A Widow’s Tear
Hi, I’m Joni Eareckson Tada, and with yesterday being Veteran’s Day,
I’d like to take a moment to thank from my heart all the remarkable men and women who serve our country. Like my friend, Corporal Robert Martinez who served with the First Marine Regiment in the Vietnam War back in the late 60s. That was a tough war, and Vietnam veterans back then (as you well know) did not receive the kind of welcome home that we now give to returning military servicemen and women. It’s why Robert (I call him Bob) loves to give back to veterans and their families. And one of the ways he does that is by playing the Taps on his bugle at a military service —no tape-recording, but he has a live bugle and he bugles at graveside. It is a chance for Bob to not only show honor and respect to a fellow soldier, but to really minister to the families and loved ones of fallen soldiers.
Just recently Bob shared with me that he had the honor of playing Taps on his bugle at a funeral service for a World War II veteran. There stood the soldier’s widow; a small, bent over, frail woman in her 90s, dressed in black, with tissue in hand, wiping away the tears that rolled down her cheek.
Bob shared his reflections in an email to me; he said, “Joni, it was so beautiful, this ceremony, honoring the life of a man that had valiantly served our country, but the most touching part for me was at the end. After the ceremony had concluded, the widow walked up to me to say thank you. With a trembling and faint voice, she expressed her love for her husband to me. And then, she looked up at me and gave me a big hug. Bob went on to write: Joni, I held this little old lady as she cried in my arms. And when she pulled away, she was so apologetic about having cried and smeared makeup on my uniform. That’s when I told her, pointing to the awards and medals on my uniform, ‘Ma’am, you see these medals right here? None of these awards come close to your tears. I will treasure this moment forever. Thank you.’”
Wow! I can just picture that scene so easily, can’t you? Sometimes we think about the young wife of a military officer who, perhaps, lost his life in Iraq or Afghanistan. We think of the young soldier coming back from war wounded from an IED or suffering with PTSD. But there are others. Others who are older, such as this 90-year-old woman who recently lost her life partner, and he indeed, was a life partner, given that we’re talking about World War II here. And our World War II veterans are vanishing quickly. According to US Department of Veterans Affairs statistics, we are losing 372 World War II veterans per day. Oh my goodness, before you know it there will be none of these servicemen left.
And that’s why I was so blessed by that email from Corporal Bob Martinez. I love the way he honored that elderly military widow by assuring her that her tears on his uniform were just as, if not more precious than those medals pinned to his chest. So I hope you will do what Ken and I do all the time when we encounter either an American serviceman or woman, or their family member. When we learn that they have served our country in the military, we always thank them for their service. For that matter, we do the same for law enforcement officers who we might meet, or fire fighters, or guardsmen. God bless those who serve our nation as well as our communities. So speak up, say thank you. It’s one way God can use you to bless America. Come to my radio page. Let me know what you think. Let me know what you think at joniandfriends.org.
© Joni and Friends
