Friday 11.11.11 Veterans day and I sit here with a tie around my neck...

that is not my usual outfit. IN fact it rarely is an outfit at all for me with the exception of funerals, weddings and graduations. But today is an exception, it is Veterans Day and I had a small part in the annual program at the Effingham Veterans Park here in Springfield. So, I donned the tie and coat (I should have added sweater, overcoat etc. It was cold with the wind at the park) to fit in with others on the program.

Isn’t that funny that we dress up for ceremonies that remember or sanctify (set aside) actions that were anything but pretty or dressed up. War is a dirty messy business. Soldiers and sailors are not pretty in combat. They are often dressed in dirty, bloody, stinking clothes having not bathed in days or weeks because of their duty, the call to combat. Yet because of their enduring of filth and grim I can wear a tie to an event to honor their service.

The veterans were in the clothes of their service today, hats marking the conflict of their service, uniforms from active duty now or in the past, medals commending service above and beyond the call of duty proudly worn on coat lapels all clean and proud and nice for the unimaginable. The color guard was dressed in uniform and ceremony for the flag of our country the clean symbol standing out of brutal conflict. We sang the national anthem with its text of a flag waving in the wind following a night of brutal bombardment yet still there. We remember but not dressed like it was.

In heaven the saints will found in white robes the symbol of purity and wholeness bought by the spilling of blood. Not unlike our Veterans Day remembrance ceremonies and parades, the redeemed, the free will be pretty and white and here the redeemers (veterans) too are dressed in their very best. Not so in heaven, the Redeemer, The Lamb, the Son of the Living God will be dressed in symbols marked by the sacrifice of the conflict.

¹³ He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is the Word of God.  Rev 19:13 NIV 1984

Blood that was his own in our place (Gal 3:13) that’s why our robes are white and his is blood stained. Recently a report made the national news of the oldest serving soldier who is in his 50’s. When asked why he was serving overseas he replied “So that a 19 year old doesn’t have to.” Why is Jesus dressed in a blood stained robe with scars on his hands and feet so we don’t have to.

Freedom has always come at a very high price. Usually blood stained the field and combatants so that others didn’t have to. To remember the sacrifice parades and memorials, ceremonies, uniforms and nice clothes are fine even a tie but not really enough are they? No, a sacrifice of that kind of price demands a life lived in the freedom that was purchased. A life lived with utter commitment and devotion to the one who gave his all.

Freedom is free but not cheap.