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LONG RED LINEFritz Berggren, Ph.D.
by
Fritz Berggren
A book called the Long Gray Line tells the story of the West Point class of 1966; in the telling, it also tells the story of the two hundred years of service to this country by the United States Army. The book is a tribute to the men, and now the women, who for two centuries have pledges their lives, their fortunes, and their honor for the defense of this great republic. THE LONG GREY LINE
There would be no United States of America without a United States Army. America was birthed in war. It was the US Army alone that defeated the British in land battles. And it was the defeat of the British Army that gave the United States independence. America passed through adolescence in the Civil war.
The United States Army determined that we were One Nation with No Slavery. Those nameless soldiers who died are owed a great Thank You for the Abolition of slavery.The United States reached adulthood in the Twentieth Century through two world wars and has taken it's place at the forefront of the nations through war. Twice it defended France and England from German aggression and held the line of Soviet expansionism after World War Two.
So much is owed to those who served and sacrificed for two centuries. Those who did not fight will never know the cost of freedom. Those who died will never know the benefits of freedom.
During the time of the American Revolution, about one third of the colonists supported the rebellion against Britain. About one third opposed it. And about one third didn't want to be bothered either way. The first third supplied the soldiers who fought in the war.
Some five thousands men died so the others could live in freedom.The two-thirds who refused to support the war enjoyed the blessings of independence. Who is greater? The farmer who didn't fight in the war? Or the un-named private who gave his life so that farmer could live in an independent America?
620,000 soldiers were killed in the Civil War. Over half of these were from the Northern Army, under Lincoln's command. Freedom for the Slaves was purchased with the blood of those soldiers. So who is greater, the slave who gained his freedom? Or, the corporal from Connecticut who died on the field of Manassas, Virginia?
In the First World War, thousands of marines stormed trench lines in France to push back the Germans. Today they have no heirs, no offspring, no children, and no name. In the history of France who is greater, the man who fought and died so there would be a France? Or the Frenchman who survived the conflict?
In the Second World War some of your parents and grandparents fought. Many died. Many lost limbs. Who is greater - those who remain and have a legacy of children and grandchildren? Or those who paid the ultimate price for freedom - unknown, unnamed, not even old enough to have their own families when they died on the shores of a Pacific Island or a mountainside in Italy?
This unbroken line, this long gray line, stretches back over the generations and has been there to make this nation what it is.
ANOTHER ARMY Yet, there is another nation, an older people, a more formidable host than the United States Army.
For two thousand years an Army of Believers has served the Gospel of Jesus Christ. With their lives, their fortunes, and their honor, they have delivered the message of salvation and the benefits of Christian freedom to a lost world.
Year after year, century after century there have been those few who would stand and pass on their sacred faith to the next generation. This army is made of preachers and pastors, teachers and deacons, Sunday school leaders and ushers, the young, the old, the single, the poor, the rich, the married, the childless, the tithers. These faithful soldiers, mostly unnamed privates, stand apart from those who have sought refuge in the comfort of non-involvement.
It was the same in the Revolutionary War. Some came forward to serve, some stayed silent, and some opposed.
Those who fought and served are greater than those who, for comfort's sake, let others bear the burden.It is an honor to serve in a local church and those not present with their regiment or platoon are AWOL. Those who, for selfish reasons, refuse do dirty themselves with the trials and rigors and sacrifices of regular duty are absent without leave.
It is that little local church, whether in Oregon or Oklahoma, Miami or Minneapolis, America or Armenia, whether Baptist or Pentecostal, black or Korean, Charismatic or Presbyterian, that faithfully represents the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the world.
This organized regiment preaches to the public several times per week.
The contributions of tithers create the physical means to invite the community to hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ.That local body allows for a Sunday school, which preaches the Gospel to the children.
That local body that supports a Boy Scout or Royal Ranger's troop, hosts Thanksgiving Dinners for the homeless, and as a groups finances missionaries in the far corners of the earth.No military mission can succeed if the army is a disorganized collection of individuals. The Great Commission is most effectively carried out by organized local churches of men and women and children who work together and sacrifice for the proclamation of the Gospel.
One day, at the great "getting up" of the saints, the honor and the glory shall be to those unsung heroes who marched with their troop over the decades to represent the Gospel in their town and city and nation and to pass it on to a younger generation who in turn would do the same.
This is a tribute to those in the Ranks: from the faithful attender to the Senior Pastor. The church stands because there is a Pastor who answers the call of leadership. The Pastor stands because there are privates and corporals and ushers and deaconesses and others who will faithfully attend and serve. THE LONG RED LINE
These soldiers are the long Red line of Redemption that stretches from Saint John and Mary at the Cross, to a Roman Legion - 6000 Christian soldiers - who were martyred because they refused to massacre a town for being Christians. To Jon Wycliffe, whose bones where burned and tossed into the River Thames because he dared teach men to read the Bible. In the 1300s, his Lollards - nameless privates wandering as vagabonds - taught Englishmen to read so they could understand the Bible for themselves. To Martin Luther, a low ranking priest who unwittingly set millions free because he dared to ask a few questions from the Catholic bishops.
To the Huguenots - French Protestants slaughtered by the thousands, to the Pilgrims - boatpeople who fled from England to Amsterdam, and then, as indentured servants, to the New World where they and their Puritan cousins began one the greatest experiments in the history of the world:
Could free men live under the freedom of the Gospel and the Laws of Moses? Would this new American Republic live up to it's calling as a City Set On a Hill - a beacon of Light and hope to a lost world?
You and I would not be here today except for the sacrifices and faithfulness of this great army - this long red line - that trod the sacred ground of battle for generations before our time. What great battles shall you fight? Wycliffe and Luther and the Pilgrims had not the faintest idea of their effect on our generation. They sought not fortune nor fame, only faithful service to their fellow man.
Here is an example of one private's work: In 1861, Julia Howe, and assistant editor for a small anti-slavery journal, wrote a poem after visiting the Union Army in Virginia. I think you will recognize it.
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;
He is trampling out the vintage where grapes of wrath are stored;
he hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword,
His truth is marching on.I have seen Him in the watch fires of a hundred circling camps;
They have built Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps,
His day is marching on.He has founded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before His Judgment Seat'
Oh! Be swift, my soul, to answer Him, be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on.In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and me;
AS HE DIED TO MAKE MEN HOLY LET US DIE TO MAKE MEN FREE
While God is marching on.The "Battle Hymn of the Republic" is a testament to the anti-Slavery impulse that became the emotional focal point for those who saw the war a crusade to end slavery.
And there are many other stories of our Great Army.
There was a great Missionary movement launched into China, who though wiped out by the communists, became seed that produced 100 million Christians in China today.There is Martin Luther King, Jr., a young black preacher who stepped forward to serve the purposes of God in his generation. Many preachers refused to step forward. It was too costly. It was too controversial. Today, everybody claims to have supported the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s. But who was there when it wasn't popular? Who was there when it cost you a church? Or a Job? Or your reputation? Or peace with the neighbors? Or peace with the police? Or your life?
Teddy Roosevelt said it best, not just for Martin Luther King, Jr, but for ten thousand nameless pastors and tens of millions of faithful church members who showed up for the long march when others didn't:
"It is not the critic that counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or the doer of deeds could have them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the Arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but he who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great devotion; who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best, knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails while daring greatly, knows that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls, who know neither victory nor defeat."
As you make your choices in life, think of those saints who gave their lives to build a little local church. They walked away from the world's better offer.
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