Today a flood of memories came back to me via pictures that social media had picked up of my career in military chaplaincy. I saw pictures of leading fellow soldiers in the Lord’s Supper at Abraham’s Well in Iraq and of preaching a year’s worth of services in Afghanistan. I saw pictures from invocations and benedictions at events honoring veterans of America’s wars and rumors of wars. I saw pictures of times at my state’s capitol building under the golden dome. I saw pictures of times visiting with soldiers in hospitals and physical rehabilitation facilities where soldiers were to convalesce via physical and occupational therapy regimens. On and on it went.

And I was reading Isaiah today, too, and was in some of the most beautiful poetic language in Scripture:

[N]o weapon that is fashioned against you shall succeed, and you shall refute every tongue that rises against you in judgment. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD and their vindication from me, declares the LORD (Isaiah 54:17 ESV).

It’s remarkable how quickly time passes, how quickly the miles add up, how the trips around the globe accumulate. I am unbelievably thankful to be able to minister to those who probably will never darken the doors of a church. They’ll probably never read a Bible very much or with much hermeneutical acumen.

But God has been gracious to allow me years to pursue this calling, to try and reach those who are often physically tough but spiritually broken. God and His gospel are the only redeeming answers, but they are building a heritage of the servants of the LORD, and God knows them by name.