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Ruth 1:1-8, 14-18 Ruth and Naomi: I will go where you go.
John 11:7-16 Jesus, heading for Jerusalem. Thomas "let us go
and die with him."
One of the chief delights for my daughter Allison is that she was born
on the 25th April 1978. Even at 28 years old, she still thinks it is really
cool that the whole of Australia has a public holiday for her birthday.
Like all Australian children she has grown up with the ANZAC legend, hearing
year after year the story of Simpson and his donkey and the horrors of
the trenches at Gallipoli. These stories were instilled in me too, from
my childhood, that this was one day when the businesses didn't open, the
parents didn't sing, and the war memorial in Beaufort where the names
of my uncles and cousins is inscribed on the cenotaph in the middle of
the town is to my family, the most sacred place in Australia.
My father didn't go to war. Born in 1909 he was too young for the first
war, and as a farmer in the second war, required to stay on the land.
But he used to tell me over and over the stories that his brothers told
him, and one of the favourites was a story about the commander of the
Anzacs, General William Birdwood, affectionately known amongst the troops
as Birdie.
My memory of the location of the story is sketchy because foreign place
names meant little to me as a country boy, but the story itself instilled
in me an ideal of what made a man worth respecting.
Birdie instilled courage in his men by being where they were, sharing
their danger, treating them as people of worth. He didn't stand on ceremony
with people, and there is even a story of him going around the troops
without badge of rank and stopping to chat with the soldiers and share
their meals as just another man on the front line.
So the story goes, on one occasion General Birdwood was moving around
among his troops when one of the soldiers spotted the glint off a snipers
rifle, aimed directly at General Birdwood. The soldier reacted instinctively
and shouted at the top of his voice "Duck Birdie Duck."
General Birdwood ducked and the snipers bullet missed him.
Telling the story later on Birdwood was asked rather stiffly by a fellow
officer, "And what did you do the impudent young twerp?" and
General Birdwood replied "Why I gave him a medal of course."
Reading my history books, General Birdwood wasn't seen as a brilliant
tactician but he seems to have gathered the respect and love and trust
of his men. What they liked about him, and this seems to be the common
thread, is that he was with them in the fray. Whatever happened to them,
he was there sharing it with them. The soldiers believed that he cared
about them as people, he shared their world, and understood. For this,
they respected him and gave him their allegiance.
As a child, around every ANZAC DAY, on every Remembrance Day, our teacher
would gather her entire school of 10-12 pupils, and we would sit and listen
to the broadcast on the ABC, and hear the words from the Scripture "Greater
love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends."
I wasn't very old before I realized that there was a profound difference
between the type of laying down of life required of a soldier, and the
type of laying down of life that Jesus did.
Jesus chose to die without resistance, as a sacrificial act. Soldiers
are involved in warfare, carrying weapons that kill other human beings.
Jesus spoke only of peace, and to take the blows from the enemy without
retaliation. Soldiers may lay their lives down as a sacrificial act for
their country but often through the process of attacking others. The differences
are profound, yet strangely, perhaps, the image of Jesus, going to the
cross is still held as a symbol of men and women who have given their
lives for the freedom and protection of others.
So in using the metaphor, we need to remember that it is not a perfect
metaphor, there are profound differences. But acknowledging the differences
does not invalidate the metaphor. Rather it highlights the concurrences.
What Jesus did when he took on humanity, when he took on the pain and
the suffering of humanity, symbolized in the cross, is to announce to
all creation, "I am with you in the pain. I am with you in the suffering.
I am with you in the incongruency, the inconsistency, the vulnerability,
the hope, the victory, the defeat. You are my people. I am with you -
even to death.
In the Scriptures, the figure of Ruth is often seen as a picture of Christ.
The story of Ruth is about a Moabite woman whose love for her mother in
law, Naomi, was such that she was prepared to follow her to a strange
land, to an uncertain future, for love. Ruth's identification with Naomi
means that her future is tied to the future of her mother in law, even
if it is a dangerous future, the outcome uncertain.
Such was the relationship between Australia and Britain in the first and
the second World Wars. As Robert Menzies said in 1939, "Britain is
at war, so we are at war." Like Ruth to Naomi - where you go I will
go, your future is my future.
I remember once, in my recruit training days, coming into conflict with
another soldier who was determined he was going to beat the daylights
out of me because of a disagreement we had over a certain course of action
I had taken. I managed to convince him that to do it in the barracks would
not only wreck our room but that the Sergeant would have our intestines
for stockings, so we scheduled the matter for the gym the next day.
That morning, my would be opponent called it off. I confess to, in some
part, being a little disappointed as the battle fever had me by the scruff
of the neck and I was primed, but being a Christian I also recognised
I should be glad. I didn't understand why the contest had been aborted
until several days later. It turned out that a couple of my mates had
said to this chap, if you fight Bruce, you fight me too.
There was a code: if one was in strife, you were with him, right or wrong.
He was your mate. It was unspoken, and inviolate. Your lot is my lot -
a fierce identification and loyalty - such as existed between Australian
and New Zealand troops, such as existed between Australia and Britain,
such as is exhibited in God amongst us in Jesus.
So despite the differences between the Saviour who gives his life in love
and does not raise his hand against his enemy, and the soldier who lays
his life down with a rifle in his hand, in battle, despite these differences,
there is also a deep synthesis.
On the 25th April each year, (my daughter's birthday of which she is so
justly proud,) the nation of Australia stops to remember a comradeship
forged out of adversity, between three great nations. As daughter nations,
Australia and New Zealand would go with their mother nation wherever she
went, her future was their's and Kiwi and Australian stood shoulder to
shoulder in that resolve. It was in that unconditional commitment of mateship,
that the great ANZAC tradition was forged, much as in the great unconditional
commitment of God to us, the Christian faith was forged.
Such great sacrifices, such great legends, should not be easily put aside
or forgotten.
But to live, they need to be more than history. They need to be lived
and renewed in the living.
The story of Ruth and Naomi is the story of costly love. For a long time,
their lives hung in the balance, surviving off the practise of following
behind the reapers in the fields, picking up the leftover grain.
Starvation and death were their ever present foes until the day that deliverance
arrived in the form of a relative, a man called Boaz, who drew both mother
and daughter into his family as kin.
For Jesus, the story was one of costly love, and the cross stands as symbol
of the pain and torment that preceded the resurrection.
For Australia and New Zealand, the story was of costly love, and in every
town and settlement, there is a place that remembers the multiple griefs
of the communities whose young men never returned, and this only touches
the pain of war. I still remember well one of my Uncles, of whom the family
would say quietly, "Its because of the war Bruce." And as a
child I never really understood.
We must remember, not only those who died, but those who lived, and those
who lived with the living and the dying.
But we also remember, and I hope never forget, the opportunity that is
ours because of the living and dying, and the great responsibility that
is laid upon us - to treasure what we have because there were those who
gave their lives for us, and also to remember the responsibility and opportunity
that is laid upon us because of the one who gave his life that we might
live, and in whose name we pray as we remember and honour the Australian
and New Zealand Army Corps.
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