The Faithful Job of the Soldier.

  By faith they opened their eyes to the world around them and chose the hard road of change.

  By faith they pulled their feet out from under the bedcovers, laced up their boots, walked out through the familiar door of their homes and security, and bade farewell to the only family and friends they had ever known.

  By faith they put all that they owned into sacks of homespun, swung them over their shoulders and boarded unknown vessels for an unknown land.

  By faith they fell to their knees on the cold, wet sand and praised God who had carried them safely to a dangerous new land and asked for His help for whatever the future might hold.

 

  By faith they lived, grew crops, starved, fell ill, built, rebuilt, fought, survived, prayed, sang, cried, laughed, and died...

for freedom.

  By faith they created a government based on wisdom, Biblical guidance, the three offices from Isaiah 33:22, "For the Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king; he will save us," to balance and work together, unlike any other government that had ever existed. They elected strong, proven leaders with the stains of hard work on their hands, the strength of hope in their minds, the love of freedom in their very being, the sacrificial spirit of service for their fellow men, the ready use of knees for prayer, the fear of God in their hearts.

  By faith they took up their guns when that freedom demanded blood and honor to seal it's promise of a future.  They looked beyond themselves to their sons, grandsons, great grandsons, and they took their prosperity to heart making the greatest sacrifices of life, limb, and fortunes.

 

  By faith they penned documents to restrain the evil of the past, carefully chosing words to protect the hope of the future, commanding their unknown posterity to always treasure and defend the freedoms that they had so arduously won.

  By faith they protected the rights they held most dear: religion, to have and hold and speak freely of wherever the sole of their feet touched on the good ground of a free land, knowing full well that God wants to direct the lives of man everyday, not just on Sundays in the tall spired churches of the quickly increasing towns and cities; free speech; freedom to share the truth through penned words;  freedom to bare the arms needed to always keep freedom secure, tolerance only for protecting right; force for restraining evil.

  By faith they stood by a government of the people, by the people, for the people while "appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions."

(taken from the Declaration of Independence.)

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  By faith every day they pull on their combat boots and stand up in the shadow of those who stood before.

  By faith they take up their guns and board unknown vessels for unknown places because they have seen the face of the past with the evils of tyranny.  They willingly pick up their guns and offer their life blood for the safety of a free today and the faith of a free tomorrow.

  By faith, they carry on with the brave steps of those who came before because the value of freedom burns in their hearts.

And on Memorial Day we remember all those who gave their lives for the faith they had for the worth of freedom.

 Thank you, to all who gave and to all who continue to serve.

"Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."

Hebrews 11:1

(The rest of my garden tour can be viewed here: Pails of Paint.com)


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When Freedom Waves...

As I stood looking out the window in the darkness etched with the breaking of day, the tears streamed down my face.  The knot in my stomach seemed to travel up and connect to the strings of my heart.  I had finally found him after years of waiting and praying, and now I had kissed him "Goodbye;" I realized it could have been my last kiss from his lips, that last embrace still seemed tangible to me. With everything in me, I hadn't wanted to let go, but I had to.  I did it as he did..for my country, for the love of liberty.

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Not long ago a friend posted on facebook that she did not feel comfortable saying the pledge of allegiance to our flag.  She felt, I suppose from other things she has said, that a pledge is a serious thing to promise to a country that, in many ways, has stepped away from its state of origin.  I didn't respond to her post, understanding her frustrations, but also because I was too angry and irritated, I knew I might say too much and needed to think and pray about what to say.  I checked on the post a quarter of an hour later and saw that she had several kindly vehement responses from people, mostly who had served in the military.  I felt their responses were so much better than anything I could say, so I went to bed.  It still troubled me when I awoke the next morning, but when I checked, she had deleted her comment.  Perhaps it had troubled her in the night as well.

Still, I couldn't help but wonder if she would feel the same if she had stood by the window as I had several years ago as my husband headed off to the war in Iraq, my then almost two year old little girl sleeping soundly in her bed.  I had spent those moments wondering what life would be like for the next 9 months, not knowing what my husband was facing, wondering if he would be the same person when he came home... if he came home...always, countless times a day, pushing THAT thought out of my head.  He must come home; I needed him.  I couldn't think about what could happen.  I had to concentrate on keeping up with our lives at home.

 Graphicsfairy

Sitting in church was hard.  Having a full time job in the day and then working our farm in his off hours, my husband doesn't get much time to relax.  Church is a time to just sit next to each other, feel each other's presence.  I treasure my time at church with him.  I wondered if she had ever sat alone in church and felt the emptiness of the seat beside her, and wondered if that seat would ever feel his presence again...pushing that thought aside to try to concentrate on the sermon at hand.

