For the 50th
Anniversary Commemoration of the Liberation of The Netherlands by
Canadian Armed Forces, I was invited by the organizing committee for
the Remembrance Day ceremonies in Taber, Alberta, to give the main
address. I was assigned a text, 1 Timothy 2:1-6.
As this
commemoration has, these last days, again been on our minds, I
thought I would publish it here:
Remembrance
Day
November 11,
1995
Taber,
Alberta
Soli Deo
Gloria
Scripture: 1
Timothy 2:1-6
First
of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and
thanksgivings be made for all people, for
kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful
and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This
is good, and it is pleasing in the sight of God our
Savior, who
desires all people to be saved and to come to the
knowledge of the truth. For there
is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the
man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all, which
is the testimony given at the proper time.
------------------------------------
Mr. Mayor, Honoured
Veterans, Ladies and Gentlemen:
In the passage
of scripture which was read, the apostle Paul said that we are to
pray for those in high positions (kings and governors) so that we may
lead a quiet and peaceable life, godly and respectful in every way.
God's people are to pray that the rulers of the country may achieve
conditions of peace and security, so that the church of Christ may be
enabled to pursue a godly and holy life. Paul tells the church to
pray that it may have room. That it may have space in society to
live, to function, to be a light in a dark world.
Fifty-five
years ago, the people of God in Europe were, to a great extent,
denied this space. By the summer of 1942, 400 million people in
Europe lay under the yoke of Adolf Hitler and the godless principles
of National Socialism. Hitler's empire stretched from the Arctic to
the Mediterranean, from the English Channel to the Black Sea.
Hitler's partner, Mussolini, had been reduced to the role of a
puppet. In the ancient capitals of Europe—in Athens, Rome and
Vienna, in Paris and Prague, Oslo and Warsaw—all voices were
drowned by the voice of Nazi Germany. Hitler's panzer armies were
within striking distance of the Nile River. His U-boats had carried
his offensive to the Atlantic coast of North America and into the
Caribbean. He seemed to be unstoppable. By the summer of 1942, he had
been denied victory only in the sky above London and in the snow
outside Moscow.
Those of you
who lived in Europe at that time will remember what it was like to
live under a regime which denied your most cherished values. Hitler's
goal was to establish a world empire. To attain that goal, he formed
Europe into a fortress. A fortress from which he could continue to
conquer east and west. He was seeking
room to live. A word was coined to describe this search for
room—Lebensraum! Room for his followers. Space for his
antichristian principles and policies.
And if his
followers and his principles needed room and took up space, there was
then no room nor space for those who opposed him. Already in Nazi
Germany, the church had been largely silenced. In 1933, Protestants
who supported Hitler seized control of the key positions of power in
the national church. The national church fell silent in the face of
the persecution of the Jews and the systematic massacre of the death
camps. And that part of the church which, under the courageous
leadership of men such as Dietrich Bonhoeffer, continued to confess
the truth of the gospel and spoke against the anti-Semitism and other
Nazi policies embraced by the church became marked men. Many who
spoke against Hitler and the hypocrisy of the National Church ended
up in the death camps.
The oppressive
policies of Hitler and Nazism suffocated true Christian freedom in
other countries as well. My parents who were young adults in the
Netherlands during the war told us children about this oppression.
My paternal grandfather died in a death
camp—Sachsenhausen—because he dared to speak against Nazi
oppression. One of my seminary professors who was a young minister in
Holland during the war remembers the secret police sitting in church
on Sundays to hear what he had to say in his sermons. To see if he
would say anything subversive.
Because of this
oppression—because of the Nazi craving for more Lebensraum—others
were no longer granted room. The room to lead quiet and peaceable
lives (as spoken of by the apostle Paul) became very closed in.
But then God
answered the prayers of his people. The Lord Jesus Christ, the
eternal Son of God, sitting in majesty at the right hand of God the
Father—the Lord Jesus Christ, he who controls the ebb and flow of
history, who raises nations up and sends them crashing to the
earth—he raised up liberators. God's people prayed for freedom and
for space to worship him according to his word. And God answered
their prayers.
He used the
Allied forces to push back Hitler's armies. He used many Canadian
soldiers to liberate Holland. First the south in Sept. of 1944. And
then the north in May of 1945. Fifty years ago, Holland fell in love
with Canada. And as we could see so powerfully this past May,
Holland's heart still throbs for Canada—for the sacrifice of so
many young soldiers in liberating Holland from oppression and
suffocation. My parents told me that May 5th, 1945, stands out as the
happiest day of their lives. For it was on May 5th, 1945, that a
Canadian Lieutenant-General dictated the terms of surrender to his
Nazi counterpart and Holland was liberated. And on that day, the
Canadians, the liberators, rolled through the streets of their city
in victory.
Today, as a
Canadian, born of Dutch immigrants, who has heard the stories about
the war and about the Canadian effort to free the Netherlands, I
salute the men and women of this community who gave of themselves to
work for liberation. We salute all the men and women who so
unselfishly sacrificed themselves, often to the point of death, in
the two World Wars and the Korean war to set an oppressed people
free. We wear our poppies. We will not forget those who gave their
lives so that others could live and breathe and move.
But I also
salute the Lord Jesus Christ, the King of kings and Lord of lords.
For he, seated at the right hand of his Father, has been given all
power and authority in heaven and on earth. He holds the reins of
history in his hands. He is bringing history to its God-ordained
conclusion. As he does this work, he raises nations up and pushes
them down. And as he does so, he keeps his eye firmly focused upon
his people, his church. In some periods of history, now here, then
there, he, in his perfect wisdom, allows his people to be hemmed in
by oppressive overlords and ungodly principles and policies. But
then, at other times, he gives his people room to live, to serve, to
worship, to breathe.
We remember
those lying in Flanders Fields and in unmarked graves. But let us
also remember Jesus Christ, the King of kings, the Lord of heaven and
earth who rules history according to his sovereign power and wisdom.
