Words for Worship

Ministry Today

It was the iconic

bomber operation

of the Second World War.  

 

It raised morale.

 

It indicated that

Germany

wasn’t going to get it

all its own way.

 

It proved that

we may be down

but not out

as a nation.

 

It was of course,

the dam busters’ raid.

 

Now that brave action

took place

a mere 65 years ago

on 17 May 1943.

 

Yet years later

Barnes Wallace

the inventor

of the famous bouncing bomb felt it was not a triumph. Instead, he remained crushed by the sadness

of knowing

that 53 allied airmen

died in the attack.

 

Nevertheless, 1943

had its over generous share

of tragedies

on the other side.

 

Take on the eastern front.

 

On 2 February,

the German enclave

e around the city of Stalingrad collapsed to Russian forces.

 

And at the end

of that nightmare struggle,

400, 000

of prisoners of war

were taken to labour camps.

 

Of the German contingent

of nearly 100,000

less than 5,000

would see

their homeland again.

 

And so when we survey 1943 we look

into the darkest winter of war.

 

A time when we say –

where was God in all this?

 

What was Christ doing

in the midst

of this cauldron of bile?

 

In fact, does not war

destroy religion

as it does most other things?

 

Well I mused

upon those bleak questions.

 

Then I spied

a strange entry

for the day after

the fall of Stalingrad.

 

It is the tale of the 4 chaplains.

 

In freezing waters

an American troopship

was torpedoed.

 

Onboard it, were

the Methodist George  Fox,

the Jewish rabbi

Alexander Goode,

the Roman Catholic Priest

John  Washington

and the Reformed Church

Clark Poling.

 

As the vessel sank,

the four chaplains

calmed

the frightened soldiers and sailors,

aided in the evacuation

n of the ship,

and helped guide

wounded men to safety.

 

The chaplains

also gave over

their own life jackets.

One survivor then recalls –

As I swam away from the ship,

I looked back.

 

The flares had lit everything.

 

The bow came up high

and she slid under.

The last thing

I saw was the Four Chaplains were up there

praying for the safety of the men.

 

They had done everything

they could.

 

I did not see them again.

 

 

Here then is where Christ

is to be found

even in the most ghastly

of circumstances.  

 

He is to be found

in Christians.

 

Christians who profess

with every fibre of their being.

 

Christians who are

sacrificially loyal

to their sacred duty.

 

And that means

in first instance

bringing comfort –

practical comfort,

selfless comfort

and faith powered comfort.  

 

This point is

poignantly made

maybe by

the arch type chaplain –

G A Studdert Kennedy.

 

Now he revelled

in his nickname

woodbine Willie

because it told of

what he did.

 

For early in the First World War chaplains were not allowed

into the trenches.

 

The reason being

their deaths would be

a morale blow.

 

However, Studdert Kennedy pushed to get to the front line.

 

When he got there

he won the military cross

for rushing out

into hostile fire

to retrieve the wounded.

 

Yet it was his habit

of dishing out

the cigarettes

to the scared troops

drowning in mud

and hopelessness

that made him famous.

 

For as he advised

a new army padre -

“Take a box of fags

in your haversack

and a great deal of love

in your heart.”

 

 However studdert Kennedy admitted that

comfort alone was not enough, because

as he writes in his poem woodbine Willie

 

Their name!

Let me hear it —

the symbol
Of unpaid — unpayable debt,
 

For the men to whom I owed God’s Peace,
I put off with a cigarette.

 

In other words

there must be more.

 

And that is my reason

for telling you a story

I have told you before.

 

    

Some years ago

I attended

an elders' away-day

 at Churches House

 at Dunblane.

 

At its back

 is an ancient Celtic monks cell

 that is now

 a small chapel.

 

There we shared communion.

 

 But the communion set

we were using

 had a history.

 

For it had once been

a possession

Of a Chaplain held

 in a Far Eastern

Prison of War camp.

 

Within its battered case

was a small notebook

which related

this clergyman’s experiences.

 

In it,

 he noted that

 his first communicant classes

were always filled

 to overflowing

 with young soldiers.

 

Few of whom,

one suspects survived

 their captivity.

 

 Here then is the second job

of Christians

in dangerous situations.

 

And it is to bring hope.

 

The Hope that binds up

the wounds in the soul.

 

Hope that the bloodshed

will end.

 

Hope that peace

will one day

return.

