Orgun-E

Just got back from the Orgun district in East Afghanistan, where we have a FOB called Orgun-E. No one seems to really know what the "E" is for, except possibly "East." Our guys run RCPs (Route Clearance Packages) out there in a highly kinetic area - meaning they get in a lot of TICs (remember that one? "Troops In Contact") and get blown up a lot. We are a very blessed military to have such amazing technology, as it seems that no matter how much explosives they put right under us we generally suffer only minor injuries from their IEDs.

But these guys get rocked quite often - and still manage to keep their wits about them in order to engage the enemy. The latest trip they took led them (knowingly) into an ambush, initiated by an IED, followed by small arms fire, RPGs and the dreaded recoilless rifle. While four of our guys suffered minor injuries and were flown to a local med center, the Taliban did not fare so well. While they managed to get everyone out - the alive and not-so alive - the blood trails and the equipment left behind (rare for them to leave stuff) indicated that we hurt them badly.

I have noticed that, as a chaplain, you don't always walk in to a FOB and have immediate friends. Sometimes you just go hoping to find that one person that needed someone to talk to. Sometimes you're inundated. This time I found a few people to talk with, but one in particular who was just a great guy to hang out with. A very experienced EOD operator, he is looking at getting out of the game and focusing on his family - this after being WITH them for about 6 months of the past three years. Talking with him at length I find that he is a great father, totally taken with his six-year-old daughter (wrapped around her finger is more like it) and a great husband, totally in love with his wife. They're stationed in Anchorage and it turns out, since she is a marathon runner, they know my best friend from high school. Small world. (Wouldn't want to paint it, though.)

In talking with him at length over several days we share many points of similarity - especially our love of our wives and our "dates" we have with our daughter(s). He's definitely not the sort that would mix well at a Christian party - unless they really let him be himself. He would restrain his language for them, but often I've seen cloistered Christian groups fail to adapt to the insertion of someone as rough around the edges. He actually did have a great time (his words) hanging with me as I chatted with two other chaplains, each of us telling ministry stories. One of them is a down-home, Alabama country-boy who can make any every-day event into a hilarious and insightful adventure.

Along the way, my new friend got a heavy dose of Gospel, with out the religiosity. Afterwards I got a great compliment - I was told that, while he was usually very uncomfortable around "religious" types, he found me not to be that way. It was humbling, as it is something I have been striving for and I believe it is something that comes to me more easily over time as I closely examine two things. First, I remember whence I came and the grace that brought me here. My righteousness is not my own and is thus not to be worn as a religious vestment. Second, I look at how Jesus did things. He really let his own life be his "religious" statement first and foremost. He didn't batter people with rules and regulations - he just lived a life that was so compelling that people wanted to know more about this Father he had - it was a get-to-know-him opportunity, rather than a WWJD thing.

As our society becomes more and more secular there is good reason to rejoice. Jesus came for the unrighteous, not the righteous. I guess that means for us that he is present wherever there are people who need him. Religious people ought to take note: If you can't "mix" with the unsaved anymore, perhaps you've lost your "need" for Him? Maybe we just get too scared to be ourselves and not "look" like the Christianity (or something like it) we see displayed amongst the best of the religious people out there. Why can't we just trust that, if we truly are ourselves, Jesus can best display himself in the life changed daily, weekly, monthly, yearly - not in the outward effects (rules and regulations we "obey" in order to whitewash these tombs), but subtly in the inward man. Yes, as society becomes more secular, there will be less of religiosity available out there on which to pattern ourselves. We might actually have to go back to the One who originally told us that HE was the way, the truth and the life.

Pray for the safety of our guys in areas like Orgun-E, and pray that more Christians will have an impact on their lives by being available to them; not because they can show them better rules by which to live their lives, but because they exhibit that aroma of life, more sensed than seen, and as attractive to the dying as the smell of food to a hungry man.