 Graphicsfairy.blogspot.com

Weekends were difficult. Suppertime was hard.   Holidays were an effort of being jovial while missing him.  His phone calls helped, except for the tedium of the time change, the waiting for the transmission time to fill in the gaps of silence and learning how to not interupt each other because of it.

I wondered if she would feel the same way if she'd gone to bed alone, night after night, felt the loneliness and sadness, wishing he was there, wishing life was normal again, trying not to think that that spot next to her on the bed might not hold his presence again...and pushing that thought aside so as to force the sleep to come that was needed to hold up the home-front.  Courage constantly battered by fear.


And yet, invariably, as I lay there looking out at the stars, I thought of other women...women who held down their homes during wars where there was no reliable means of correspondence, going weeks or months without knowing where their husbands were or if they were ever coming back.

Source 

 I felt a sense of comfort knowing that their hearts had traced the outline of their losses on their beds as well, tears falling in the darkness, extra prayers passing their lips.  We had a bond, these women I had never met, a bond of knowing the price of freedom...sometimes our own, but always for posterity's sake.  Tucked beneath the worry, there was the underlying sense that the value of freedom is worth fighting against the terror of not having it .

Graphicsfairy

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We brought little flags to the airport the day he came home.  Our daughter thought it was fun to wave hers around saying, "My daddy is coming home today."  I touched the stripes of my flag as we drove up to the airport, realizing that sometimes we have to see things in light of the bigger picture. This flag stands for much more than the cloth it is sewn from...it symbolizes the weight of what our country was founded on. As long as it stands for the freedom that it symbolizes, as long as men and women like our husbands and wives, sons and daughters, fathers and mothers, give of themselves to defend that freedom and keep it that way, I will stand and honor that symbol.  I will be grateful to those who sacrifice for her freedom today and in the future.  Perhaps someday, if her son grows up and heads off to serve in the military, the weight and pride of freedom from this vantage point will give her a new perspective of our flag.

  Some may feel the need to express their freedom by burning Old Glory, some by not pledging because they are dissatisfied with the current problems affecting our country, and that is because they are free to do so.
  For me, I will stand beside my husband and love the freedom our flag symbolizes: a freedom that is a merciful gift from God.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

For my American readers, please show your love of freedom and vote for it today.

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Thank you.

It has been one year since I started blogging,

and the following was my first real post,

so I thought I'd just share it again.

Thank you for making this first year such an incredible adventure for this

often mothering-perplexed, adult-deprived woman.

I can't begin to express to you how much I've enjoyed meeting 

amazing people

through this way!

Saturday, September 11, 2010

I remember

It doesn't seem so that nine years have passed since that day on September 11.


I was headed to an auction to meet a friend and do some shopping for some more furniture to paint when I heard the news on the radio.  I was stunned, but only slightly compared to when I heard that a second plane had crashed into the second tower. 
  Returning home, I watched in horror as the scenes unfolded from Ground Zero and uncontrollable tears were mingled with anger as I saw the towers come down.  These incredible buildings that reached to the sky were gone.  In the days that followed, I wondered what it all could mean for the those people in the midst of the chaos, for the United States of America, for myself.  My husband was in the navy reserves and fear gripped my heart at the thought of what war might do.  Our lives were happy; we had lost a baby in pregnancy, but we were praying for another and I didn't like the thought of having to risk the man I loved in a land I didn't know anything about.


My farmer did have to go to war, but not until 3 years and a baby girl later. I knew he had to go, but we missed him terribly.

We'd just bought our 30 acre farm 3 months before he left, so I tried to keep busy painting in the house to get things nice for when my soldier came home.



We'd celebrated our girl's second birthday and then Christmas without him; I thought of those who had lost their spouses/parents at Ground Zero and prayed I'd not have to spend another Christmas without him.

This man that I'd seen carrying his lunchbox to work everyday, a shovel to clean the barn out in the evening, who'd tenderly held our baby girl and worn his "It's a girl" pin on his shirt everyday for the first week after she was born...to the farm where he worked, was now toting a gun praying for protection everywhere he went.




But he did come home.

Our daughter and the 2 we have had since do not have the memory of what their courageous father did some years back.

That stage of life for myself, however, will always cause me to say a special prayer for those who lost people that they loved on September 11, 2001...

because I remember.