Veteran’s Day Speech
Gorman Christian School Durham NC
Rob Tennant
11-11-15
Thank you for inviting me to your
school today. I am honored to be
here. One of the greatest privileges I
have is to be able to stand before groups of people and talk about my Christian
faith. Today I will talk about my
military experiences, but my most important message is this. God loves you and that is why God became
human. Jesus is God in human flesh. He died on the cross and rose from the
grace. When we give our lives to Him and
receive forgiveness from Him, we are born again, made new in Christ. I cannot say anything more important than
that.
With
that said, I will share about my life in the military and how that is tied to
my life as a follower of Jesus.
Because of my experience with the
army, I have traveled. I have lived in
Germany, Kentucky, North Carolina, and Texas.
And it all happened before I turned 3 years old! This is because my father was in the army.
My dad was a commander in a tank
platoon. He was stationed in
Germany. So even though my family is
from Michigan, I was born in 1970 in Frankfurt, Germany where my dad was
serving our country. After I was born,
we moved around a bit as he went from assignment to assignment. Then, last in 1970, when I was about 9 months
old, he was sent to Vietnam with the army.
I didn’t see my dad for an entire year.
Thankfully, he made it home safely.
In 1973, he got out of the army.
But the military was kind of always in
the background in my life. My dad was a
veteran. Both of my grandfathers were
World War II veterans. One was with the
army in Europe. The other was with the
navy in the Pacific. And when I got to
college, I could feel inside of me a pull.
I felt like I needed to serve just as my father and grandfathers
had. They never put any pressure on
me. But I felt it inside myself.
I also needed to pay for college and
at that time, the army national guard had a great program to help soldiers with
their college tuition. So I talked to my
dad about it and he recommended I enlist in the National Guard. I did not want to go full time in the army
because I was playing college football at the time.
National Guard soldiers go through the
same basic and advanced training that regular army soldiers have. From late May until the end of August in the
summer of 1989, I was at Fort Benning, Georgia, learning how to be an infantry
soldier. It the hardest, hottest summer
of my life.
We did hundreds of push-ups every
day. Some guys lose weight in basic
training. I actually gained because of
the muscle mass I gained in my shoulders and chest. We ran 3 or 4 miles several times each
week. For me those long distance runs
were the hardest part. We also learned
how to fire and clean an M-16 rifle. We
threw hand grenades on the practice range.
We became soldiers.
One of my most memorable days from
basic training came after had done some training in the early morning. We were back at our barracks, outside in the
shade. It was hot, but the shade felt
nice. We were all sitting around
cleaning our rifles. I kind of leaned
back against a wall. My rifle was all
taken apart and I had the oil that you rub on the parts to keep everything
working right. I leaned back against
that wall in the shade after the hard early morning training and I just fell
asleep.
The drill sergeant noticed and before
my buddies could get my attention he creeped over. He quietly put his face right up next to
mine. And then he screamed, “You better
wake up, soldier!” He yelled some other
things and had me do a lot of push-ups.
When my arms were tired from the push-ups, he had me roll on my back and
do a bunch of flutter kicks. When I was
tired from the flutter kicks, he rolled me back over for some more push-ups.
Now that treatment may sound rough,
but it taught me to not fall asleep and to get my work done. Most of the rough treatment sergeants give
troops is really about getting soldiers ready.
Push-ups make us strong. Running
gives endurance. When you train all
night, then in real combat, you are ready for an all-night mission.
After basic training, I went back to
college and joined my National Guard unit.
I would spend the next six training with them. We trained one weekend every month and two
weeks every summer. We practiced all the
basic infantry soldier skills. We also
trained on how to do riot-control. And
we did push-ups and marching and running.
One of the neat things I learned in
the National Guard was repelling. That’s
where you are up on top of a building or on a mountain or in a helicopter, and
you come down a rope that’s hooked to your belt. You lower yourself down. I never got to do it out of a helicopter but
we did get to do it off of a practice tower.
I was afraid of being up so high, but I learned that the best way to
overcome a fear is to face it. And even
though we did not get to repel out of helicopter, we did get helicopter rides
and that was very cool.
In the early 1990’s the United States
had reduced the number of soldiers with the plan that if conflicts came up,
they might call up reservists and the National Guard. Then Iraq invaded one of our allies,
Kuwait. That was the conflict known as
Desert Shield and Desert Storm. During
that time, the American military got involved.
