We’re leaving for the battlefield Brother, take my hand that you might be with us this day.  As I reach down to you to help you into the leaving truck I see the frantic face of indecision.  You drop your shield and spear in hesitation hoping to somehow delay long enough to miss my hand up.  But you have heard the Lord’s voice this day, bidding this is the time for which you were made, to stand against tyranny and evil as it seeks to swallow defenseless humanity.  By switch, impulse or thought you bound up into the truck, knowing the full measure of this life’s worth is to arrive on time for the divine opportunities written in your ledger of life.

What so moves your heart that you would lay down all for its defenses?  A child, wife, business or home, perhaps the camaraderie of friends, bound by oath, sworn to mutual defense.  Do you see this world, consuming maw that it has become, threatening to eat all in its pathway?  There is no hope of escape but supernatural freedom, no hope of air but protection by heavenly troops, no place we would rather be than on the front line, standing in courage and trust, hope and faith in Jesus Christ the King.

It is now that trumpet sounds calling us to rampart, wall, cannon, supply and defense.  Our world is threatened through the lost innocence of youth and the frailty of elder woman and lost child.  Men have looked long into the swirling wine, losing themselves in hypnotic contemplation or into the supple folds of strange flesh hoping for seconds of satisfaction.  Ought we such be fooled by disinformation and plastic daydreams?  Stand for the purity in your heart, that child I knew who defended everything, only to see this world slowly strip it all away including pride, passion and courage.  We were not made for such frail position but to stand in hope of light even in the midst of absolute darkness.  Let them rage for we know the path to the King’s Hold, where supply never ends and our bastions lay.  Come this day into the fray, fighting for whatever you believe worth defending.  In Jesus’s Holy Name I pray for your courage and strength this important day.