In infantry lingo…we all have to carry our own rucksack. The Christian Servicemen’s Center in Clarksville TN brought something priceless to my war years, hope against hopelessness. Any vet can tell you that things do not always add up. My short life at the center prepared me for the abyss called Vietnam.
I affectionately call my early family background…heathen. We all wore our brand of faith on our dog tags; mine was marked Protestant. However, we were what is referred to as an unchurched family. My Dad’s tags were Protestant. Most of my military experience was an attempt to emulate my father, but I was cut from a different cloth. I had to find my own way to carry the rucksack.
Harold Witmer directed the center. He had a keen entrepreneurial spirit. He could raise funds and gain community support in a town in a love-hate relationship with the military. In reflection, Harold was a leader. His voice and life exampled strength and clarity.
Glen Davis served quietly as residential director and was the heart of the center. I never met a man more genuine than Glen. In a few short months he became my spiritual father. I have strong suspicions many more soldiers could say the same. His wife Jeanie was in the background of most center activities. Soldiers could be crude and hard to love. Her gentility shown in stark contrast to our normative behavior. On occasion, I would catch glimpses of their beautiful relationship…hoping one day I might find the same.
The center was designed to confront soldiers with Christianity, particularly to the Person of Christ. I bought it… hook, line, and sinker. One of the least vocal members of the team quietly led me through verses of a familiar book. He shared the military version of the Gideon Bible, that book I always wore in the left hand pocket on every jump. I sensed another Presence as he talked. Some can’t wrap their minds around that, but it helped me carry the rucksack. The Center was my piece of heaven; Vietnam became my hell. Both influence me…in all the days of my life.
The crown jewel of the center’s history was a man named David Hicks. As a young man, he also struggled. He spent time with none other that Glen Davis. David took a leave of absence and went to seminary. David Hicks returned to serve as a military chaplain and later became Gen. Hicks, Chief of Army Chaplains.
The Center has long since been torn down. It’s influence remains. This Christmas season, as many of my extended family celebrate, they have no clue of their indebtedness to a quiet man named Glen Davis. I took the message home for my first Christmas, as a Christ follower. When I returned from Vietnam, the message had a life of its own, throughout my family.
The Message made me a more compassionate medic. It gave me the courage to make house calls under enemy fire. Faith and medicine have remained twins for me all these years. Whatever good I have done, has been as a wounded healer. For the past few years there has been a lovely niche for me called hospital chaplain. In that sense…the Center and its work quietly lives on.
althompson101 