TWO JOES AND BILL

Let me preface these remarks with a disclaimer. The most significant uniform I ever wore was #23 for the Madison High Cougars baseball team. However, I’ve lived a lot of life with and around individuals who have served in uniform as members of the armed services, and their impact on me cannot be overstated. I was raised as what John Fogerty would call a “Military Son,” silver and blue variety. Dad was a twenty-year man and Commandant of the US Air Force NCO Leadership Academy. I began married life beside Lisa, a combat medic in the garb of a hospital nurse. My sons wore uniforms, Army and Air Force respectively. My brother was Navy, his ship firing the first missiles into Iraq long before 9/11. The first corpse I ever saw was my mother’s first cousin: back from Viet Nam, buried in uniform. Years later I made it a point to find his name on the wall.

As a pastor, I recognize and affirm the wisdom of upholding appropriate boundaries around patriotic symbols and focus in Christian worship, but I have no such restriction beyond that sacred context. It is not “My country right or wrong,” but it IS my country. The ownership and stewardship of that privilege was bought and paid for, in part if not in most, by the folks we honor on Memorial Day weekend. Today, three come to mind. Two are no ordinary “Joes,” and the other helped foot freedom’s “Bill” like no other person I know.

My friend, Lt. Colonel Joe Gregg, was the first person I “pastored” in real-time during war. Modern technology had made it possible for us to communicate as he led soldiers into Bagdad in the war’s earliest days. Joe cared deeply for his troops, praying for their safety while ordering their advancement. Most, but not all, of those prayers were answered affirmatively. Jenni, the kids, and our church did a lot of praying those days, too. Joe came home to a nice promotion, retirement, and a second career in Atlanta with the CDC. I still remember introducing Joe to a lady whose son was a contract worker in Iraq. When she asked Joe if he had been to "The Green Zone," he replied with humor and humility, "We created it." I am proud to have been his pastor and to still call him my friend.

The other Joe was a young officer by the name of Helton. I first knew him as high school classmate of and fellow cross-country runner with our older son. Joseph was quiet and quite exceptional. Who could have known then that a few years later he and Thad would be fellow cadets at The Air Force Academy? Or that Joe, two years ahead, would ceremoniously place his shoulder boards on Thad as he entered the cadet ranks? Or that Joe would be the first Air Force security officer to be killed in action since Viet Nam? Or that there would be a statue of Lt. Helton on the Air Base near Thad’s North Tampa home? I was honored to conduct his funeral. While his was not my first service for one in active service, I pray it will be my last.

I stopped by yesterday to visit Bill Allen on the week of his 98th birthday. He is among the last living embodiments of Brokaw’s “Greatest Generation." Behind his chair hung every evidence of an accomplished life: family pictures, civic and professional awards, and such. But the frame he was quick to point out housed an aerial photograph of Omaha Beach taken D-Day plus one. It was taken just hours before the young corpsman braved water, bullets, and God knows what else, pulling the fallen back into the boat that served as makeshift hospital. And morgue. He spent the afternoon of D-Day on “death duty,” a sacred task he said was marked by a sense of “peace and honor.” So, too, was the life he was able to live afterwards, never forgetting the images of those not afforded that chance.

Joe the Younger gave the full measure of devotion. Joe the Elder and young Bill, still with us, left much of themselves over there, too. They cared for many who never made it home, and helped make sure that many more would. These are the heroes that come to my mind this Memorial Day. And while I stop short of worshipping the flag they fought for and I live under, I pledge my grandest allegiance to it. I know that without the remarkable lives of these three, and legions more like them, I could not know the freedom and joy of being part of a grateful nation that, on this weekend, pauses to remember. And to say thanks.