Busy Time

The title kind of says it all.

It has been a "busy time", and will continue to be so for a while. However, I can say that we have a new tool to help with that.

First, let me step back and give a belated blog congrats and happy birthday to the new SERGEANT Robert Ramos! He was promoted recently. Just in time for his birthday. You can see from the pictures some of the ceremony. One of the cool aspects of being in a cavalry unit is that we have a fairly rich heritage. That is why you see many of the Soldiers in Stetsons. It is not required, but there is a strong camaraderie with the units and Soldiers. By the way, I don't think CH Randall is really that tall. I think the rest of us were standing in holes. ;-)

So, back to the new tool for ministry. SGT Ramos and I finally have a HMMWV (or Humvee) in order to get in and out of the field. There are times when we are asked to share it with other groups in our unit, but for the most part we are able to use it to get back and forth.

Why this is really significant is because we typically rotate Soldiers in and out of the field for training. So at any given time, I have Soldiers at one or more of our training ranges, and then some back at our main offices. Fort Campbell is pretty large and so some of the ranges are 45 minutes away. As a chaplain, a lot of my service comes in the form of counseling. It can then be difficult to counsel at the offices when I am out at a range, but there are needs on the ranges as well. So therefore, having our own vehicle to be able to go back and forth as needed REALLY makes a difference. Of course we also had to get licensed and that took time too, but now we are good to go.
Another side-benefit of having our own vehicle is that we have a fair amount of gear to haul if we want to do a "full-blown" field service. A field service is pretty much like it sounds--a form of a church service in the field. Now the "field" could be an outpost, or in some sort of structure, or usually, literally in an open field.

If you take some time to consider all of the elements that are usually included in a standard church service, you begin to see our potential dilemma. The Army though has had A LOT of experience at this and so we have chaplain kits and a few other items that help with these challenges. However, having a vehicle helps because we are able to bring out the gear that we need, and then even use the vehicle in order to setup. In our case, this last week we were able to do a field service and even included communion with it. It seemed that the Soldiers who came very much appreciated what we were able to share with them.