LESSONS FROM IRAQ
Delivered by Randy Conner
April 17, 2005
When Father Bud asked me to speak to all of you about my experiences in Iraq and what I had learned, I was at first hard-pressed to know what to say. I was sure that I had learned many things; I just wasn’t sure what they were. So the exercise of sitting down and putting on paper the lessons of the past year has been very helpful to me. And I hope that the product of that exercise will in some small way be profitable to you as well.
It turns out that I learned many lessons; some of the lessons were about me, some were about God, and some were about humankind in general. Some of the lessons came to me not because of any specific event but rather due to the fact that I had so much time on my hands for reflection. In the interest of brevity I have chosen to focus on just a few.
First, the words of Psalm 91 ring especially true to me in ways that they did not before:
Psalm 91:1 He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty.
Psalm 91:2 I will say to the LORD, "My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust."
Psalm 91:3 For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler and from the deadly pestilence.
Psalm 91:4 He will cover you with his pinions, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness is a shield and buckler.
Psalm 91:5 You will not fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day
Throughout the year I felt absolutely confident that the Lord was watching over me and protecting me. This feeling was confirmed in a dramatic way on March 9, five days before I was to leave Iraq and begin my final trip home. At 6:20 that morning while I slept, an Al Qaeda-recruited suicide-bomber drove a garbage truck filled with 1500 pounds of explosives through a security gate and to within 100 yards of my hotel room. Our hotel guards fired hundreds of rounds onto the truck in an attempt to stop it. The force of the subsequent explosion broke almost every window and door in the eight story hotel, and injured 48 people. Seven of those people were injured severely enough to necessitate their being sent to Germany or the United States for treatment.
The force of the blast sent me into a state of shock-induced stupor for some time. But when I came to my senses I realized that, although my room had been thoroughly trashed, with the entire window frame blown across the room, furniture thrown from one side of the room to the other, I didn’t have a scratch on me. I later learned that the people who were injured the worst were the ones who heard the gunfire and went to their window to see what was happening. They were standing in front of the windows when the bomber detonated his device. Somehow I had slept through it all. Although I can’t prove it I am convinced that there were angels with me in that hotel room, ensuring that I stayed asleep and protecting me from flying debris. Truly I can say with confidence that the Lord is “My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust”.
I know from Father Bud and Lisa that this congregation regularly lifted me up in prayer during the course of the year. For this I will be forever grateful. And the way that I was protected during this attack is evidence that your prayers were powerful and effective.
Those who have put their faith in Jesus need never again be afraid of death. We can live with the confidence that he will keep us safe until the day appointed for our transition from this life to the next. And I believe that when that day comes he will not leave us to face the process alone; he and his angels will be there to minister to us. So, there really is nothing for us to fear.
Second, my attitude concerning my vocation has changed.
I’ve spent much of my life believing that my work had to have some abstract quality of “significance” in order for it to be worthwhile. I allowed my job to define who I was. I now realize that I have many vocations: I am a follower of Christ, a husband, a father, a son, a friend. What I happen to do for a living is just another piece of the puzzle. Luther said that ruling a kingdom, changing a diaper, or working in a field are all services rendered to God if the person understands them as a calling.
Jesus said that whoever seeks to save his life will lose it and whoever loses his life will save it. He also said that we should seek first his kingdom and his righteousness and not worry about all of the secondary issues that most of us spend so much of our time concentrating on. This means that my primary focus in life should be on getting to know him and becoming the kind of man that he wants me to be. If I do these things he has promised that he will take care of the rest. He will place me where he wants me.
Therefore, I now try very hard to live in the moment rather than spending so much time peering into the future and trying to figure out how it will look and how I can manipulate it to fit my will. Jesus said don’t worry about tomorrow and with his help I’m trying to follow this command. A much- asked question in our culture is “What do you see yourself doing in the next five years”. We are expected to answer that we see ourselves in ever-increasing positions of authority. My answer now is that hopefully I will be five years closer to being the man that God wants me to be.
Thirdly, I learned how precious my family is. And I don’t just mean my wife and daughter, although they certainly are more precious to me than anyone else. I also mean my spiritual family, my brothers and sisters in Christ. One of the things that really struck me over the last year is what a great difference there is between the people of God and the people of the world. There were times in Iraq when I was blessed with the fellowship of other believers.
At the beginning of the mission, before we were separated and sent out to other parts of Iraq, we all lived together at the Al Sadeer Hotel in Baghdad. Some of us started a bible study which I was privileged to lead. It was a small group, usually about a dozen participants on Sunday and Wednesday nights. We leaned on each other and truly enjoyed each other’s company. Then at Easter, by God’s providence, all of us were under lock down because of an up-serge in violence against Americans. No one was allowed to leave the hotel to go to work. We decided to hold a Easter morning service, expecting that maybe 25 or 30 would attend. As it turned out over 100 people, having no where else to go, showed up for the service and heard a full presentation of the gospel message. Afterwards many of them came up to us and told us how much it had meant to them. It was one of the most gratifying moments of the year for me.
But there were also long periods of time when I was utterly alone. I came to realize how important Christian fellowship is in my life. The church is our shelter from the storms of life. It’s where we come to engage in the kinds of activities that cause us to grow: worship, service, listening to God’s word, praying with other believers, supporting one another. It’s a place where we can go to be with people who love us simply for who we are, not for what we can do for them. In the past I’ve taken this for granted. I pray that I will never do so again.
So it turns out that I learned quite a bit during my time in Iraq and for that I am grateful. The fact that I had to go to Iraq in order to learn these things speaks volumes about both my stubbornness and about God’s patient persistence. I’m sure that He has things that he wants to teach each one of us. So let’s each ask him to show us the things that he wants us to learn. Let’s open our hearts and minds to what He has for us and eagerly wait to see what changes He will bring about in our lives.