A Prayer for Our Warriors

To this place they came as students;
As warriors we send them back
Not to battle flesh and blood,
Not kings and rulers to attack,

But powers and principalities—
Which are so much more a threat—
Led by the Ancient Enemy
Defeated, but not destroyed as yet.

Count their years; a law may say
That they are old enough to die.
Some call it “ultimate sacrifice”
To defend home and family.

But they are babes; their faith is young:
Innocent, vibrant, but untried.
Do they see the cross? Do they know the cost?
Having put on Christ, they now have died.

And, yes, received life, but this promise made—
Greater than the vow of man and wife,
Greater than the oath a soldier takes—
Do they know it could cost them life?

They speak of homes and families.
More than English and education,
They have a burden, news to share:
They have truth; they have salvation.

How will they be received by them,
By those who are their very own?
As a messenger of good news?
Or a prophet despised in his home?

Your people fight an unseen war;
The Enemy wields despair and strife.
Here the great threat is complacency,
There the threat may be on their life.

Help us to train them quickly, Lord,
To teach them what they need to survive.
Show them that you are worth any cost,
Give them the courage they will need to thrive.

Hold these new believers in your care,
Foil the plans of the Enemy.
Guard their souls, we beg you Lord,
Their lives also, unless it cannot be.

Then make them like seed upon the earth,
Like seed that dies that life may be.
We ask that you use only their lives
But if not, Lord, in your mercy
Use their deaths.