 

Hope indeed

of the fulfilment

that all that is going on

has meaning

even purpose.

 

This general hope

was well expressed

by a picture

in a wartime Life magazine.

 

It showed a soldier

reading under the shade

of his tank

in the western desert.

 

And his book was called – preparing for a better world.

 

Here surrounded

by the detritus of battle

was a young man

thinking beyond it

to a better future.

 

The future we too

believe in

from the vision of Isaiah.

 

Because God does promise

a tomorrow

when there is no famine,

no enemies,

no pain and conflict.

 

Yet to the frightened warrior this wider hope

is not enough.

 

For him or her,

there must be personal hope.

 

Hope that they will survive.

 

Hope that we will be left standing at the end.

 

In fact, the very hope

that Alan Wicker saw

turned to certainty

when he remarked

in his documentary –

“I doubt whether Venice

has ever been as lovely

or as happy

as in that summer

of 1945

when we were all enchanted just to be alive.”

 

Unfortunately to offer

such hope

of bodily survival

is not always possible.

 

And to do so unequivocally

is both to be a fraud

and to devalue religion.

 

Rather as Christians

we must give something

more profound.

 

For as a current army chaplain relates:

 

 

“Soldiers for all their profanity at times

seem to have a deep awareness of the sacred

and many are searching

for a sense of meaning

and purpose in life.

 

On one occasion

I was woken at 3am

to catch a helicopter flight

into Basra City.

I arrived still half asleep

at the reception area

and received the safety brief.

 

After the brief

the young serviceman said, “Everyone outside

apart from the Padre.”

 

I wondered what was going on, but after the room cleared

the young man said,

“Are you a Christian

or a Catholic?”

I tried to enlighten him

that Catholics

were Christians

but that

I was in fact C of E.

 

The conversation continued and what he wanted was someone to pray for him

and his fiancée

and all that they were facing

at this time.

 

We stood and prayed together and then several minutes later

I sat

somewhat bemused, surrounded by soldiers, listening to the thundering

of the rotor blades,

as the helicopter

swooped low over the city

with the tail gunner

keeping lookout,

thinking what an amazing privilege this ministry is.”

 

Here then is probably

the greater role

that religion play

in time of war.

 

It is also certainly

the aim of every Christian caught up in fear,

disaster and tragedy.

 

And it is help connect

the promise of God

with the awfulness

of the moment.

 

It is to show

that we believe

God will redeem

your personal situation

no matter

how impossible it seems.

 

 Put more directly,

it is to demonstrate

that is we are all

in God’s hands

and he will never

let one of us go.

 

And it is strangely

in that spirit

of this eternal soul

that

Marshall of the royal Air Force Arthur Harris

wrote in Guy Gibson’s account of the dam raid.

 

For, thinking

of the eventual deaths

of Gibson

and many of his compatriots, he said –

if there is a Valhalla,

Guy Gibson

and his band of brothers

will be found there

at all the parties,

seated far above the salt.

 

 

 

During February

in Helmand Province,

a Royal Marine

jumped on a hand grenade

to save the lives

of three comrades.

 

The grenade was part

of a Taliban booby trap

which he had

inadvertently triggered.  

 

 

Lance Corporal Matthew Croucher

had less than seven seconds

to make up his mind

about whether

to risk sacrificing his own life

to save his friends.

 

Without hesitation

he chose to save his friends.

 

“It was a case of either

having four of us as fatalities

or one,”

he said after the incident.

 

“I thought

I’ve set the bleep thing off

and I’m going to do

whatever it takes

to protect the others.”

 

The newspaper reporting

that Matthew

had been awarded

the military cross

was headlined –

ordinary people

called to do

extraordinary things.

 

 

Well today

we may be ordinary people called

to do extraordinary things.

 

We might be required

to offer comfort,

hope and God’s promise

when someone is in danger.

 

Worse still we may have to have that religious duty courage

when we ourselves

are threatened.

 

Yet we can do no less.

 

For, we are indebted

to the self-sacrifice

for our freedom

in past wars.  

 

We are mandated

to valour

by the courage of so many

at this moment.

 

And we are inspired

to such faith witness

by the promise of Christ –

the personal life saver

who died,

who rose

and who will come again.

 

Let us then go out

now as Christians

to make a better tomorrow; that very tomorrow

for which

they gave their today.

 

 

 

Amen

 

Offering

 

HYMN…………….