I was at college by the phone. I
wondered will I miss a year of school.
My dad had fought in Vietnam. I
wondered, would I be sent to Iraq. The
phone call never came.
That c0nflict passed without me being
called up. I continued my service
through National Guard training.
One summer, at one of our two-week
commitments, I had an experience that really was the first step in me deciding
to get out of the military. We were out
in the woods and we were supposed to be picked up by helicopters. So we were there waiting and it got later and
later. They never told us the
helicopters weren’t coming. We just
waited until we all fell asleep around 9PM out in the woods.
We had not set up shelters or tents or anything
because we didn’t think we’d be staying.
Well, around 11PM, it was pitch black out in the woods, and the skies
opened up with a hard rain that did not stop for five hours. Those hours of laying uncovered in the rain
were miserable. The next day we learned
that the helicopters didn’t come because of the weather forecast.
I thought about that.
While we were sleeping in the pouring rain those pilots were relaxing in
the warm, dry barracks. As soon as we
got done with our training, I applied to go to school to be a pilot and I got
accepted into the school. But, it would
mean I would have to miss a year of college and I would have to extend my time
in the National Guard.
At that point, I knew God was calling me to be a
minister. I wanted to focus on learning
how to be a pastor. So even though I got
accepted into the pilot program, I did not go.
I finished out my time in the National Guard. I was offered a promotion to Sergeant in my
final six months, but only if I signed up for a few more years. I decided to turn it down.
In May 1995, I put my uniform on for the last
time. I turned in all my equipment. And in June, I receive an honorable
discharge. Eight years later, I was well
into my career as a church pastor. I got
married. My new wife and I talked about
me possibly getting back into the military as an army reserve chaplain. But she really did not want me to do that.
Her father was a career navy man. He was gone from the family for many months
at a time. This was 2003, and our
country had just begun the war with Iraq.
She did not want her new husband going off to war right after we got
married. So, I did not get back into the
military.
In my story, you can see that at several point the
sacrifice soldiers make. The rock star
Kid Rock has a song in which he sings about all campfires and parties
throughout the summer of 1989 on the shores of Lake Michigan. He and I must be the same age, but I also
remember that summer. But while he and
many of my college classmates were having fun all summer, yelling drill
sergeants were teaching me how to be a soldier.
My dad made a much bigger sacrifice as he was away
from his family for a year when he went to Vietnam. Had my unit been mobilized, I would have
missed a year of college in Desert Storm.
This happened for a lot of men and women during the Gulf War.
Soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines sacrifice a
lot for their families and their country.
We enjoy a great deal of freedom in America and one of the ways that is
preserved is the service of our military.
Today is a day to thank America’s veterans and to honor them.
However, we
must remember something very important whenever give honor to veterans. We are Christians. We are called by Jesus to love all
people. In God’s eyes, no one country is
better than any other. God’s concern is
the Kingdom of God where people from all nations are joined together as
brothers and sisters – children of God.
Jesus was very specific on this point. He said these words in his Sermon on the
Mount.
38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth
for a tooth.’39 But I say
to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right
cheek, turn the other also; 40 and
if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; 41 and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second
mile. 42 Give to
everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from
you.
43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall
love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I say to you, Love your
enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 so that you may be children
of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the
good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. 46 For if you love those who
love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the
same? 47 And if you greet only your brothers and sisters,[o] what more are you
doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?
Soldiers should be appreciated and loved and honored,
but not revered. Reverence belongs to
the Lord. We worship God as we know God
in Jesus Christ. And our love for America
should never produce in us hatred for people from other countries. They love their nations as much we love ours. And our deepest love is for God. We are more strongly connected to other
Christians than to other Americans.
First and foremost we are disciples of Jesus Christ.
As I said at the beginning, my most important message
is to talk about following Jesus. As a
pastor I get the wonderful privilege of doing this in a lot of different places
and settings. I am very grateful. All Christians are called to share their and
to glorify God in all they do.
On this Veteran’s Day, I am thankful for the freedom
we Americans have to live out our faith in Jesus. And I am thankful to the sacrifice veterans
have made to preserve that freedom.
AMEN
