Why Ask God Why? Wounded Times Kathie Costos March 27, 2016 For the majority of the Christian World, today is all about remembering when God actually proved them wrong.
The night before this day, they went to sleep with a lot of questions. They wondered how the Man they thought was the Son of God ended up suffering such a horrible death. They would have run what Jesus said a thousand times in their mind trying to make sense out of what they thought was the end of the story. How could they have believed Him? Why did God let it happen?
They had no way of knowing what would happen on the day the tomb would be found empty even though Jesus told them it would happen that way. As if that was not a strong enough piece of information to give, there was also the fact that it happened when everyone thought that Lazarus was gone forever too. It was even foretold hundreds years before it happened to Jesus, but they still did not believe the end was not really the end, but the beginning of an awakening.
Isaiah 53
7 He was oppressed and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth; he was led like a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before its shearers is silent, so he did not open his mouth. 8 By oppression and judgment he was taken away. Yet who of his generation protested? For he was cut off from the land of the living; for the transgression of my people he was punished. 9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death, though he had done no violence, nor was any deceit in his mouth. 10 Yet it was the Lord’s will to crush him and cause him to suffer, and though the Lord makes his life an offering for sin, he will see his offspring and prolong his days, and the will of the Lord will prosper in his hand. 11 After he has suffered, he will see the light of life and be satisfied; by his knowledge my righteous servant will justify many, and he will bear their iniquities.
It is easy to think they were happily shocked by the empty tomb. No one knows if any of them asked "why not" when they received word that Jesus lived again.
When something bad happens human nature takes over and we always want to know why it happened. Did we do something wrong? Did we deserve it? Could we have prevented it? Did God do it to us to punish us? How about, why did God spare us from it being a lot worse?
I am Greek Orthodox and we are known as Easter people because we celebrate the new beginning and rejoice over the fact that Jesus was willing to die for us but defeated death along with all our sins He carried on His shoulders. We will celebrate Pascha on May 1 this year. Let this day be a new beginning for you. A day when the person you were yesterday is let go of and take on a new life, free of sins and torment. Free from asking "why" and you begin to ask "why not" for the future. When you see a homeless person, remember Jesus was homeless too and depended on the kindness of strangers for food and shelter. Do not look for miracles that did not happen for you, like hitting the lottery last night when someone else did, but look for the miracles that happen every day in great as well as small ways in your own life. If you are grieving, then grieve knowing what is behind it. Is it for the loss you suffered or is it because you believe you deserved it? God does not send bad stuff into our lives but He does give us what we need to get through it. Stop and think rationally about what you could have done differently and then actually think about if it would have really been possible to do it with what you knew at the time and within what your human abilities would have allowed you to do. Veterans have a habit of thinking they could have done things that even a comic book super hero could not have done. Stopped a bullet? Jump in front of a buddy before the RPG was fired? Drive over a bomb before it went off? Spot a sniper before he pulled the trigger? Tell a buddy to duck? So many things you may want to believe could have happened when it actually could not have been possible for you because no matter how much you love, no matter how courageous you were, you are in fact still just human like the rest of us. Yet as a human, even you can defeat the death of all the good inside of you. Remember that you were willing to die for the sake of someone else and that required the purest form of love. Even in your grief, a part of you is still willing to sacrifice for those you lost. That is from love. Use that love to defeat what is haunting you and keeping you from rejoicing when you defeated death and survived combat. Don't keep wondering "why" it happened and start asking what you can do with the rest of your life for others. Time to roll the stone away and defeat PTSD. It does not have to win the rest of your life. Yesterday cannot be changed, but today can start to change at this very second.
Combat veteran attacked while on motorcycle by chase suspect fights back ABC 15 News Vivian Padilla
Mar 24, 2016
MESA, AZ - While waiting at a stoplight, a veteran's combat skills were put to the test when a wanted man, who led police on a chase , approached him from behind and tried to steal his motorcycle.
Brandon Jenkins was on his bike on Southern Avenue and San Jose when Joshua Michael Monigold, who was driving a white pick-up truck , ran out of the truck and tried to push Jenkins off of his motorcycle just as he was about to take off.
Jenkins, a combat veteran, fought back. He wasn't going to let his bike, which he purchased with money earned during his time in the military, get stolen.
