Day 7, RFTW 2010 – Sharing Peace for the Pain

I am wearing an armband given to me that reads “BETRAYED” “POW * MIA” and is black in color. Then I was given the duty of reading the following after I had led the prayer for the day,

“THOSE THAT ARE FORGOTTEN”

No special medals or big parades
No Presidential handshakes or public charades
Side by side we fought and some brothers died
But no one in our government even cried.
We gave our lives and our souls
But were sold out for other goals
But one day those traitors we will meet
And then we’ll dual at Satan’s feet
Eternally in hell they will rot
For the heroes they FORGOT

I am still learning the pain and bitterness of many of the veterans, most from the Viet Nam war. If you were not there, you may think that would be all behind them, but not if you don’t fight at night to shut out the memories – not if you didn’t have buddies killed right in front of your eyes – not if you had not experienced the pain of being called a “baby killer” knowing that some of the children that carried boot shining kits were actually booby trapped and died before your eyes. After I read the above poem, sent to us to carry across the nation from South Africa, a Nam vet came and fell in to my arms weeping, “Chaplain sometimes we just need you.”

I could speak of so many men who have spoken, wept with, and asked for prayer of our Chaplain team. There have been so many great comments about our Chaplain Corp. God is really using them to just be a light of hope. One man told one of our Chaplains at lunch, “I am not religious but this is making an impact on me.”

The day started with greeting eleven men from My Father’s Vineyard IPH Church in Pensacola, FL who rode up just to feed RFTW in Meridian, MS. I did not see them last night due to the wreck. It was great seeing some great friends with a passion for Jesus.

Before the rider meeting one of our female riders had a wreck, this took several out for a while. Thank the Lord she was just skinned and bruised up. It is awesome to be a part of the IPHC family – folks that respond when there is a need. Pastor Glenn Lafferty of Quitman, MS took over our duties of pastoral care and visited our two riders in the hospital.

At our first stop today a lady comes up and asked about where all the water, snacks and fruit came from. It was my privilege to take her to our banner with church’s and ministries names on it and tell her the story. A story about churches thanking the veteran for the Freedom of Religion that comes from a heart of deep gratitude. She could not talk for crying. “I didn’t know people in church felt that way; My husband of 35 years recently retired from the military after 41 years of service. He has fought in every war from Viet Nam to the current fight on terrorism. I just didn’t know.” After a hug we all went our way both being enriched by the moment.

We had “Biker Blessing” stickers made up for Mission:M25 and we have already prayed over 28 bikes and bikers. It is a great opportunity to share this blessing with these men and women. We pray more for the biker to find a relationship with Jesus that will cause them to fulfill the destiny God has put them here on earth to accomplish.

This morning at the VA hospital, see the attached picture of our lunch, Chaplain Moore had the idea to give out the cards the Royal Rangers sent to us to distribute. He decided to give them to men and women with RFTW to distribute to these great heroes of our country. While handing them out, Pastor Kevin McBride, Chaplain Sgt. Rock and Chaplain Moore all had an encounter with a man who was with General Patton when he died. Can you believe the people we are being allowed to show God’s love?

We welcome Pastor Birt from Sandy Cross, GA of the Georgia Conference to our team today. I met Pastor Birt at General Conference last summer. He said he was going to come and guess what – he DID!

Also joining our team for the rest of our journey is Jimmie “Drifter” Lawson. Drifter is an “In Country” Nam vet who we met on RFTW. He lives in South Carolina and was instrumental in giving a man who had a family member burn all of his medals and uniform when he returned from Nam. He has carried the pain of ‘disgracing’ his family by going to war for over 40 years but is finding healing. Drifter was waiting for us to arrive for dinner when three women came up to him and started talking about their husbands who died in the past year, all from “Agent Orange”. They asked him to carry some of their ashes to the wall in Washington DC. These type of things are such a huge blessing but at the same time carry a lot of heavy emotions.

We were blessed to greet David and Gayna Murray, huge supporters of Mission:M25 but more importantly, great friends of Carolyn and I that live here in Chattanooga, TN. Another blessing was Richard “Pointman” Cole, a minister who is a Viet Nam veteran and great friend, living in Knoxville, TN. I only regret that we don’t stay the night in Knoxville, I have a bedroom there! Pointman will be joining our Chaplain’s for the ride from Knoxville to Wytheville, VA tomorrow.