Stewards of Their Sacrifice

Four brothers went to war—World War 2. Their names were Alfred, John, George, and Henry. As of last month, the last one (George) entered heaven’s gates at 95 years old.  They were my uncles, my father’s older brothers.

Only three brothers came home from the war. Henry J. Schaal sacrificed his life in the service of his country in the Hurtgen Forest on November 5, 1944. He was only 20 years old. He never married, never had children, never watched them grow or gave them in marriage. He never held his grandchildren in his arms. He never saw the country he helped to save.

I remember my uncles growling to one another over the waste. They believed the battle that cost their brother’s life was wholly unnecessary in the overall effort to win the war. It was the most disastrous US effort of World War 2, ending with at least 33,000 US casualties and the complete failure of its intended mission. It is one of the painful realities of war–lives lost in failure. But that does not diminish his sacrifice. He gave up life and all its opportunities, so that we might enjoy the opportunities of freedom.

I am reminded on this Memorial Day of the great cost of our freedom. Henry J. Schaal and hundreds of thousands of others have given their lives so that we might live free.

I cringe when I hear that they died to preserve our American way of life. The present day American way of life—well, I am not sure that is worth saving. But the freedoms that we still enjoy, the opportunities that those freedoms afford, those are valuable indeed. The greatest failure would be for us to squander the freedoms so selflessly won for us by wasting them on sinful, selfish, and self-indulgent living. Our freedoms are a stewardship, afforded us by providential hand God Himself. Memorial Day must be a reminder to use those freedoms for His glory. They are more precious than gold and they must not be wasted.

Ronald Reagan expressed this idea in a Memorial Day message at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier on May 31, 1982.

“Yet, we must try to honor them — not for their sake’s alone, but for our own. And if words cannot repay the debt we owe these men, surely with our actions we must strive to keep faith with them and with the vision that led them to battle and to final sacrifice.

“Our first obligation to them and ourselves is plain enough: The United States and the freedom for which it stands, the freedom for which they died, must endure and prosper. Their lives remind us that freedom is not bought cheaply. It has a cost; it imposes a burden. And just as they whom we commemorate were willing to sacrifice, so too must we — in a less final, less heroic way — be willing to give of ourselves.

But give of ourselves to what? We must give of ourselves to honor, to faithfulness, to protect the nation and the freedoms for which they died, to use those freedoms for the purposes for which they were intended. Our greatest privilege is to worship God freely and whole-heartedly. That worship must not just be a gathering on Sunday but our whole lives lived in deep dedication to our Savior in a country where such great sacrifices have been made so that we might do it freely.

No matter how they died, whether in glorious victory or horrible loss, the real power is in our hands to waste or make good on their sacrifice.  It is now our responsibility, our stewardship.