I realized a few months before I left for the trip that young men my age 40 years ago would also have to leave home, but not because they have chosen to take an 11 month mission trip, but rather because their country told them they had to. 40 years ago, young men my age were heading to basic and then to the very city I am writing this message from right now….originally known as Saigon, presently known as Ho Chi Minh City. I don’t pretend to be much of a scholar on Vietnam at all. I don’t pretend to understand what the country was going through at the time and who thought we should be over here and who didn’t.
What I do know is that the Vietnam war was ugly. It was ugly and it was brutal. I was thinking the other day of the people who I knew that were in the war. I was trying to think if any of my friends’ parents were in the war, and tried to think if any of my friends’ parents were killed in the war. I stopped in mid-thought and realized the ridiculousness of the statement in my head. Of course none of my friends’ parents were killed in the war. The men that died in the Vietnam war did not go home to have children. They did not come back home to their families. Mothers who waited in anticipation for the sons to return, much like my mother is right now, were greeted by an American Flag instead of their sons.
40 years ago men were not packing a back pack for a mission trip, they were packing for war, and many when they left, it was the last time they would see home.
We went to visit some of the historical sites of the war. It wasn’t what I would call a pleasant experience, interesting yes, but pleasant no. Like I said I don’t begin to understand the situation that took place both in Vietnam or in the US during the unofficial war, but I know it was ugly. I know it is a different experience than I am having right now.
I don’t mean to offend anybody, or try to start a debate with these comments, but in some small way hope to honor those who died during the war, on both sides. Not because someone was right and others were wrong, but rather simply because they were people. And like I’ve said before, one of the main things I have noticed this year is people are people. No matter what language they speak or what color their skin, people are people. We all feel the same emotions, the same blood runs through all of our veins. I guarantee you that both Vietcong and American soldiers felt fear during the war, they felt what it was like to literally fight for your life. I hope to honor these people, even if only for a moment, by simply taking a second to remember them, to remember that they were people. Many were young men my own age, who were probably raised very similarly to how I was raised. They were brought up and had plans. They were planning to have a family some day, many might have wanted to go to law school when they returned home. Most I imagine probably missed their families and friends at some point, if not all the time.
Vietnam is not a particularly evil place, nor is it a particular joyful one. It is a place filled with people who need a savior. Unfortunately the government makes spreading the gospel a little more difficult than in other places, but so did the Roman Empire. Vietnam is not a hopeless place, there are people who are lost and confused, people who are searching for purpose and reason. I believe that Christ is their only hope. I believe only will these people be freed from their oppression when they embrace Christ as their true and lasting hope.
This month we are doing quite a number of various things throughout the city, none that I can go into great detail about. We are working with kids, cancer patients, the elderly, churches, anywhere and everywhere we can.
I ask you to join me this month in lifting up the people of Vietnam in prayer. I pray that this country with a dark past may come to know light. My prayer is that Vietnam can stand as a light on a hill to Southeast Asia, a symbol of hope. That by the time my children are my age, Vietnam will have gone from a country plagued by war to a country that is sending out missionaries to the rest of the world to sound the message of hope. That in space of two generations Vietnam has seen one of the greatest transformations a country has ever seen in this world. Please pray with me.
