Father Warm Their Hearts Tonight

 

Father, I don't know his name, or his location, but if there is a conflict going on, he's out there, preparing to take a bulllet for me. He's bundled up and wiping the sand from his eyes, but I don't have to. I sit in the comfort of my home and write this prayer down. He kneels in the sand and asks for your protection, in between the firefights and the calls of duty. He misses his family and his heart longs for home, but for his country....and me and my family, he stays on, out of his deep desire to complete his duty. Father, may our President and our country's leaders be humbled to to their knees when they consider the price  these young men and women pay and the trust they place in them to take their well being to heart. May our soldiers know we are ptaying for them today.....keep them, safe, strong and reliant upon you and as before may this prayer stay on my heart as General Douglas Macarthur wrote it so many years ago......

 

A Famous Father Prays - General Douglas MacArthur

A Father’s Prayer

(by General Douglas MacArthur)

Build me a son. Oh Lord, who will be strong enough to know he is weak,
and brave enough to face himself when he is afraid;
one who will be proud and unbending in honest defeat, and humble and gentle in victory;

Build me a son whose wishbone will not be where his backbone should be;
a son who will know Thee –
and that to know himself is the foundation stone of knowledge;

Lead him I pray not in the path of ease and comfort,
but under the stress and spur of difficulties and challenge.
Here let him learn to stand up in the storm;
here let him learn compassion for those who fail.

Build me a son whose heart will be clear, whose goal will be high;
a son who will master himself before he masters other men;
one who will learn to laugh, yet never forget how to weep;
one who will reach into the future, yet never forget the past.

And after all these things are his, add I pray, enough of a sense of humor,
so that he may always be serious yet never take himself too seriously.
Give him humility, so that he may always remember,
the simplicity of true goodness, the open mind of true wisdom,
the meekness of true strength.

Then I, his father, will dare to whisper, “I HAVE NOT LIVED IN VAIN.”

The world had better beware because the spirit of this great man lives on.

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