Thank You to Those That Have Served

On this day we remember and honor those that have served and died for our country.  It is fitting and right we do so.

Though I didn't serve in the military, My family has a long list of those that have.  I have no proof, but family anecdotes tell of a relative that stowed away on a ship from London to the New World (illegal alien?), and then fought under Washington in the Revolutionary War.

I have a Great Grandfather that is buried in a town south of here that fought in the Civil War.  A great Uncle that fought in the Aleutians during WWI.  My father served in the Army just after the ceasefire in Korea.

My father-in-law joined at the end of WWII and made a career of being a Navy pilot.  Eventually he died of Agent Orange poisoning while serving in Vietnam.   One of his sons was a Marine officer for 12 years and was in Kuwait City on Day One, and his daughter, my wife, was a Marine until God intervened and we met and married.  Our son in in the Army and has served in Haiti and Iraq.  He has a cousin that has served in the Marines in Afghanistan.

I never served in the military.  I was in that strange zone just after the Vietnam War where the draft was halted, but we registered.  I think that is the beginning of the disservice our leaders are foisting upon its citizens.  That was a strange time in this country and many had the feeling that people should be able to make choices for themselves.  Especially when it came to serving in the military.

But we are losing something when we get to do what we want, when we want.  Some call it spoiled, some say it gives a sense of entitlement that hasn't been earned.  As I was sitting in church yesterday listening to the pastor talk on Romans 5:1-5, it hit me that we have demeaned the gift of serving.  We as Christians are called to serve, but how many really do?  I looked at the people making the service happen.  Most of them served in the military. Some fought in wars.  But the act of giving two years of your life to something and someone else earns them a confidence that is rare today.  A confidence that life can't do much to them.  Life may be painful and unpleasant, but they will get through.  I don't see that in many young people.

I may have not served, but I grew up in the first generation that didn't have mandatory service.  I grew up and was taught by those that did.  They didn't let us forget that we were fortunate and others had served to give us that fortune. Today youth don't have that generation reminding them,and if someone does remind them the young scoff.

That is the disservice to our young and to our country.  We are making life too easy and soon the piper will have to be paid.  Just as those who served did and those serving are doing.