Another View Point
May 29
"I love you." The text came across my phone Sunday night...short. sweet and unexpected from a thirty year old son. My fingers texted back.... "Are you ok?" He wasn't. One of his best Army friends had taken his own life on Friday. Our son stayed with the wife and three children until her parents arrived Sunday morning. An explanation from another view point followed.
"While most people are celebrating Memorial Day and rejoicing with thanksgiving for the sacrifice so many men and women have made for our freedom, this holiday brings heartache to soldiers whose are overwhelmed by the memories of what they have seen."
I can honestly say that I have never looked at this holiday from that perspective and also that while I pray fervently for the protection of our service men and women, I don't pray for the protection of their minds from all that they have seen and that torments them.
Proverbs 28:16-18 speaks of the guilt of murderers that haunts them and there is no way to help. While war is war and killing occurs, I cannot imagine the mentor torment that follows a soldier home who has witnessed death and dying.
Ten Boom says, "I suddenly saw that the ocean of God's great love is greater than human cruelty. God sent the lark every day for three weeks to teach us to direct our eyes to Him."
As we await another 365 days for Memorial Day to roll around, let's add relief from mental torment for our soldiers to our prayer list.
"I love you." The text came across my phone Sunday night...short. sweet and unexpected from a thirty year old son. My fingers texted back.... "Are you ok?" He wasn't. One of his best Army friends had taken his own life on Friday. Our son stayed with the wife and three children until her parents arrived Sunday morning. An explanation from another view point followed.
"While most people are celebrating Memorial Day and rejoicing with thanksgiving for the sacrifice so many men and women have made for our freedom, this holiday brings heartache to soldiers whose are overwhelmed by the memories of what they have seen."
I can honestly say that I have never looked at this holiday from that perspective and also that while I pray fervently for the protection of our service men and women, I don't pray for the protection of their minds from all that they have seen and that torments them.
Proverbs 28:16-18 speaks of the guilt of murderers that haunts them and there is no way to help. While war is war and killing occurs, I cannot imagine the mentor torment that follows a soldier home who has witnessed death and dying.
"Human love can fall short; God's love never does." Corrie Ten Boom writes of the cruelty in a World War II concentration camp and how one day when she was hardly able to bear it any longer a lark started to sing in the air and all the prisoners looked up and listened to the bird, but she looked further and saw heaven and thought of Psalm 103:11.
For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him.
As we await another 365 days for Memorial Day to roll around, let's add relief from mental torment for our soldiers to our prayer list.
