Welcome to November, which seems to be the month for remembering. We observe All Saints Day, Remembrance Sunday, The Sunday of Christ the King, and the First Sunday of Advent this month.
For all of us, November is a chance to remember with thankfulness those whom we have influenced our lives towards faith in Christ, in all saints. Lets us remember Christ as King of the universe, and over our lives, also the first advent when God came to live among us in Jesus Christ.
And, of course, there is also our national act of Remembrance-on-Remembrance Sunday.
As the mother of two sons who served in the Royal Marines and two tours in the Iraqi war, I never fail to be moved as I see poppies displayed in Churches and on cenotaphs, which brings me great pride in my son’s courage and commitment to their country. However, it also brought feelings of dread in me, and an uncertain future for them.
Remembrance is more poignant in our own day as the reality of war and its human cost is again apparent. There will be services at war memorials and churches across the UK. Let’s remember those who died fighting to protect us and bring peace and justice to our world, and we pray for those serving in our Armed Forces today.
Memories and remembering are central parts of our personalities and character and, in many ways, makeup part of who we are. So being remembered is very important to us, and the thought that we might be forgotten can be heart-breaking.
I often read these verses from Isaiah to people who are feeling lost and abandoned for any reason or who are grieving the passing of years, which means that all those whom they knew and loved and who held the memories of them as younger people have died:
God says, “‘Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you! See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands.” (Isaiah 49:15-16a)
For believers and followers of Jesus Christ, the most significant act of remembering is when we come together to remember in bread and wine the death and resurrection of Jesus.
Jesus was willing to sacrifice himself on the cross to conquer the power of sin, which is eternal death – on our behalf. For Christian believers, the ultimate expression of self-giving love at the heart of God is when Christ’s hands were marked by the nails of the cross for our freedom.
“Do this in remembrance of me.”
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?Paula Rose Parish?
