America: Great or Good?

From a recent prayer breakfast talk:


For more than 60 years but really for much longer, we have had these prayer gatherings since the dark days of WWII, but they were institutionalized in the 1950s and have continued to the present.

We gather to express our deep need and dependence upon a transcendent God for His grace, mercy and intervention in our world.

As we gather, more than 4300 of our brothers and sisters have fallen in Iraq since 2003, and almost 1,000 in AFG since 2001. More than 31,000 have been wounded in Iraq and nearly 5000 in AFG. Our Army is the most deployed, most combat experienced, in our nation’s history. We serve with a new greatest generation, who have endured repeated deployments, have volunteered, and put their lives on hold because their nation and their units called.

The question I want us to focus on is this: is the American soldier, the American Marine, the American Airman, feared or welcomed, when he or she arrives on foreign soil? The answer is at once simple, but there is a nuance. Yes, I hope that our Soldiers are feared by those who would do evil and who would attack our nation and her values. The nuance is that I would hope that our Soldiers would be feared by our enemies AND welcomed by the innocent people caught in the middle of war.

Now, we know how to train and equip Soldiers to inspire fear in the enemy. We study that relentlessly and we implement draconian training standards all over our Army to make sure our troopers are “disciplined, physically and mentally tough, trained and proficient in warrior tasks and drills.” We teach them to “Always place the mission first…never accept defeat…never leave a fallen comrade..never quit.”

But how to we teach and equip them so that they will be welcomed by innocent people wherever they go?

Presidents and politicians have for years said something like this, and incorrectly attributed this to Alexis De Toqueville in his master work, Democracy in America. While De Toqueville never said this, it is a great quote which to me has the intuitive ring of truth:

“America is great because America is good. If America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.”

Why is America good? Why have subjugated peoples be glad to see our Soldiers arrive? In France during WWI and WWII, in Korea, and I would argue in Iraq and Afghanistan today?

How do we train our soldiers to be good?

We can only train them to be good by getting back to the basics of the spiritual values that are taught in Sunday School. We can only train them to be good by remembering Revelations 2:4 and helping them remember not to “forsake their first love.”   ©2010 Ray Woolridge