch.” Railton was greatly moved, later writing “How that grave caused me to think! But, who was he, was he just a lad. There was no answer to those questions, nor has there ever been yet. So, I thought and thought and wrestled in thought. What can I do to ease the pain of father, mother, brother, sister, sweetheart, wife and friend? Quietly and gradually there came out of the mist of thought this answer clear and strong, ‘Let this body – this symbol of him – be carried reverently over the sea to his native land’.
During the war he wrote to General Haig to suggest that an anonymous solder be buried with full military honours as a memorial to the unknown dead, and although his idea was not taken up at the time, he did not give up. In 1920, he wrote to the Dean of Westminster, Rt Revd Herbert Ryle, suggesting that the unknown soldier should be buried in Westminster Abbey. Ryle’s support, together with that of Lloyd George, brought the project to fruition and an unknown soldier’s body was interred in the Tomb of the Unknown Warrior on the second anniversary of the end of World War I.
On the morning of 11th November, the coffin of this Unknown Warrior was laid on a gun carriage and processed in state through the streets of London. It was adorned with a crusader sword from King George V’s private collection as well as a standard issue Army steel helmet and webbing belt. At the Cenotaph, just before 11 o’clock, the gun carriage halted and the King placed a wreath on the coffin. The two minutes’ silence was observed: then the King unveiled the new stone Cenotaph. The funeral cortege moved off again, to be met by a guard of honour of 100 holders of the Victoria Cross at Westminster Abbey. The coffin was borne inside and a short funeral service took place. 100 women, each of whom had lost their husbands and all their sons in the war, looked on. At the end of the ceremony Queen Mary apparently lost her composure and sobbed.
So, on Armistice Day 1920, over a million people turned out to witness the Unknown Warrior being carried to Westminster Abbey. During the following week alone, 1¼ million people queued day and night to pay their respects to him. 300,000 floral tributes were laid at the Cenotaph, a huge mound of chrysanthemums and other flowers stretching up so high that mothers and wives clambered up it to lay their wreaths. Poppies were only first introduced in 1921. The Unknown Warrior was – as his tombstone reads – buried ‘among the kings’: and such is his significance that every procession entering Westminster Abbey has to side-step his tomb. Even monarchs have to walk around the spot where he lies. He is ‘everyman’, not only representing the fallen of the First World War, but nowadays all those who lose their lives in the armed service of this country. An ordinary soldier, he is the embodiment of those words from John’s Gospel – a man who laid down his life for his friends. As Justin Welby said: “ Loss immeasurable is laid here, yet because of the resurrection, hope infallible.”
This hope infallible is seen in our scripture readings, where Job who had endured great pain and suffering says: “I know that my redeemer liveth.” Job believed in life after death and although he knew nothing of Christ’s rising from the dead, he nonetheless believed in the miracle of the resurrection. This resurrection is described more fully for us in the letter by Paul to the people in Corinth. Paul states categorically that death is not the end. “Behold, I will tell you a mystery!” In other words, Paul was saying, “I am going to tell you something that is too big for our human minds to fully comprehend, but I am going to tell it to you anyway.” He was saying, “I am going to give you a glimpse, however, cloudy, of God’s mind. And then he said: “We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.”
It is a mystery says Paul and you are not going to understand it, but, even if it is difficult, there are some things that we can understand. First of all Paul is telling us that we will be resurrected from the dead, just as Christ was resurrected from the dead. We will have bodies in eternity—not just spirits. Just as Christ’s body was raised from the dead, so our bodies will be raised from the dead. Then Paul goes on to tell us that our resurrected bodies will be somehow different from the bodies we now have. He says: “We will all be changed”. I take this to mean that our bodies will be different somehow from the bodies to which we have become accustomed. I believe that we will be recognizable as the persons we have always been but that our bodies will somehow be different. This is our infallible hope that in Christ we have victory over death.
Winston Churchill understood all about victory and he knew about victory over death. Death was not the end. This he demonstrated in his own funeral. He planned every detail of his funeral at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. He worked clandestinely with cathedral staff, under the code name “Operation-Hope-Not.” One aspect of his funeral seems absolutely inspired: a bugler played The Last Post from the west end of the cathedral. Then a full minute of silence passed. And then, surely a surprise to all those mourners who crowded into St. Paul’s that day, another bugler, this one positioned in the east, rose to play Reveille, the happy morning bugle call that gives soldiers and scouts the “get up and go” they need to kick-start their day.
Always a commanding presence – even from the dead – Churchill relayed two important messages. First, he offered a testimony to the shock, joy, and surprise of the Resurrection. It wasn’t random that the Reveille came from the east, where the sun rises, the direction the altar faces in many churches, the direction from which we expect Christ to return again. Secondly, Churchill bid them to press on, to attend to the day at hand, and the life ahead, in the here and now. Let us heed Churchill’s bidding and press on with the day until we finish the race and are called home, to be forever in the presence of Christ and with all those heroes or saints in Christ who have gone before us. Amen
ACT OF REMEMBRANCE
The Exhortation
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.
