Anzac day 2025
Leaving aside your view on war, a just or unjust war, kill or be killed, turn the other cheek and go the extra mile, keeping your silence or speaking out, injury by one human-being towards another has not ceased since Genesis 4:1-10.
Now Cain said to his brother Abel, “Let’s go out to the field.” While they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him.
How that first death from the first war on earth was commemorated by those family left behind, we can only imagine.
But we know what God said:
Listen! Your brother’s blood cries out to me from the ground.
There is a cry from all those who have ever fallen…that is the blood of that person cries out…and for those who knew that person, they hear it, just as God hears the cry of every single person ever fallen. Military traditional in Australia includes a cry called the Last Post.
The bugle call Last Post is inextricably part of the end of day traditions which include Beating the Retreat and Tattoo.
Retreat is the older custom dating back to the 16th Century and consisting of prolonged drum beating at sunset to warn the night guard to mount and also to give notice that the gates of the town walls were about to close. This custom was also part of the end of day battle procedure when volleys were fired and a hymn played in honour of those who had fallen during the day. At this time of evening the colour would be trooped. Today this latter activity is replaced by the lowering of the National Flag.
There is some confusion over the ‘post’ calls. It seems that the ‘First Post’ and 'Last Post' came into being in the early part of the 19th Century. The ‘First Post’ was sounded as the orderly officer, the orderly sergeant and a drummer (with a bugle) started the Tattoo. They then marched from post to post with the drummer beating his drum. Upon reaching the final post the drummer would sound the Last Post. (This is why drummers carry a bugle.)
The Last Post was really the end of the day.
This bugle call has been passed down through the centuries in many countries of the world as an accompaniment to the impressive rites of a soldier’s farewell - the closing bars wail out their sad valediction to the departing warrior. (source: www.anzacday.org.au)
At the end of the battle day, there was an account - an account of who had fallen, and who remained. The fallen in battle take on something that can only really be understood in the forging heat of battle, when side by side, that person next to you dies, and you don’t.
I think we all can in part appreciate that death in uniform, death in battle is what gives friendship and mateship in war something of a family, a brotherhood. And this is because while we would all give our lives for our loved ones (we think) - who would die for a friend, let alone a stranger or nations interest?
We struggle to comprehend this.
For the majority who do not serve in a place where preparedness to give your life is part of the job, giving your life for a stranger, a friend - at the cost of your own family, your own plans and hopes…that is difficult to grasp. Somehow Anzac Day creates a way for us to momentarily reflect and appreciate this difficult to grasp this reality - helping us to develop perhaps gratitude, honour and respect for those who somehow find it in their heart to put their lives in the firing line for others.
Regardless of how a person arrived in the service of a country, regardless of the battle and reasons, when we stop and listen, a space can be created to hear the ‘cry of blood from the soil’. Today Anzac Day services continue to be well attended, and thought about. Even for a moment, we pause and reflect and think about death, suffering, the futility of war, the ceasefire war can bring, the toll on the average family surviving war, and desiring to survive the after effects of war. We think about the giving of one’s life to noble causes that happen everywhere all the time, but there is something more when that giving is total - the giving of one’s life.
That is hard. Jesus calls this love.
And that is why the blood in the soil cries out - and is heard by God. The Gospel of John reminds us of a greater love - to lay down ones life (John 15:13)
“I am the true grapevine, and my Father is the gardener. 2 He cuts off every branch of mine that doesn’t produce fruit, and he prunes the branches that do bear fruit so they will produce even more. 3 You have already been pruned and purified by the message I have given you. 4 Remain in me, and I will remain in you. For a branch cannot produce fruit if it is severed from the vine, and you cannot be fruitful unless you remain in me. 5 “Yes, I am the vine; you are the branches. Those who remain in me, and I in them, will produce much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing. 6 Anyone who does not remain in me is thrown away like a useless branch and withers. Such branches are gathered into a pile to be burned. 7 But if you remain in me and my words remain in you, you may ask for anything you want, and it will be granted! 8 When you produce much fruit, you are my true disciples. This brings great glory to my Father. 9 “I have loved you even as the Father has loved me. Remain in my love. 10 When you obey my commandments, you remain in my love, just as I obey my Father’s commandments and remain in his love. 11 I have told you these things so that you will be filled with my joy. Yes, your joy will overflow! 12 This is my commandment: Love each other in the same way I have loved you. 13 There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. 14 You are my friends if you do what I command. 15 I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me. 16 You didn’t choose me. I chose you. I appointed you to go and produce lasting fruit, so that the Father will give you whatever you ask for, using my name. 17 This is my command: Love each other. 18 “If the world hates you, remember that it hated me first. (John 15)
On Anzac Day, take a moment and think about the idea of love and the practice of love which at its greatest, is giving your life for one’s friend. Jesus described death for a friend as the path He was taking, that He would give up His life for us, who He calls friends. Such is worth our attention, our gratitude and our belief. And that is why a commemoration like Anzac Day will continue to speak to those who live - the notion of no greater love - because life is given.
The world hates, and wars continue, and blood in the ground will continue to cry out to God. And so does the blood of Jesus, it continues to testify of the love of God for those would receive Jesus as friend. Jesus says remain in my love and this love has resurrecting power, power to recover from any death, from any terrible circumstance and atrocity. We are invited to remain in the love of Christ who is no longer in the grave, a proven life giving love that cost His life - giving meaning to the cliché - die to live!
May we remember those who died that we might live.
May we somehow determine to love one another in the same way Jesus loves us.
May we appreciate those who serve in vocations where at any time, they may be called upon to give up their own lives.
And may we think about Jesus and 1 John 4:7-10, the author of love who gives meaning and context to blood in the soil that cries out to God:
Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.