Lest we forget
On ANZAC Day I went to the dawn ceremony at the foot of the Australian War Memorial in Canberra. From the early hours of the morning, the crowd had been steadily growing, the mass of dark faces punctuated by pinpoints of candlelight. We stood and sang hymns we didn't know very well, listened quietly to various ceremonial niceties (musical and unmusical), reverentially observed the one minute silence and gave our attention to the Right Reverend Dr Tom Frame's address.
He quoted Psalm 112:6:
For the righteous will never be moved;
he will be remembered forever.
and said that the ANZAC legend proved that the righteous will be remembered throughout the ages and that, in another hundred years, people would still be gathering in this place to remember the lives that were lost and the sacrifice that was made.
Unfortunately nothing was said about Jesus who confers his righteousness upon us. And I doubt, because of Romans 3:10-12, that the ANZACs were truly righteous. How sad that we remember as righteous those who were not, but the one—indeed, the only one—who was, we remember not at all.
However, thankfully for us, the Lord is not so fickle nor his memory so short.
(Listen to the dawn service and view the program. (PDF))