St. Luke’s in the Meadow Episcopal Church
6 Easter – May 25, 2025 – Memorial Day
Acts 16:9-15; Psalm 67; Revelation 21:10, 22-22:5; John 14:23-29
Homily preached by the Rev. Canon Linda S. Taylor
During my senior year in high school, I was a member of Junior Achievement. According to their website, it’s an international NGO dedicated to educating students about workforce readiness, entrepreneurship and financial literacy through experiential, hands-on programs.
I didn’t know all that when I was a member. I have no idea how I even learned about the organization—maybe an announcement at school. What I remember is showing up for the weekly meetings, getting to know the other kids in my assigned group and being mentored by volunteer businessmen—yes, men only—through a process of deciding on a product, building a budget, learning to use the power tools, then trying to sell our product in every venue imaginable. Our product, by the way, was a large key-shaped plywood key-holder. In all truth and with some charity, I have to say it was not a handsome creation, and I am grateful to all those family and friends who plunked down $2.50 to buy one. I don’t think I ever saw any of them in actual use. The Junior Achievement moment that stands out most clearly in my memory occurred during the keynote speech at a regional multistate conference attended by about a thousand students and sponsors. The speaker was a representative of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Really.
The moment I remember was a question that has been with me at some level or another since that day. I have no idea what the lead-up was or where the speech went afterward. All I remember was the speaker asking: “If we had lost the war in Korea, would you think that we were at peace?” As we consider this question, it’s helpful to remember that the Cold War was the context for this man’s remarks. It’s also helpful to notice what his question accomplished. First, it established that we had indeed won the war—which was not the opinion of Syngman Rhee, the president of South Korea who refused to sign the armistice agreement because his goal of reunification had not been met. Second, it framed winning—getting one’s way—as the true foundation for peace. Third, it implied that conflict resolution is a zero-sum game—that conflict can only lead to a situation where there is a winner and a loser.
Jesus said, “Peace I leave you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.”
When we think of peace, all kinds of pictures come to our minds. Many of us think of peace as an absence of strife—and absence of disruption—perhaps as a quiet, empty sort of space that lets us have room to think or dream or imagine. We think of peaceful places as those serene spots—particularly in nature—where we can rest our souls and catch our breaths. Jesus spoke of shalom, the ancient Hebrew concept of God’s peace brought to earth.
Shalom describes a different peace than the world knew in Jesus’ time. This is not the Roman peace—the Pax Romana—enforced by soldiers in the street, soldiers ready to put down any disturbance that threatened to mar the quiet surface of the well-regulated life. Shalom is not a fragile, superficial peace bought with the threat of the sword but a sturdy, viable peace built from roots of justice. Jesus brought us the gift of peace, but it’s a gift with a catch: we have to build it ourselves. Unlike the other build-it-yourself gifts we may have experienced in our lives, this gift comes with instructions. We begin to build shalom—God’s peace—by working to keep Jesus’ word—to keep his commandment to love—to show that love by our actions in every day of our lives.
Tomorrow is Memorial Day. As I’ve reflected on those women and men who have given their lives in hope of creating peace, I’ve realized how much war has touched our lives. I—in company with many of you—was born during World War II. 407,316 US military were killed in that war. I remember hearing that the war in Korea was over. An estimated 36,574 US military were killed—8000 were and are still missing. I remember the long war in Viet Nam. I volunteered on Friday nights in the USO at SeaTac Airport. Troop carriers brought soldiers home from Viet Nam on those nights and took new soldiers to war the next morning. Most of them were teenagers. 58,220 of them were killed. During the Persian Gulf War—Operation Desert Storm—383 US military were killed. During Operation Enduring Freedom (Afghanistan) 2349 were killed. In Operation Iraqi Freedom 4418 were killed. In Operation New Dawn, 74 were killed. And in Operation Inherent Resolve—still continuing since 2014—96 US military have been killed.
Back in 2004, my church in California wanted to recognize those who were dying in the Gulf wars. We posted a list of their names, but our administrator also found a list that contained pictures, ages, and the situation in which the person lost his or her life. She spent a Saturday morning of her free time to cut those little pieces of paper apart – all 909 of them – and we placed them in an offering basin so that we could all select a little piece of paper and hold those people and their families in prayer. At the end of that day, there were about 100 names still in the basin, and we continued to add names as the casualties were posted.
