......to all of our veterans....especialy to those families who paid the ultimate sacrifice for our great country....by giving us your sons, daughters, husbands....and even wives...that were lost in battles on foreign soils.

Thank you....and may God richly bless you!!

Respectfully,

-- Anonymous, May 29, 2000

Answers

Amen!

-- Anonymous, May 29, 2000

Thank you, and may the God who gave our freedom to us, preserve and protect those freedoms as we continue to take the gospel to the world.

-- Anonymous, May 29, 2000

Thank you, Danny, for reminding us to remember our veterans who have served so self-sacrificially for our freedoms.

One doesn't see them very often anymore (I happened to see some people last Memorial Day) but for the VFW members and families who sell the poppies to raise money for the 'Veterans of Foreign Wars.'

It is a remembrance of those who gave their lives in 'Flanders Fields' and in every other area of the world. I think there was a poem titled 'Poppies in Flanders Fields' or some such.

If we see them, and give generous donations, it is a way to help the causes of the persons whom our government sometimes forgets.

May God heal all of the memories of those who suffered SO MUCH for love of country and its freedoms.

May every one of them believe in the Lord, who also suffered for each of them.

-- Anonymous, May 29, 2000

To share with all:

In Flanders Field The Legacy of Colonel John McCrae

Summer, 1915. World War I. English and French armies had dug in their heels against the bulldozer onslaught of the German army as it ploughed its way across the plains of Flanders. After a day of ferocious fighting following the second battle of Ypres, the sun rose on a relatively quiet battlefield.

Col. John McCrae cautiously poked his head above the security of his trench to be met with the horrifying sight of row upon row of makeshift crosses littering the plains before him: ghostly reminders of the grim aftermath of the earlier battle marking the graves of the fallen.

McCrae, a Canadian veteran of the Second Boer War and professor of medicine at McGill University in Montreal, was struck with admiration at the courage of the dead and overwhelmed by awe at their selflessness as he caught sight of the tiny, red poppies dancing lazily in the gentle breeze among the grave markers of his fallen comrads. Inspired by the sight, and by the memories of the previous days of vicious fighting, McCrae grabbed a pad of paper and pen and quickly began to write down the words that had suddenly appeared in his mind. In minutes, his creation was complete:

In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row, That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved, and now we lie In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe: To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders fields.

McCrae's fellow commanders read the poem and encouraged him to publish it. He submitted his simple poem to Britain's famous Punch magazine, which readily published it in a rarely-used bold type. The effects of the poem washed across Britain like a giant wave. All of Britain was moved and encouraged by the words, and the poem quickly spread thoughout the allied nations.

The poppy became a symbol of 'Life' and 'Resurrection': the red petals were the color of the blood that stained the battlefield; the yellow/black center represented the mud and desolation; the green of the stem became representative of the forests and fields where generations of men have died to make their land free; the stem itself symbolized the courage of the fallen soldiers. Life and freedom, all in this tiny, overlooked flower.

In 1918, a seriously-wounded Col. John McCrae was carried by stretcher to a rear base hospital on the coast of France and placed in a room where he might look out the window toward the Dover cliffs across the channel. He died three nights later.

McCrae's final words, according to his doctor, were: "Tell them this, if ye break faith with us who die, we shall not sleep." Colonel John McCrae was buried in the cemetery of Wimereux.

-- Anonymous, May 29, 2000