This is his job

Today my father is leaving to spend the next 4 months in Iraq.

When I was a freshman in high school I was sitting in my biology class when the principal spoke over the PA system and called me to the office. Daddy was leaving for the Gulf War and our family was going to spend a few more hours together before he left.

The six months that he was gone are etched with memories of me changing and trying to find my place as a high schooler. I acted out by sneaking out of the house one night, and I argued with my father via letters about dropping my typing class. (I didn’t get to.) I had one boyfriend when he left and when he returned I had another one (a senior!).

This time, Daddy is a grandfather to the cutest redhead in the world. He has no children living at home, and I promise not to email him asking to drop my typing class. Just the fact that he will have email and internet access is a big thing for me. He will get to check the Daily Fuller Fix and see his grandson grow as the months pass.

I think because of our experience with the Gulf War I haven’t really thought about what awaits my father in Iraq. I keep wondering if I suddenly need to form an educated opinion regarding the war. But then I push aside that thought and just think, “This is his job. This is what he has to do, regardless of if I think the war is right or wrong, I just have to accept the fact that he is leaving and going somewhere very dangerous.”

Daddy is a chaplain in the Air Force, so his circumstances are slightly different than those of most the military people they report about on TV. As a chaplain he doesn’t have a gun. There is someone assigned to him to protect him. This weekend Daddy kept telling people that he has had convoy training, but that he was informed that Daddy doesn’t go on convoys. Because he is a chaplain, he goes on “heavily armored humanitarian missions.”

I will miss my dad, and I will pray for him everyday. I will pray for his safety and the people that he is serving. I will pray that his relationship with God will grow everyday and that the people he works with will know the God that Daddy loves and serves.

Will you pray with me?