So today is the day we celebrate the birth of Jesus. I’m guessing all He wants for His birthday is for all of us to heed these words:
“This is my commandment, that you love one another, even as I have loved you.” – John 15:12
In return, here is the Christmas present we all should accept over the Wii:
“Peace I leave with you. My peace I give to you; not as the world gives, give I to you. Don’t let your heart be troubled, neither let it be fearful.” – John 14:27
Too often war is viewed, usually by those far away from the front, as a glorious and heroic adventure. To those in the trenches, in the Humvees, and in the mountains of Afghanistan, it is anything but.
This past Sunday in church there was a special lay-service put together for Veterans Day. It featured World War I poetry written by those who fought and saw (and in some cases, experienced) the tragic waste of life first hand. The poems of Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon were particularly powerful.
At the end of the service, they played a version of Tom Waits’s “Day After Tomorrow.” You can read the lyrics here.
On this Veterans Day I am feeling the same way I have always felt: extremely grateful for our soldiers’ service and sacrifice. And unbelievably sorry.
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.”
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