Daily devotion – Remembrance Day
John 15:13 “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends.”
Remembrance Day falls on the 11th of November each year.
On the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month, a minutes’ silence is observed and dedicated to those soldiers who died fighting to protect the nation.
In Australia and other allied countries, including New Zealand, Canada and the United States, 11 November became known as Armistice Day – a day to remember those who died in World War One. The day continues to be commemorated in allied countries.
After World War Two, the Australian Government agreed to the United Kingdom’s proposal that Armistice Day be renamed Remembrance Day to commemorate those who were killed in both World Wars. Today the loss of Australian lives from all wars and conflicts is commemorated on Remembrance Day.
What is the origin of Remembrance Day?
11 November is universally associated with the remembrance of those who had died in the First World War. This conflict had mobilised over 70 million people and left between nine and 13 million dead and as many as one third of these with no grave. The allied nations chose this day and time for the commemoration of their war dead.
At 11 am on 11 November 1918, the guns on the Western Front fell silent after more than four years of continuous warfare. The allied armies had driven the German invaders back, having inflicted heavy defeats upon them over the preceding four months.
The First World War had a devastating impact on Australia. In 1914 the male population of Australia was less than 3 million, yet almost 400, 000 of them volunteered to fight in the war. As many as 60 000 died and tens of thousands more were wounded. In 1939 Australia with a population of just 6.9 million people, 40,000 young Australians made the ultimate sacrifice in WW 11 with another 40,000 wounded.
Australian war dead of the First and Second World Wars total 102,256.
WW2 – a young Aussie Digger wrote, “I prayed a lot, I believe in prayer. I knew my parents and grandparents were praying for me so that helped me lot. And of course, I had my mates. When you have good friends, good mates, you don’t leave them. It was a brotherhood. We got a message from Port Moresby that . . . we had to stay there and fight to the death. That was horrifying. I thought, ‘Well, I won’t see my family again, I won’t see Australia again.’ But I was prepared, like the rest of us, to stay there and fight to the finish.”
Let us not forget!