ANZAC DAY OR ACCEPTABLE COMMEMORATIVE EVENT - and  CHRISTIAN USAGE.

GREAT LAND OF THE HOLY SPIRIT. The world has usurped stirring memories of sacrifices, having featured marches, services even national football events launched in almost sacred atmosphere. They have seized this significant day.

Christian church dismissed or miscalculated the potential of Anzac Day for proclamation of Christ and His atoning sacrifice.

In Adelaide, 5000 attended   the dawn service at the Cross of Sacrifice.  Many at Naracoorte for dawn service, with young people predominant, reading prayers, historic hymns - familiar during those years- Last Post ( death of a day ) and Reveille ( wakening to a new day ) typified His death and resurrection.

Gallipoli   6,000 Australian and 2,000 New Zealand men sacrificed themselves.   Thousands of young people attend annually on Turkish soil. Gripped by the heroism, acceptance of horrifying,, subhuman   circumstances. Courage, pride and tears dominant.   Prayer, messages, laying of wreaths.   and hymns . A national opportunity for our Lord should   be covered in prevailing prayer.    Our own church silent on such a national remembrance day.

Villers Brettanoux France two years later where 60,000 Australians died ( population of 5 million )  City has not forgotten 90 years’ history.   City saved.    Nazis repelled.   Turning point in war.

These sacrifices guaranteed our freedoms to worship without ungodly challenging: to preach Christ freely: to freely read the word of God; not as in Saudi Arabia, who forbid reading our precious Bible.

Coral Sea battle resulted after   Australian Government ceded control of Australia north of Brisbane, by Partitioning, and   surrendering part of Australia to the Japanese..   National disaster!    Who interceded with our God to reverse the outcome?    The blue sky over our hospital was covered with bombers - first use of radar ( British- invention ) in WWII.
 US navy overwhelmed enemy ships.
Every Japanese ship sunk   22 in all- appalling loss of life.

My prayer life in the jungle that night, asking    ‘Why?’    Ruth had just been born;  My Mother and grandmother and beloved wife and baby were spared.     Singapore had fallen, Indonesia subdued,   Europe over-run; God called me out of banking into medicine, and to serve in Indonesia.
Such momentous days recall memories during Anzac Day.

The discovery that the Nazi raider had sank the Sydney with 645 personnel aboard, galvanized me; I had passed through those waters to and from the Middle East.   They gave their lives, while our troopship had been   spared. The torpedoing of the hospital ship ‘Centaur’ outside the Sydney heads reminded me that our 2 nd Ninth Australian General Hospital was contraband on the troop ship.
We were ordered to stay out of sight until well past the Sydney Harbour heads, lest we be identified.

I may be the sole survivor of our hospital of 250 personnel, and accommodation   for 2000 patients, mostly carried out from the Kokoda Trail in 1942, 43 by ‘fuzzy-wuzzy angels’.

Korean and Vietnamese Veterans may participate in such a service of remembrance.The most sacred national remembrance Day should be an opening for believers to present our   Lord Jesus Christ as our Redeemer, Reconciler and   Reigning Lord.

A service on the evening prior to the dawn service on Anzac Day will remind them of the sacrifices to preserve and secure our prevailing freedoms to serve the living God and proclaim his great salvation.

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