We throw around the term hero far to often these days. If a man can outrun a defender to score a touchdown, or if a person can slam dunk the ball we call them a hero. If a person can get on the big screen and pretend to do something great, we call them a hero. We have so belittled the term that we don’t really know what a hero is. A hero is best defined as someone who puts their life at risk to save the life of another. Someone who is willing to give the ultimate sacrifice for the wellbeing of another. That’s a hero. That’s a soldier. That’s Todd.
Todd, you may not think of yourself in that way, but many of us do. What you are about to do you are doing for us. I’m sure you’re scared. We are to. But courage is not the absence of fear, it is going forward and doing what is right in spite of that fear. And as you prepare to go and defend this great land of ours, you are our hero, filled with courage and honor, and we want to take this opportunity to thank you from the bottom of our hearts.
In the movie Saving Private Ryan movie, it starts off with an emotional old man going to a grave yard with his family, where he begins to reminisce about his role in the second world war. The movie takes off from there and it shows how many young men laid down their lives as a sacrifice to keep Private Ryan safe, and in the end of the movie, as we are brought back to the present day, the now older Private Ryan stands at the grave of the fallen lieutenant who gave it all, and he turns to his children and says, “Tell me I’ve lived a good life.”
He had been shown the ultimate love when the ultimate gift was given to him, another one died in his place, another one laid down their life so that he could live, and when he had received such a gift, he wanted to make sure it wasn’t wasted. I think now, as Todd prepares to go across the ocean to a foreign land to fight our enemies so that they don’t come and fight us here, it’s a good time to remind ourselves of what it means to be a free person in this land and how it is that we remain free today.
When I got to my first pastorate there was there a man by the name of Clyde Campbell. Clyde was 90 years old when he died, and Clyde was a wonderful man who had a million stories he loved to tell, but the ones that always stood out to me was the ones his old war stories. Clyde was a young marine during WW2, and he was actually part of the D-day invasion. He had gotten married to his wife, and then 4 days later was sent overseas to the European Theater for the next four years. Clyde saw a number of his good friends lay down in the beaches of Normandy, never to get up. He had wounds that reminded him of that vicious day, and he spoke with the utmost admiration of his fellow soldiers who gave their life on that day. And every morning, Clyde got up at Sunrise, and he rose the flag up in his front yard and saluted it, when he was to old and feeble to do it himself, his daughter would do it for him as he sat by the window and watched. Clyde flew a flag outside his house everyday, because to Clyde that flag represented more than just the United States, it represented freedom, it represented sacrifice, it represented all those men and women who served to make this world a better place.
I salute those people like Clyde and like Todd, who are protecting us, and with many Americans, I proudly call myself a patriot. Now some might call that corny, red-neckish, or what ever, but I do love this country. I believe that God has richly blessed this nation of ours. I believe that God has a great plan and purpose for our United States. Now, that’s not to say that God hasn’t blessed other nations, or that somehow America has a monopoly of God, that’s nonsense. But what it does mean is that God has blessed this nation, with one blessing after another.
And I do believe that we do live in the greatest country of all time. You might remember the Russian comedian by the name of Yakov Smernov, his line was I love this country…he said he went to the grocery story and he saw powdered eggs, just add water and there is the eggs, then he saw powdered milk, just add water and there is milk…and then he said he saw baby powder…and he said, I love his country!
I do love this country. Think of all the good things God has given to us. Like Lee Greenwood said, “I’m proud to be an American.” And I am. I’m proud of all the freedoms we have, and I’m proud of the brave men and women who have fought to defend us, and those who have died to give us that God-given right to be free. What Todd is about to do, is to go and assure that you and I remain free, that you remain free, so that America can remain the Land of the free and the home of the brave.
Someone has said we live in the land of the free because of the brave…and now the question is what do we do with this gift? Todd is fixing to leave his family and his friends behind here in Mississippi to go to some foreign land for us, and I wonder how many of us would be willing to do that same? How many would be willing to make that type of sacrifice? I think that’s what was behind the statement in the Private Ryan movie. He had been given the ultimate gift, and he wanted to make sure it wasn’t in vain. When you are given such a gift, you need to make the most of it.
I was watching a ball game last season, and Dick Vitale was commenting on how this point guard was slashing and dicing his way through these big men, putting his body in harm’s way, just to make an opportunity for his teammates to score…and then he said how depressing it was for that point guard when he did all that, sacrificing his body to get that guy his shot, and to have the guy miss the shot. He said, “all that work was simply wasted!”
