Evening Lady Luv:
Nice night to be saluting our heroes of today (as well as times past) wherever they may be and take a few moments to reflect on all the sacrifices these brave men and women have made to ensure our freedom.
Those of us who served in past conflicts are especially sensisitive to the trials and tribulations they experience and they are all constantly in our thoughts and prayers.
Of course, we must not forget the families who also deserve our respect and appreciation for their own personal sacrifices and the loneliness and anxiety they endure.
I salute them all and ask God to look over them and keep them safe and should any fall, that He accept them into His Kingdom and have a special place reserved for them due to their sacrifice.
Here is my little contribution this evening:
Battle Hymn of the Republic
by Julia Ward Howe
Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord:
He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;
He hath loosed the fatal lightning of his terrible swift sword:
His Truth is marching on.
I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps;
They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;
an read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps.
His Day is marching on.
I have read a fiery gospel, writ in burnished rows of steel:
As ye deal with my contemners, so with you my grace shall deal;
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel,
Since God is marching on.'
He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before his judgment-seat:
Oh! be swift, my soul, to answer Him! be jubilant, my feet!
Our God is marching on.
In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and me:
As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,
While God is marching on.