Ground pounders and why I love them

Ground Pounders is military talk for infantry (Soldiers and Marines). Here is my tale about why I love them.

During the Vietnam War I graduated from college. That was before God woke me up to how Real He is, in January 1968 when the Viet Cong Tet Offensive began. During a vietnamese religious holiday the VC attacked many South Vietnamese cities to convince the US the war would cost too much. Then, even more than before, Uncle Sam wanted me and others to get involved.

I didn’t believe in the war and wanted no part of those jungles, so I enlisted in the Navy for four years. After boot camp I worked as a keypuncher on the base in San Diego until I was to be transferred. That’s when I was blessed to hand my own notice of availability to the Petty Officer who assigned recruits their next duty. He asked me what I wanted, so I asked for more data processing. That is how I got six months of computer schools in San Francisco and Washington, D.C., and then after doing well my choice of orders to shore duty in Hawaii.

Wheeler AFB is in the middle of Oahu. Less than a mile away is an underground Navy base in a large bunker, an alternate to the fleet control center in Pearl Harbor. I served there in under the pineapple fields in air-conditioned computer rooms for two years. That is how I was blessed with shore duty and the rank of Data Processing Petty Officer 2nd Class (E-5) before going to sea my last year.

That last year was aboard the USS Constellation aircraft carrier. I had about nine months at sea. I worked in a computer area with six other sailors preparing reports on fuel, ammo, and spare parts for the ship and our planes. My best sea story is that the President once ordered our forces to strike the enemy capital in Hanoi after peace talks had failed. We spent our time the night we moved to attack by passing around a magazine article about Soviet pilots based in North Vietnam with supersonic bombers, nuclear bombs, and a desire to sink American aircraft carriers.

What did I take away from Navy service?
During my Vietnam war service I learned what undeserved gifts are that you can never repay. At all times my air-conditioned computer room was defended by several other ships, many tons of steel, and dozens of aircraft. Only a few miles away there were ground-pounders and flyboys suffering and dying in the jungle in my place and partly for my freedom. Those flyers who didn't suffer it were risking the worst of it alone in enemy territory. Those men faced unknown enemies in miserable conditions. Getting shot at or booby trapped there might even be easier than facing the unrelenting heat, humidity, bugs and diseases at every turn - never knowing when someone might surprise you with a grenade or AK-47, or a buddy die in some horrible way before your helpless eyes. There were many horrible things those men cannot forget, and I hope they try to warn us against. Unlike some of them, I came away with only good things.

Undeserved Gifts.
Experiencing that undeserved gift of life and freedom, knowing just a little bit what other men chose to do partly for my sake, was part of what finally compelled me to REALLY consider the Bible. In a far greater measure, that is exactly what the Messiah, who is fully God yet fully in the form of a man, did on the cross. Jesus paid for our lifetimes of unholiness, for us to have an undeserved eternity of incredible friendships and celebrations, with His own blood. To reject that message, to delay attempting to know it for yourself, is the only sin that actually condemns us to eternity without God. Every other sin of a lifetime is forgiven the instant we actually know that truth in our hearts, enough to keep acting upon what we know.

Jesus suffered untold pain in the hope we would seek Him through His Word, come to know Him because of it. I have had many Real answers to prayer, yet often I cannot expect an answer because of my unholy thoughts, deeds or failures to do. The truth is He DOES answer prayer when we expect an answer because of HIS Holiness.

Yes I take the Bible literally, including Genesis chapter one. Which actually says that God created heaven and earth from nothing in the beginning, THEN God let the first visible day occur on the surface (dispersing thick clouds, see Job 38:8), then during those six Hebrew “yom” periods of activity created three life forms from nothing including mankind. Those six periods of activity completed the making of heaven and earth, but clearly did not include creating any part of heaven or earth from nothing. Take the Bible literally, hope for answers there, and keep hoping until God hints it is time to look.