Today’s reading isn’t as famous as other parts of the Gospel of John, like …

John 1:1 (“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God …”)

or John 3:16 (“God so loved the world that he gave his only Son …”).

But it is part of a prayer Jesus prayed for his disciples,

and the YMCA uses part of the prayer on its seal,

asking “That all may be one” (v. 21).

It is a prayer for unity and harmony among God’s people.

Memorial Day has been around since the end of the Civil War.

At first, it was called Decoration Day, reminding people to strew flowers and otherwise “decorate” the graves of soldiers, sailors and marines who died in battle. Sadly, in those early days, it didn’t include all American troops who perished, but only those from the victorious northern army. The defeated southern troops and their families were ignored.

And flowers were just part of the day. General John A. Logan, who issued the original Decoration Day orders, had several larger goals in mind:

To show that we haven’t forgotten “the cost of a free and undivided republic”;

To express “the Nation’s gratitude” for those who gave their lives; and

To renew our “pledge to aid and assist … the … widow and orphan” of war.

General Logan’s proclamation to that effect came on May 30, 1868 – 141 years ago. Yet an earlier celebration (if we can call it that) took place unofficially three years prior – in 1865 as the War was ending … in the heart of Dixie … without official proclamation … and carried out by a band of newly liberated slaves (which helps explain why it was long ignored). Those ex-slaves – in Charleston, SC, near where the War began – moved the remains of Union soldiers from a mass grave to individual plots, and later returned to decorate each grave with flowers. Quite daring for that time and place, and those men, if you ask me.

Nowadays, for many people there’s not much daring or significant about the holiday. It simply marks the start of summer, time to open the cottage, work in the garden, have a cookout, or watch the Indy 500.

If that makes it sound less than it once was, it has become more in some respects. By the end of World War I, Memorial Day not only included Union soldiers, but Southerners … and those who died in other armed conflicts too. More recently, members of police and fire departments who lost their lives in the line of duty have been memorialized as well during this weekend.

It is fitting that we bear tribute to them all, not only with flowers, but in all the ways General Logan proclaimed: remembering the cost, expressing our thanks, and caring for the families they left behind.

Yet because we are church people, there’s even more than that for us to do this holiday weekend. As we join a grateful nation in remembering those who died to protect freedom and preserve the powerless, we also listen to Jesus as he prays.

That prayer is extraordinary and complex. But if we listen carefully we will hear a minimum of three things that are significant today.

First, as we remember those who gave their lives for our nation, we will hear Jesus ask God to protect all people who live in a hostile world. “I am no longer in the world,” he says, “but they are in the world. Holy Father, protect them in your name” (v. 11a,b).

Second, as we are mindful of the divisions that lead to war, we will hear Jesus pray for his Church to stand for unity and community, asking “that they may be one, as we are one” (v. 11c). The same oneness that exists between God and Jesus is to be reflected in and among Christ’s followers, regardless of what is happening in the world around us.

Finally, when we listen to his prayer, we hear Jesus ask God to set us apart from the world – not for us to ignore the world, but so that we might not be caught up in the violence, hate, and the injustice that undergirds war. Jesus does not pray that we will retreat into the turtle shell of our church buildings, but that God will send us to display God’s peace to the world. The Bible’s word for that setting-apart and sending is “sanctification.” Jesus prays for his people to be sanctified “ in the truth” as they are “sent … into the world.”

Listen again. On this Memorial weekend, as we remember our war dead, Jesus prays …

·         for people living in a hostile world to be protected;

·         for unity and community within the church; and

·         for us to live apart from the world’s sinfulness, but connected to the world in ways that show God’s love.

Jesus prays us into a new day, in other words, when there is no more violence or killing or war … and when the sacrifices of countless soldiers will not have been in vain.

Psalm 46, our Old Testament reading, is similar, for it too invites and envisions God’s promise of global peace.

We do not know exactly what year it was written. But that doesn’t matter, for we know it came into being at a time much like our own, a time when “the nations are in an uproar, [and] kingdoms totter.” So it could be almost any year.

Yet in that dangerous setting, the poet offers hope, affirming that God is “our refuge and strength,” with the ability to “make wars cease to the ends of the earth.” The ways of war will not always exist, the psalmist says, and the deaths of sons and daughters, wives and husbands dressed in battle fatigues will finally come to an end, as surely as God “breaks the bow and shatters the spear; [and] burns the shield.”

The psalm isn’t just saying that God wants us to stop fighting – though that in itself is a worthy goal. On a larger scale, it is calling us to remember who has charge of our lives – whether we live or die – and who is trustworthy to provide what we need.

In short, it calls us to “be still” (meaning, stop fighting) and “know that I am God.”

Now, as I was working on this psalm, I began to wonder if King David wrote this psalm. After all, he wrote a lot of psalms. And he was a warrior – a soldier through and through. He killed Goliath, led armies to victory, and greatly expanded the power, wealth and size of the nation. Could such a man have been the author of a psalm that speaks so eloquently about peace?

When I turned back to the Bible to check, I found that he was not. Instead, the caption at the start of Psalm 46 attributes it to “the leader. Of the Korahites.”

… Which made for another mystery. What (or who) is a Korahite? I looked them up in my Bible dictionary. And I found out that Korah was a fighter, who led a revolt against Moses in Numbers 16. (I bet you already knew that!)

Korah was a violent man. But, the sons of Korah – i.e., the Korahites – opposed what their father was doing, and repented of his behavior. They were not fighters.

That seems like a good place for me to leave things on this Memorial Day weekend.

When we do as Jesus and the Korahites pray for us to do, we not only honor fallen soldiers, but we also “know God.” We not only strew flowers on graves, but we glimpse the vision awaits those fallen heroes – a vision that is truer and nobler than what we ourselves now see.

We come to trust God’s protection as well, not fearing any earthly power even as we continue to live in this hostile world,

We reflect the unity and community of God and Jesus Christ, reminding us that arms that embrace will enter the kingdom of heaven, where military arms do not.

We reveal God’s loving, life-giving power for the world, including the widows and orphans of war, so that their ranks do not continue to swell, and so that they do not have to sacrifice health care or other opportunities.

Not least, as we heed the prayers of Jesus and the Korahites, it is not just this weekend, but we ourselves who become a vivid memorial that those who gave themselves for the life and liberty of others shall not have died in vain.

What a prayer! May it come not only from Jesus or the offspring of Korah, but from our lips and hearts as well. And may it be fulfilled in our lifetimes.