So many people are not making the most out of the freedom we have been given. It’s a shame when that freedom is neglected or worse, when that freedom is misused, and then the question is asked was all that work wasted? When men have given their life so that we could have the freedom of speech, and to see that freedom used as an excuse to peddle pornography under the banner of free speech. When men and women around this world live under the tyranny of a dictator, and here we can’t even get half of our population to cast a vote. It’s a shame when that freedom given to us is neglected or when it is misused. Or even scorned.
To often there are those in our nation who despise the very thing that upholds them. They hate the military, yet if not for the military, if not for people like Todd, where would we be? For one, we would all be speaking German right now. Where would we be if brave young men and women didn’t risk giving all to preserve our rights, our freedoms, our great nation.
So often we take our freedoms for granted, not realizing the sacrifice made to keep those freedoms alive. Chuck Swindoll read a letter on the radio the other day, and it so moved me that I searched and searched until I found a copy of that letter, and I want to read it to you this morning. It’s about how one man’s opinion changed when his son joined the Marines.
"Before my son became a Marine, I never thought much about who was defending me. Now, when I read of the war on terrorism, or the coming conflict in Iraq, it cuts to my heart. When I see a picture of a member of our military who has been killed, I read his or her name very carefully. Sometimes I cry.
In 1999, when the barrel-chested Marine recruiter showed up in dress blue and bedazzled my son John, I did not stand in the way. John was headstrong and he seemed to understand those stern, clean men with straight backs and flawless uniforms. I did not. I live on the Volvo-driving, higher education-worshipping north shore of Boston. I write novels for a living. I have never served in the military.
It had been hard enough sending my two older children off to Georgetown and NY University. John’s enlisting was unexpected, so deeply unsettling. I did not relish the prospect of answering the question, "So, uh, where’s John going to college?" from the parents who were itching to tell me about how their son or daughter was admitted to Harvard. At the private high school John attended, no other students were going into the military. "But aren’t the Marines terribly southern?" asked one perplexed mother while standing next to me at the brunch following graduation.
"What a waste. He was such a good student," said another.
One parent, a professor at a nearby, and rather famous university, spoke up at a school meeting, suggesting that the school should now carefully evaluate what went wrong. When John graduated from three months of boot camp on Parris Island, 3000 parents and friends were on the parade decks - stands - we parents and our Marines not only were of many races, but also were representative of many economic classes - many were poor. Some arrived, cramped, in the backs of pick-ups, others by bus. My John told me a lot of parents couldn’t be there, they couldn’t afford the trip.
We in the audience were white and Native American, we were Hispanic, Arab, African-American and Asian. We were former Marines wearing the scars of battle, or, at least, baseball caps emblazoned with battle names. We were southern whites from Nashville, skinheads from New Jersey, black kids from Cleveland wearing ghetto rags and white ex-cons with ham-hocked forearms, defaced by jailhouse tattoos. We would not have been mistaken for the educated and well-heeled parents gathered on the lawns at John’s private school a half year before.
After graduation, one new Marine told John, "You know, before I was a Marine, if I had ever seen you on my block, I would have probably killed you just because you were standing there." This was a serious statement from one of John’s good friends, an African-American, ex-gang member from Detroit who, as John said, "would die for me now. Just as I would for him."
My son has connected me to my country - in a way that I was too selfish and insular to experience before. I now feel closer to the waitress at our local diner than to some of my oldest friends. She has two sons in the Corps. They’re facing the same dangers as my boy. When the guy who fixes my car asks me how John is doing, I know he means it because his younger brother’s in the Navy.
Why were I, and the other parents at my son’s private school, so surprised by his choices? During World War II sons and daughters of the most powerful and educated families did their bit. If the immorality of the Vietnam War was the only reason those lucky enough to go to college dodged the draft, why did we not encourage our children to volunteer for military service once that war was done?
Have we wealthy and educated Americans all become pacifists?
Is the world a safe place now? Or have we just gotten used to having somebody else defend us? What is the future of our democracy when the sons and daughters of the janitors at our elite universities are far more likely to be put in harm’s way than are any of the students whose dorms their parents clean?
I feel shame, because it took my son’s joining the Marine Corps to make me take notice of who is defending me. I feel hope, because perhaps my son is a part of the future greatest generation. As the storm clouds gather, at least I know that I can look the men and women in uniform in the eye. My son is one of them. He is the best I have to offer.
He is my heart."
Now Todd, you are our heart, and as you go, I know that God will go with you, in fact you will find that God is already there to meet you. You are going with the prayers and support of this church, of your family and friends, and all of us pray that God will speed you coming home.
We can’t put into words our appreciation for what you are doing. You are indeed a hero, a courageous hero. You are a soldier. Thank you, and may God bless you.
