Operation Denali

Saturday night my hubby and I attended the annual banquet for the Society of American Military Engineers.  It was a good evening out.  Hubby and I were all dressed up and had an evening out together.  The key note speaker at the banquet was the best speaker we have ever heard at one of these events.  I want to share a bit with you.

The speaker was Marc Hoffmeister. Marc is an US Army officer and 1992 West Point graduate currently stationed at Elmendorf AFB, AK.  Marc was wounded by a roadside bomb while serving on a Military Transition Team as an embedded trainer with the Iraqi Army.   He shared with us a bit about trying to deal with the devastation of his injuries and how his wife Gayle challenged him to overcome.  He told us that she announced one day that she was going to climb Denali!  Realizing that she was determined and he could not let her go alone, he determined to take up the challenge and Operation Denali was born.

Operation Denali Mission Statement:

Enable four Warriors wounded in the Global War on Terrorism to overcome devastating combat injuries and successfully summit 20,320 ft Denali, the highest mountain in North America, symbolizing the strength of our Nation and those who defend it.

He shared with us a very inspiring story. He spoke of not only the challenges of the climb in which only 40-60% of those who attempt actually summit. Denali is a dangerous mountain in which people loose their lives each year attempting to summit.  Imagining the challenges of attempting such a big climb is intimidating but image doing so without all of your limbs.  Yes, these wounded warriors climbed and summitted the mountain with prosthetic limbs.  He told stories of how they even passed other teams on the mountain.  That was rather encouraging for them, not so much so for the other fully bodied teams.  Why even try to attempt such a feat?  Reaching the summit was the goal but more importantly than actually reaching the summit were the following objectives.  Even for the few who did not actually summit, their objectives were reached.

1.  To raise awareness for the needs of severely injured service men and women
2.  To  work together to overcome our physical limitations and achieve a common goal made to seem insurmountable by the impact of our injuries on our lives.
3.  To demonstrate by performance and example that no obstacle is so great that the human spirit cannot overcome it

Let me give you a little bit of perspective on this challenge.  A little lesson on Denali.  Denali meaning the High One or the Great One is the Native word for the mountain that outsiders refer to as Mount McKinley. Denali, being North America’s highest peak, rises to an elevation of 20,320 feet amidst a sea of glaciers and other peaks that compose the Alaska Range.  Here is a photo I took from Anchorage, several hundred miles away.

For a closer look and updated photos check out the webcam from Denali National Park & Preserve. Their view is from Wonder Lake.

Please make sure to do your part in supporting our veterans.  They give up so much for the freedoms we all enjoy!  I ask that you share this story and encourage others!

To read more on this inspiring story visit Operation Denali! You can also see a slide show of the expedition. You can read their expedition journal too!

Take some time to learn more about Operation Denali and be sure to leave me a comment too!

Eyes Opened

May the Lord continue to open the eyes of those who promote death.  Abby Johnson, former Planned Parenthood director who now protests against the horrific procedure of abortion.  This is an interview with Mike Huckabee.  May the lives of these unborn children be saved!

Babies Having Babies

I know the title of this post is an older and seemingly overused phrase but that is exactly what this post is about.  I saw an article come across on my Facebook page today that saddened my heart.  A boy 13 and a girl 15 delivered a healthy baby girl.  Neither seem to have any idea of what is involved in raising a child.  The road ahead will be hard not only for them but for this little girl.  I do, however, commend them for not aborting this precious child and seeing the value of life.  Even amidst sinful circumstances God does often bless with a child.  Yes, even a child in this situation is a gift and blessing from the Lord not merely a physical consequence.  The saddest thing, so many do not realize that the view of sex has been so distorted by society that there is little value and purity left.  This situation is a symptom of what so many young adults have been being taught.  Maybe it is time to begin teaching them something other than contraception.  Maybe we need to replace that with value, purity, and abstinence. 

Where are the parents of these teenagers?  I wonder what kind of relationship these youth have with their parents that they are seeking effection elsewhere.  Was there any guidance, discussion, confidence in their own parental authority?  It just makes me wonder.  Yes, the teens are ultimately responsible but some of the blame may be laid at the feet of their authority (lack of) as well as the culture of devalueing.

 There will always be those that fall into temptation and end up in these situations.  My main point is that we have so lowered the bar of expectation we should not be surprized when things like this happen.  Let us raise the bar back to where it should be and expect children to live up to it.  Put value, meaning, and purpose back in place. 

Here is the news article: Baby-faced boy Alfie Patten is father at 13

Your thoughts??????

Home-schoolers Threaten our Cultural Comfort

Indications are that home schooling is working well for the kids, and the parents are pleased with their choice, but the practice is coming under increasing suspicion, and even official attack, as in California.

Why do we hate (or at least distrust) these people so much?

Methinks American middle-class people are uncomfortable around the home schooled for the same reason the alcoholic is uneasy around the teetotaler.

