Jane Cook - Stories of Faith and Courage from the War in Iraq and Afghanistan

• Special military training for Special Forces, Survival Evasion Resistance and Escape (SERE), Ranger School, and others require coaching and determination.

Our actions in this life are the continuation and completion of our faith. When we are committed to Christ, our trust and confidence in him is strengthened when we focus on his Word and thoughtful mentoring, coaching and discipleship of others.

Thank you so much, Lord, for giving me an understanding of the salvation that comes through faith in Jesus Christ. May I never doubt you or your Word or your presence in my life. Instead, please use me to share your good news with others.

“But as for you, continue to hold to the things that you have learned and of which you are convinced, knowing from whom you learned [them], and how from your childhood you have had a knowledge of and been acquainted with the sacred Writings.…” (Ephesians 5:1–2, Amplified Bible)

“Perry was in Fallujah because his nation called him to defend what he believed in. He was convinced that God gave basic rights to people. Where do those rights come from? Is that something the founders just invented or is there a biblical basis for the fact that God gave us life?” Congressman Akin asked, referring to the principles for which his son, Lt. Perry Akin, fought for in Iraq.

“I now ask people to picture this. Adam and Eve are standing in the garden. They’ve been created by God in the image of God. There’s no sin yet. They’re hardwired with all the things that we feel as human beings. Adam is looking out. He sees his gorgeous wife looking at the garden. He’s shaking with anticipation,” Akin describes of the scene.

“What does God say to him? He says, ‘Adam the way you feel is the way I made you. It’s okay. Be fruitful and multiply. Build a bridge. Put the barn and the orchard over there. It’s okay. That’s what I made you to do: to work the soil, to love your wife, and to make children that the earth can be filled,’” Akin continued.

“You see God called Adam to do what was in his heart to do all along. This was more than a creation mandate; it was the gift of freedom. The Bible says it was a blessing,”

Dictionaries define a mandate as command, but blessings are different, something prosperous, glorifying, and honoring.

The Declaration of Independence reflects the blessing of Genesis. “Creator” signals the origin of the blessing when God gave humanity freedom. “We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights.”

“It was at that point that humans received their freedom under God. That’s why we fight to protect our God-given freedom,” Akin said. “What is the blessing? Isn’t that what we’ve been fighting for? Isn’t that what the terrorists want to undue?”

And indeed, many have fought for the blessing of life over the years and are defending it today. The blessing is God’s gift to us.

God, what a blessing you have given me, the blessing of freedom, the gift of prosperity and hope for the future.

“God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it.” (Genesis 1:28a)

“You guys are the next on the list,” recalled Sergeant Michael Huntley of his deployment to Iraq in 2005. Huntley, a Marine canine handler, had begun training his new dog, Keve, the previous February. “In November 2005, it came time for us to go. Of course my family and friends were worried. People put me on their prayer list. My father told everybody at McLean Bible Church in Virginia, and they were really supportive through their thoughts and prayers.”

Huntley wasn’t too worried. From what he knew, he would likely be stationed at a well-protected, sizable air base such as Al Asad. The worries began when he and the other teams joined up at Camp Lejeune, North Carolina, two weeks before deploying.

“As we were arriving, we learned a dog team was coming home from Iraq because the handler had been shot through the arm. He wasn’t hurt too bad, but he was still coming home,” Huntley said.

Because the dogs are so effective at detecting IEDs, insurgents put a higher bounty on dogs and their handlers than other soldiers and Marines. Snipers were on the hunt. When the injured handler arrived at Camp Lejeune, the deploying handlers peppered him with questions.

“He was at this place called combat outpost. It’s not really a working base, just a large post. It was called the wild west because all this stuff was breaking out there,” Huntley recalled. “If you liked to be in gun fights, get blown up, or get shot at, then combat outpost was the place to go.”

As he anticipated his assignment, Huntley took comfort in what he knew. (The dogs and their handlers normally rotate in and out of Iraq with each originating from different bases.) The Marine Corps was now sending dogs and their handlers for only two-week rotations into combat outposts because it was so dangerous.

When he arrived at Al Asad, he got his assignment. “Huntley, you’re going to combat outpost.”

That was not the only shock. The military had stopped the two-week rotation. Huntley was going to be there for seven months.

Huntley was thinking, Okay, we just had a handler leave there because he was shot and now things are blowing up there. Suddenly the likelihoods had changed. He was going to need more courage than he ever expected.

You are the source of courage when life takes an unexpected turn.

“I eagerly expect and hope that I will in no way be ashamed, but will have sufficient courage so that now as always Christ will be exalted in my body, whether by life or by death.” (Philippians 1:20)

“I didn’t tell my parents,” Marine Sergeant Huntley said of his assignment to the combat outpost. “I tried to make it as comfortable as possible for them.”

The United States Army had just taken over an agricultural college in Ramadi after a fierce firefight when Huntley arrived there in November 2005. They had turned the college grounds into a combat outpost. The place was a web of generators and strung out power lines. A village with many boarded up windows surrounded the outpost. Because the buildings sat above the outpost, insurgents could just take pot shots into the post from different buildings.

I arrived during a blackout at 4 a.m. The other dog handlers came out and grabbed me and said. “Hey, follow us.” They had us sit down.

“We just got attacked yesterday; gun fights are here and there.” And within the hour they were attacked again.

“The enemy launched about seven or eight mortars, large rockets, into the base. Then they just started shooting,” Huntley recalled. “This was the first night I was there. I was already firing back at random things and shooting large machines guns, something I hadn’t done since target training. Now all of a sudden I’m shooting at people, shadows, or silhouettes of where I think the fire is coming from.” The firefight lasted about thirty minutes.

Huntley soon learned why this place was so hot. They were in the enemy’s backyard.

“Ramadi was where all these fighters lived. They would travel to Fallujah and Al Asad to fight. Then they’d go home at the end of the day to Ramadi. So we were fighting pretty much in their backyard. That’s the reason they were so aggressive and why it was so dangerous at that point in time,” Huntley explained.