Achilles
The warrior is noble and strong. His resolve is firm and his commitment is total. His is to kill, to shed blood and to be killed. His is to die for his King and for a worthy cause. His is to protect and lay down his life for his faith, his nation, his people and his loved ones.
What manner of men are these whose spirit speak of such valour and nobility? Consider the ancient Spartans and the Roman warriors of old. Consider the fearsome Vikings who believed that it was a curse to die a peaceful death and that the only way to heaven was to die violently and heroically in fearsome battle.
Consider the greatest warrior that ever lived, the noble and gallant Achilles, the pride of the Greeks and the glory of the Mermidan, who slew noble Hector and brought down the walls of Troy.
Aragorn from Lord of the Rings
Consider Aragorn of Gondor who saved the Middle Earth from the power of the Ring and the hordes of Mordor. Consider brave Horatio who stood at the Roman gate.
Consider Ragnar the Viking King who crushed his enemies under his feet and brought glory to his people.
Consider Kahl Drogo of the Dothraki who rode into battle with fury and who shattered all that stood in his way.
Kahl Drogo from Game of Thrones
Consider Jon Snow Targarayan of the Nights Watch who manned the wall, who rode dragons into battle, who loved Khaleesi and who saved the Seven Kingdoms from the army of the dead.
Consider Alexander the Great who conquered the world with his sword. Consider King David, the greatest of all the kings of Israel, who was a man of blood and war and yet whom God so loved and who loved God more than any other.
Consider David’s “strongmen” who stood with him through thick and thin and who fought for and protected him to the very end. Consider their gallant captain, the mighty Joab and the others, Abishai, Asahel, Eleazer, the Tachomonite, Shammah, Benaiah, Eliam, Igal and Uriah the Hittite.
Ragnar Lothbrook from Vikings
These were David’s ”strongmen”: all great and valient men of war whose courage was legendary and whose loyalty to their God and their King was unflinching and unquestionable.
Consider Richard the Lionheart, Shaka the Zulu, Robert the Bruce, Bonny Prince Charlie, Beowulf the Nordic King and William Wallace the liberator of Scotland. Consider King Henry V of England who routed the French at the battle of Agincourt even though he was outnumbered by three men to one.
Consider Julius Caesar who came, who saw and who conquered. Consider Ertugrul Gaza who resisted the Mongols, who rallied the Orghuz of Anatolia, who established the Turkish state and whose son Osman was the founder of the Ottoman Empire. Consider Salahudeen the Compassionate, who took Jerusalem, who rejected the path of vengeance and who showed the Christians mercy.
Alexander the Great
Consider the great Heracles who was a descendant of the mighty Hercules himself. Consider Spartacus, who turned slaves into men. Consider Samson, who slew a troop with the jaw bone of an ass and yet who fell at the touch of a woman.
Consider Gideon who slew the Midianites, Jeptha who sacrificed his own daughter, Joshua who brought down the walls of Jericho and Jehu, who drove his chariot like a madman, who slew the witch-Queen Jezebel and who fulfilled prophesy by ensuring that the dogs ate her flesh and licked her blood in the fields of Jezreel.
Consider those that laid down their lives for our great and noble faith: Paul of Tarsus, the greatest of all the apostles, who brought the glorious gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ to the gentiles and to the wider world.
John Snow from Game of Thrones
Peter the disciple, who became the rock on whom the Church of God was built. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, Moses, Samuel, Stephen, Isaiah, Elijah, Daniel, John and all the other disciples and prophets of old.
For martyrs and heroes that lived and died for God are also gallant warriors who feared not death and who stood firm to the end in defence of their faith.
Consider George Washington who led his troops into battle and whose battle cry was “victory or death”. Consider the charge of the Light Brigade, the sheer courage and discipline of the famous 600, at the battle of Balaclava in the fields of the Crimea.
King David from the Bible
Consider General Lee at the battle of Gettysberg, Oliver Cromwell at the battle of Nasby, Horatio Nelson at the battle of Trafalgar and King Leonides, with his gallant ”300”, at the battle of Thermopalye.
Consider Generals Marshal, Patton, Eisenhower, Rommel and MacArthur in the great battles of the Second World war.
Consider Zhukov at the siege of Leningrad and his courageous exploits at the battle of Moscow. Consider Bernard Montgomery, with his fearless ”Desert Rats”, at the battle of Alamein, Charles De Gaulle at the siege of Paris and Chiang Kai-Shek in the war against Japan. Consider Attila the Hun, Ghengis Khan, Peter the Great, Hannibal Achuzia, Benjamin Adekunle, Katsumoto the Samurai, Hannibal of Carthage and Hector of Troy.
Beowulf the Nordic King
Consider our gallant amazons and female warriors of old- Boudica of East Anglia, Joan D’Arc of France, Elizabeth 1 of England, Amina of Zaria, Moremi of Ife, Golda Meir of the State Of Israel, Margret Thatcher of Great Britain, Indira Ghandi of India, Queen Idia of Benin, Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan, Queen Esther of the Medes and Persians, Cleopatra of the Blue Nile and Egypt and Yaa Asantewaa of the Ashanti Kingdom.
Consider Generals Foche and Hague at the battle of the Somme. Consider George Armstrong Custer at the battle of the Little Big Horn, the Duke of Wellington at the battle of Waterloo and Napolean Bonaparte, in his full glory and power, at the battle of Marengo.
Consider Patrice Lumumba, Thomas Sankara, Obafemi Awolowo, Kwame Nkrumah, Leopold Senghor, Jerry Rawlings, Nelson Mandela, Olusegun Obasanjo, Robert Mugabe, Jomo Kenyatta, Julius Nyerere, Emeka Ojukwu, Isaac Boro, Ken Saro-Wiwa, Gideon Orkar, Nnamdi Kanu and so many others.
Shaka the Zulu
Had these great men and women all not stood their ground and had they all not played their role in our collective history, where would the world be today? They sacrificed their today so that we may have our tomorrow.
They lived and died for the sake of others and asked for only one thing in return: that their names should live forever and that we should never forget their noble deeds and their worthy sacrifices.
And we must not forget, nay we dare not forget, for as Martin Luther King once said “if a man is not ready to die for something, then he is not worthy of living for anything”. The warrior is prepared to die for his cause. That is what makes him so noble and that is why he will always have a special place in our hearts.
Henry V of England
May the spirit of the warrior and selfless courage fill us all and, like the true warriors that we are meant to be, when the angel of death comes may the Lord give us the strength and boldness to look at him fearlessly in the face and treat him with the contempt and disdain that he deserves- knowing that he has lost his sting and that, by the power of Christ Jesus, he has been conquered and crushed.
When the dark angel comes, as come he must for us all, let us be men and let us die a good death, not cringing and crying like puppies, but like true warriors, fighting to the bitter end. For it is never for the warrior to ask the why: it is only for the warrior to do or die.
The warrior does not vanish into the night. The warrior will not go down without a fight.