Their very existence represents a rejection of our values, and an indictment of our lifestyles. Those families are willing to render unto Caesar the things that Caesar’s be, but they draw the line at their children. Those of us who have put our trust in the secular state (and effectively surrendered our children to it) recognize this act of defiance as a rejection of our values, and we reject them in return.

Deep down, however, we know that our generation has eaten its seed corn. We lack the discipline and the vision to deny ourselves in the hope of something enduring and worthy for our posterity. We are tired from working extra jobs, and the looming depression threatens our 401k’s. Credit cards are nearly maxed, and it costs a $100 to fuel the Suburban. Now the kid is raising hell again, demanding the latest Play Station as his price for doing his school work … and there goes that modest young woman in the home-made dress with her four bright-eyed, well-behaved home-schooled children in tow. Wouldn’t you just love to wipe that serene look right off her smug face?

Baby Survives Pregnancy Outside the Womb

“Most women whose eggs develop outside the uterus suffer severe pain and bleeding in the early weeks of their pregnancy and are advised to abort because of the danger to themselves…This form of pregnancy is rare enough, but to have it go full term is unheard of.”

“Doctors in the Northern Territory have hailed as “a miracle” a newborn baby who has survived a full-term ovarian pregnancy.”

Read more about this amazing miracle!

Wild Fires

When we lived in Colorado several years ago, we experienced some of the effect of wildfires. There was a large one on the other side of the mountain range. The sky was brown and it was difficult to breath. This past week things got much closer than I would have ever liked to be (and I am here in Texas). There was a wildfire that went through the town of Ordway, Colorado. (you can do a search and read about it) Ordway is a small town of about 1200 residents. We are familiar with this little town because my hubby pastored for several years in a nearby town. We still have some very dear friends who live there.

The fire was so bad that they evacuated the town. Three lives were lost, about 20 homes destroyed, and several other buildings in town. We received an email from these friends about what had happened. Here is a small excerpt of a very long and heartbreaking email…

On Tuesday afternoon the children noticed a large amount of smoke in the
sky coming from the southwest of us. I watched it for a couple of minutes and
grew uneasy….

I told all the children to grab their bags and put in two sets of clothes. I told (son) to pull out both the mini van and the big van from the garage and park them in the driveway, then I told him to grab the CPU from my computer and his Dad’s laptop. I told (daughter) to grab all the pictures from her room (that’s where we scrapbook) and grab as many off the walls as she could. …

Less than 2 minutes after (hubbys’s) last call, he called again and said,
“GET OUT! they are evacuating the entire town you have to go now!”…..

The small children were already in the vehicles with all the bags. The
older children were still helping me grab the last pictures and the “blankies” of
the youngest children. I looked out the back door and saw our field on fire
to the west just on the other side of our duck pond and the fields to the north
were completely engulfed in flames. The smoke was horrendous, we could hardly
breath. I told (daughter) to open the gates on the pens of all her animals. That
was the hardest thing she has ever done in her life. I was sobbing by then. A
neighbor girl, came running in our front door and said “Mrs. M, you have to leave NOW!”, she literally pulled me from the house…..

(Son) was driving the mini van following me. All the other children were with me and we were all just sobbing. (Daughter) for all the animals she cares for and has poured her heart into. (Other son) was crying “I want my Dad, I want my Dad”. It wasn’t just the house we felt we would never return to, it was the home, the memories. It is so hard to express those feelings in words. And then (Other Daughter) began to pray out loud. Her words were so soothing. The crying did not stop completely, but it softened…..

When we reached my sister-in-laws house we were glued to the TV news of course. The
pictures they were showing were horrific. And then we heard that a family with 12
children had lost their home.(THEIR HOME) By then we were just numb. So thankful for our own safety , wondering about all our friends and neighbors……

Later, we decided to try and get back into Ordway and just see for ourselves if the house was still standing and to check on our animals. That was quite a drive. There were downed power lines, some still in the roads. Their were flames just everywhere still. The night was so dark, all you could see were the flashing lights of the emergency vehicles everywhere and the red flames and embers glowing all around us….

The homes of two of our neighbors to the west were completely burned and the barn and corrals of the neighbor to the north were in flames. The house just on the other side of them was also totally destroyed. It was so good to see our home, just standing there in the dark. The fields all around completely scorched. All of our animals were there. In fact they were all in their pens except for the lambs. Their shelter had been completely destroyed and the field where their pen is was burned, so they were in the milk barn where we store the feed. The wind was still terrible and soot and ash was blowing so bad. My eyes burned for 2 days. All the fields on three sides are either blackened or just completely gray with the ash. But the flames just stopped all around our home. But we are so thankful we were spared. If you look at our land, you can see God’s hand of protection.

Please pray for the families in Ordway. I am so thankful for God’s hand of protection where our friends are concerned but there are many families who have lost everything. There is mourning for what was lost and for the lives that were lost. Two that died worked with our friends husband. There is a need for great healing in that community and I ask that you pray for them and for the Christians in that community to minister with the love of Christ.