You might like to light a candle at this point.
The Last Post is sounded.
The Two Minute Silence is observed.
Reveille is sounded.
The Kohima Epitaph
When you go home, tell them of us and say,
For your tomorrow, we gave our today.
PRAYER
Everliving God,
we remember those whom you have gathered
from the storm of war into the peace of your presence:
may that same peace, calm our fears,
bring justice to all peoples
and establish harmony among the nations,
through Jesus Christ, Our Lord. Amen
NATIONAL ANTHEM
THE CREED
We believe in one God, the Father, the Almighty,
maker of heaven and earth,
of all that is, seen and unseen.
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
God from God,
Light from Light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one substance with the Father.
Through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven;
by the power of the Holy Spirit
he became incarnate of the Virgin Mary,
and was made man.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.
We believe in the Holy Spirit,
the Lord, the giver of life,
who proceeds from the Father.
With the Father and the Son,
he is worshipped and glorified.
He has spoken through the Prophets.
We believe in one holy catholic and apostolic Church.
We acknowledge one baptism for the forgiveness of sins.
We look for the resurrection of the dead, and the life of the world to come. Amen.
PRAYERS
LET US PRAY
Lord of all,
Hear us now as we pray for the victims of war
and for peace in our world.
We remember today, O Lord
all those who have died
in any kind of war throughout your world.
We think of soldiers who perished in the horror of battle,
innocent people buried beneath the rubble from bomb attacks,
men, women and children brutally attacked
and murdered in their villages.
On this Remembrance Day we lift to you
all victims of war,
especially those caught up in the Ukrainian and Russian War.
We remember those who came home with terrible injuries,
both physical and psychological
and those whose loved ones never returned.
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer
Remembering the conflicts of the past
and the sacrifices which were made,
we pray for a world
where war is sadly still a grim reality.
Lord as we remember those who have lost their lives,
help us to renew our fight against cruelty and injustice,
against prejudice, tyranny and oppression.
We cry out to you in the darkness of our divided world,
for security and stability.
Hear our prayer for the multitudes in every country
who do not want war
and are ready to walk the path of peace.
May their voice be heard
and may they not lose heart.
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer
Lord God, we pray for the leaders of the nations at this time,
asking you to pour out your spirit of reconciliation on them.
Give strength and courage to those
who bear heavy responsibilities for the peace of the world.
We pray also for the Christian Church,
called to witness to your love in this generation.
May Christians work with all people of goodwill
to break down the barriers which divide people.
May those who profess one faith
respect those who sincerely hold another faith
and build a community
where there is harmony and understanding.
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer.
We pray for those across the world
who bear the scars of conflict-
the injured, maimed, and mentally distressed,
those who have lost limbs, their reasoning capability
or who have lost a loved one through the horrors of war.
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer.
We pray for those left homeless or as refugees,
those who have lost their livelihoods and security
and those who still live in daily fear for their lives.
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer.
We pray for children who have been orphaned,
parents who mourn their children.
Husbands and wives who have lost their partners,
countless families whose lives will never be the same again.
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer.
We pray for those in the armed forces
charged with keeping the peace
in countries across the world-
their work involving months away from family and friends,
and often danger to themselves.
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer.
We pray for world leaders and rulers,
politicians and diplomats
those whose decisions and negotiations
affect the lives of so many,
and in whose hands peace ultimately lies.
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer.
We pray for families struggling with illness
and trying to cope with hospitals and treatment.
In the quiet of our hearts we pray for those known to us
who are ill at this time in body, mind or spirit.
Lord, draw near to those we have named quietly
and grant them your healing touch and caring love.
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer.
We pray for all who mourn,
thinking especially of those who have recently been bereaved.
O Lord grant them your comfort and peace in these days.
Lord in your mercy
Hear our prayer.
Lord of all, give courage to those who strive for justice
so that all the causes of conflict may be overcome.
Give strength to those who seek to break down barriers,
that divisions over race, colour, creed
and culture may be ended.
Grant that wherever war or the threat of war
continues to haunt lives
a way of reconciliation and peace may be found.
Lord in your mercy.
Hear our prayer.
Merciful Father accept these prayers for the sake of your Son our Saviour Jesus Christ, who taught us to pray
Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
Forgive us our sins
as we forgive those
who sin against us.
Do not bring us
to the time of trial+
but deliver us from evil.
For the kingdom, the power
and the glory are yours,
now and forever. Amen.
HYMN
BLESSING
The peace of God which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God and of His son Jesus Christ our Lord: and the blessing of God almighty, Father, Son and Holy Spirit, be among you and remain with you always. Amen