Another Memorial Service

Well, I wanted to start this one off rejoicing about the amazing R&R I had this past month - it ended on about 5 December. I got back to Bagram on Saturday, the 12th, after quite a week of awaiting flights. I didn't get much time to get back into the swing of things, as we lost an EOD Technician, Technical Sergeant Tony Campbell, on 15 December, during an assault with the British SAS on a compound in Helmand Province in RC South. Tony was killed, ironically, by an IED as they breached a gate into the compound. One of his team members, SSgt. Pilla, was injured by shrapnel and ultimately sent back to Germany, then to the States for surguries. He will be fine. Two of the other team members, Chris Farrell and Derrek Victor, were thrown into a wall by the power of the blast, but were not otherwise injured - their bells were rung pretty good, but no other visible wounds.

Chris has truly been through it. This is his third buddy that he's lost "at the scene." He's lost many more friends in the EOD Community, but this is literally the third one killed in his presence during operations. It's Derrek's first tour and this was a big hit for him. I was able to pray with both men and talk with them. I know they will be fine. It will be a long haul, but they have eachother (a picture I'll post will show how tight these guys are) and they both have God. Chris' family is full of preachers and Derrek read Psalm 23 at the Memorial. Did I mention that Tony was a Cincinnati cop? This makes #2 from the Police Community killed as an EOD tech during my tour. 19 EOD Warriors KIA in 2009, in Afghanistan. It's a brutal job.

It's long, but I have decided to post my homily from the service:

MESSAGE:

I would that words could remove the sting of death and take away our pain. However, no word of hope or encouragement can fully assuage the grief we feel when a fellow warrior is taken from us. A husband, father, son, Airman and friend gave his life in battle just five days ago. A police officer in Cincinnati, Ohio and an Air Force EOD technician, Tony Campbell belonged to two elite, tight-knit communities, each of which feels deeply the loss of one of its own. Today we grieve this loss, even as we celebrate his life and his service to his country.

It was only a month ago that we celebrated Memorial Day and we saw the poppies adorn the uniforms of the Brits and Canadians, who recalled the great loss of life at the Ypres salient in World War I. So terrible was that battle that it marks to this day the hearts and minds of soldiers three generations removed. It is captured well by Canadian Surgeon, LTC John McCrae, who while taking a break from his horrifying duties, surveyed the fields outside his surgical tent and penned this poem on behalf of the dead:

By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

The poem is a call to each one of us who remain behind to face the din of battle and the uncertainty of enemy terrain. It is a call to remember those who have passed the torch to us, from generations gone by and from those, like Tony, who have recently passed…a call to remind us that we are knitted together in perpetuity with those who have given their last full measure of devotion in battle; knitted together with them through blood, sweat and toil, the warrior ethos, and a knowledge of service and sacrifice that no other profession can know.

The death of a fellow warrior is never an easy event for which to find closure, no matter how it came about. They live on with us in our hearts, in our dreams and on bracelets, plaques, street signs and building names. We carry their memory to our graves and pray inwardly that we will one day be reunited with them in the skies above Flanders Fields. However, we learn in both the EOD and Police trades to speak callously – even flippantly – of death, though we know that it looms for us more nearly than for almost any other profession. When it does hit close to home, we face the same questions that all of humanity face – questions about purpose and destiny, about meaning and mortality.

Death forces us to deal with mystery, with a closed door behind which few have peered and testimonies to which we typically respond with either cynicism or faith. To some, death is an end. To others, it is merely a transition to life beyond what we know, in the presence of the Divine. According to my own faith, one of the clearest statements about death is made by Paul of Damascus, who said, “To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord.”

Tony is certainly present before the Lord even as we grieve, but he has not left us without an example from which we can all gain inspiration. His life of service was a life lived out in love. Love is not a word we often associate with our time at war, but I believe it is the key word that illuminates why we all serve. Jesus said, “Greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” Tony laid down his life long before the 15th of December, 2009. Indeed, each of you laid down your lives long before this day. When you signed on the dotted line, you laid down your life for your country, giving up many of the comforts and freedoms of the civilian life. You chose instead to bear the hardships and trials of a war-time military life.

Tony showed his love through his desire to serve his family and his community as a police officer, putting himself on the thin blue line daily on the streets of Cincinnati. He showed his love for his team members, the Air Force, and his Country in the job he performed daily and with excellence in battle. Let me be clear: Tony’s life was not taken from him – rather, he laid down his life long ago when he chose a life of service to others over serving himself. And each of us carries on that same preference of love of others over self every day we put on the uniform of our service. And love is what each of you will need in order to carry each other through this time of loss. It is what Tony’s family will need from you, the EOD community, in the years to come, as his wife tries to redefine life in the absence of her husband, and as his children look to you to play a part in filling the role of the father they have lost. Only love can do that job, and by your lives of service, you have shown that you have it in you to give.

Another ancient Scripture reminds me of God’s intent for each of our lives: “I know the plans that I have for you, declares the Lord: Plans to prosper you and not to harm you; Plans to give you a hope and a future.” If you agree with the verse I quoted previously, the one that states our departure from this life means entry into God’s presence and into a life beyond this one, then let us hold on to this hope for ourselves when we are confronted with the question of what lies in store for each of us. As we live up to the call penned in Flanders Fields, let us trust in God’s plan for each of us and lead lives filled with that love that drives us to service, to one another and to the communities whence we come, and to God and Country – let us “take up Tony’s quarrel with our foe, and receive the torch and hold it high – and not break faith with those who die, that they may sleep as the poppies grow in Flanders fields.”

In closing I ask you to bear with me as I share a final passage that has brought tremendous hope to me. It speaks of the life beyond this one and of the God who cannot be separated from us, his creation:

“And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, he who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, who lives in you. What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? . . No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

Let us pray: Lord, help us live out honorably lives that owe a debt to the man and the warrior that Tony was; and let us not grieve as those who have no hope. Help us to become more thoughtful about the eternal things that concern you, so that we don’t live lives with only passing meaning or quiet desperation. Help us to develop that most important relationship with you, so that when one day we, too, depart from this body, we may find ourselves before you, with joy and in fellowship with those, like Tony, who have gone before us. As we go our separate ways today, comfort us and give us peace. Be especially close to Tony’s family as they struggle to understand and to adjust. Be a comfort to his wife, a father to his children in the absence of their father, and a great hope for each of them that you will never leave them nor forsake them, and that you have good plans for them. Help us, the EOD Family, to surround them with support and encouragement as they heal. Be with us as we grieve and help us to steel ourselves to complete the mission that continues to lie before us. Help us to take up the torch cast to us from failing hands and not break faith with those who have gone before us, who have bravely given their last full measure of devotion on the field of battle. I ask this in your mighty and unshakable name, Amen.

BENEDICTION:
The Lord bless you and keep you,
The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you,
The Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.
Amen.