It had been a good day. Nothing too eventful, really, but a good day. I had a young officer, a man I have respected since I have known him, come to me to say goodbye. He was transferring to another location in his military career. Part of his reasons were to care for his family and to get back closer to home so that his wife could be closer to her family, too. He was being a good husband and shepherd of his family, and was putting his own military ambitions on the back burner for the sake of his wife and their extended family.

My respect for him continued to rise. I have known men in my decades in the Army that have General written all over them–in their character, their intelligence, their abilities. He was and is one of those men.

I am old enough to be his father, and I hate to see him go.

But it got me thinking. After work, I drove to my residence, and I was reading some Reformation history, as is my custom, and continued to work my way through the classics of literature, too, via one of Tolstoy’s 1,000-page tomes, in which I can never keep track of all the characters.

But I was writing some things down in one of my journals and came across something I had written down before from some of my lifetime of reading: “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” I stand by those words.

I know it is cool to be tough, to seem unfazed by those who enter and exit our lives, to seem like we are too cool to care. But I think it is folly to don that facade–at least for me.

We will all die one day, and all will come to light. And we will answer. And the scales will be open (as they are now) before God, and there will be no place for pretense or bravado or duplicity.

I guess I just want to say this: There are good men (and women), still. And we should say so. So, Nate, God bless you and your family. I am old enough to be your dad, but you’ve impressed me like few others I have known. May the Lord prosper your way.