No, Freedom Isn't Free
by
CDR Kelly Strong, USCG (ret.), 1981
I watched the flag pass by one day.
It fluttered in the breeze.
A young Marine saluted it,
And then he stood at ease.
I looked at him in uniform
So
young, so tall, so proud,
With
hair cut square and eyes alert
He'd
stand out in any crowd.
I
thought how many men like him
Had
fallen through the years.
How
many died on foreign soil?
How
many mothers' tears?
How
many pilots' planes shot down?
How
many died at sea?
How
many foxholes were soldiers' graves?
No,
freedom isn't free.
I
heard the sound of taps one night,
When
everything was still
I
listened to the bugler play
And
felt a sudden chill.
I
wondered just how many times
That
taps had meant "Amen,"
When
a flag had draped a coffin
Of
a brother or a friend.
I
thought of all the children,
Of
the mothers and the wives,
Of
fathers, sons and husbands
With
interrupted lives.
I
thought about a graveyard
At
the bottom of the sea
Of
unmarked graves in Arlington.
No,
freedom isn't free.
"I am the resurrection and the life. The one who lives in Me, even if he dies, will live."
John 11:25
Remember the Fallen.
Remember what they sacrificed in order for us to live.
Death and suffering are the result of the Fall.
War comes from the sin nature.
Our country was built on the Christian faith and we have strayed so far.
(Photo credit to Google Images)
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