"One minute this dude is trying to rip me off my bike and I'm trying to fight him," Jenkins said. "And then I see two cops pull up and draw their firearms." read more here
Marine Killed in Iraq 'Made Sure Everybody Got in the Bunker' Military.com
by Hope Hodge Seck
Mar 26, 2016
The remains of Marine Corps Staff Sgt. Louis F. Cardin of Temecula, Calif., arrive at Dover Air Force Base, Del., on March 21. (Air Force/Zachary Cacicia)
The commandant of the Marine Corps paid tribute to a staff sergeant killed by Islamic State rocket fire in Iraq last week, shedding new light on the circumstances surrounding the loss.
Staff Sgt. Louis Cardin, 27, a member of Battalion Landing Team 2/6, 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit, was killed by indirect fire March 19 at a new artillery outpost near Makhmour, Iraq, shortly after he and a small element of Marines had detached from the MEU in order to support the small post.
Speaking at a Marine Corps Association awards dinner near Washington, D.C. Thursday night, Gen. Robert Neller said three other Marines wounded in that same rocket attack were due to arrive back in the United States that evening, headed for Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Md.
Reflecting on Cardin's loss, Neller did not prevaricate about a fight that US officials still refuse to describe as a combat operation.
"The loss of a Marine is sad, but I thought about it: He was leading his Marines in combat," Neller said. "They were in indirect fire and he made sure everybody got in the bunker, and he just didn't make it in time. Is that sad? That's sad. But if you're going to go, you want to go in the fight. read more here
Operation Iraqi Truth: New Documentary Reveals Why War Is Hell Michael Ware spent seven harrowing years covering the Iraq War – and he has the scars to prove it Rolling Stone By Reeves Wiedeman March 25, 2016
By 2009, however, another IED attack debilitated Ware's senses of smell and taste – "I get too salty, too sweet, and that's about it" – and he soon realized he had to get out. He moved to Brooklyn, but found himself unable to walk to the corner store, much less work on the book he had a contract to write. He took assignments from CNN that sent him back to conflict zones. Eventually, he went on leave from CNN, citing post-traumatic stress disorder, and never went back. "That's when I started watching the tapes," Ware says. read more here
Only the Dead See the End of War HBO
His footage captures the violence, fear and confusion that defined the Iraq War, as well as his self-described “darkest moment” of the war, which haunted him long after he left the country.
Directed by two-time Oscar winner Bill Guttentag in collaboration with Australian journalist Michael Ware, Only the Dead See the End of War examines the Iraq War and its moral consequences through the story of the rise and fall of jihadi terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the founder of Al Qaeda in Iraq and the progenitor of ISIS. A harrowing and graphic account from both sides of the war zone, as well as an illuminating window into the origins of a modern terrorist organization, the film is told through visceral hand-held video footage culled from hundreds of hours that Ware shot while reporting over the course of the war. This unique, on-the-ground view is combined with eye-opening narration for a frank, unsparing look at the Iraq War unlike any before.
Arriving in Baghdad in 2003 as a novice reporter, Michael Ware was initially on a three-week assignment to cover the invasion of Iraq. He left seven years later, having gained unprecedented access to the Iraqi insurgency and American troops, as well as a myriad of demons -- the after-effects of witnessing seemingly endless, horrific violence. read more here
Logan County Jurors Hear Witness Testimony Regarding Shooting Of Lora Karras Times Record
By Pat McHughes
Paris Express
March 26, 2016
The jury heard testimony Friday that when Lora Karras, 40, was shot three times and killed in March 2014 at her home near Scranton she may not have been the intended victim.
The jury heard that information when a taped interview between a Logan County Sheriff’s Office investigator and the man accused of her murder was played in court. On the tape, the accused, Josh Johnson, 40, of New Blaine, described an argument he’d had with Jennifer Johnson, who was then his wife, which led to her taking their two children and leaving their home. During the interview, conducted the night of March 19, 2014, a few hours after Karras was killed, Johnson told then-investigator Ray Gack what happened next.
“I loaded my gun,” Johnson told Gack. “I got in my truck and drove down there. I was hoping to get Robert.”
Robert Karras is the husband of the deceased. However, he wasn’t home. After Johnson arrived at the Karras home on Rodeo Arena Road, according to testimony presented Friday, he shot Lora Karras three times with a shot gun.
Johnson has been charged with first-degree murder and his trial opened Thursday in 15th Judicial District Circuit Court in Paris. Johnson has entered a plea of not guilty by reason of mental defect or disease. His lawyers — public defenders John Irwin of Morrilton and Aubrey Barr of Fort Smith — contend that Johnson suffers from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder brought about by four tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan. Johnson served in the Marines. read more here
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