The piece of paper I selected had a picture of PFC Stuart W. Moore. He was a member of the 2nd Battalion, 3rd Artillery Regiment, 1st Armored Division. His hometown was Livingston, Texas. He was 21 when he was killed. An improvised explosive device hit his convoy in Baghdad on December 22, 2003. I kept his picture in my prayer book, thought about him and wondered about him and prayed about him. I assumed I would never know anything about him, but I was wrong.
In late March of 2006, I received an email from Stuart’s mother, Pam Moore. She wrote that she often visits a web site called “Fallen Heroes” to see if anyone has posted any new messages for their family and to see if there is any more information that they have missed regarding their son, Stuart. One night her search turned up my sermon from May 30, 2004—the Memorial Day when we distributed the names and in which I spoke of Stuart. She wrote: “I assume that since you held in your hand the little piece of paper with Stuart’s name on it, you might have kept it for your own instructions or maybe someone else took his name to pray for our family. Let me first thank you for remembering our son and asking your congregation to pray for the families. We would never have come this far if it hadn’t been for our friends, our church family and kind Americans praying for us. I can not even imagine how a family of a fallen soldier could ever work through the pain and suffering without faith in our Lord. The thought of spending eternity with our Lord and seeing our son again gives us hope.”
Then she wrote a little more about Stuart, so that I would have a connection with this young man
for whom I have prayed. I want to share her writing with you, so that Stuart is more than a name and a number for all of us.
“Stuart’s nickname was ‘Nubb’. He lost part of his trigger finger in an accident when supposedly splitting firewood with a hydraulic log splitter while working for his dad. After his death, some of his best buddies came by the house and fessed up because Stuart had made them promise to keep quiet. The real story is that he was trying to see how far he could hydraulically press a large bolt into a piece of firewood! Therefore, he got the nickname “Nubb”. He even painted his nickname on the back of his tailgate on his truck. Living in a small community, everyone saw his nickname. He was afraid the US Army would not accept him – but they did and he was beaming with pride when he announced to us that he decided to enlist.
Stuart loved to rock climb and in one of his last letters to us, he mentioned he wanted to return home after the war and go to work for his dad in our construction company and open an indoor rock climbing gym. But upon his death, we knew there would be lots of money wasted on plants and flowers so we set up an account at our church, First United Methodist Church of Livingston and our bank and we received enough money to build a 40′ Climbing Tower with a 306′ zip line on our church’s property so we could share Stuart’s love of climbing with others. As a matter of fact, we are about to have the 2nd Annual Freedom Climb Sunday on April 23. We do this on the
Sunday closest to Stuart’s birthday. We invite the community to come climb and eat hamburgers and hotdogs for free. Like an old “Country Picnic”. We thought this would be a good way to encourage the unchurched to come and see that Christian Fellowship can be a lot of fun!”
Pam Moore and I have kept in touch. I’m not sure when the Freedom Climbs stopped happening, but I know that Pam and Dennis were hospitalized with Covid, which has changed so much in our lives. I’m hoping that this might be the year when I finally make it to Livingston to meet them and hear more stories about Stuart.
I have no pieces of paper to offer you this morning, but as you come to the altar this morning to receive communion, I ask you to remember Stuart and his family – to hold as best you can all the men and women who have died and all the families who mourn them. I ask that you pray for those whose names don’t appear on our websites or in our news – the people of ongoing wars throughout the world – the tens of thousands who have died and all those who mourn. I ask that you pray for an end to war and work for the coming of peace to this world.
In my work in chaplaincy at the VA and in other parts of my life, I’ve learned that war is never over. I have listened to the stories of men who are still living out their experience of World War II. War is never over. War is never finished, even when those who have been part of it are home again.
We can never adequately honor those who have given all they have to give. We can never adequately thank those who lives have been ravaged by the horror of war. We can never adequately thank those whose lives have been torn apart by the loss of a loved one. What we can do is live in such a way that no one else will ever have to pay such a price.
Jesus said, “Peace I leave you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.”