CAMP ATTERBURY, INDIANA– We all get sucked into the health and wealth gospel to some degree. I think of a man living in my home town of Charlottesville who drives a black Humvee, ornate with chrome trim, and the license plate reads, “BLSSD”. Yeah, the blessing of the Lord sometimes looks like that.

I’ve certainly proclaimed the goodness of the Lord. I’ve emphasized that God is good, like a Father in Heaven who loves to give His children good gifts. I’ve preached that when we pursue God and His way for our lives, we find a happier, more fulfilled, more vibrant life.

Tonight I say a prayer of benediction at a deployment ceremony. Our training stage is finally finished, and the Division is ready to enter combat. Some of the soldiers I pray for will get hurt. Some of them will die. Can I proclaim the goodness of God to them?

It’s one of those moments in preparation for war. I know that God is bringing us hard times in the year to come. I know that God is putting us in the middle of a world of hatred, violence, explosive devices—a world of steel that rips flesh and an enemy that loves death, even the death of their own children (or, at least, the children of their community).

The Goodness of the Lord is harder to proclaim in the middle of all this. Goodness, blessedness, is most fully felt by me when I’m in the presence of my family. My wife and children near me. When will I know that blessedness and peace again? For me, it’s only a matter of days. I’m returning to Division Headquarters in Richmond to work with families in the rear for the next few months before going to Iraq. But for my soldiers, their next meeting with their families is far off in the unknown future.

There are so many Psalms that apply now to me and to my soldiers that didn’t mean a thing to me in my places of comfort.

“Deliver me from bloodshed, O God, O God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing aloud of your deliverance.” Psalm 51:14. “O God of my salvation.” It just means something different now.

One sergeant I spoke with recently shared his deeper fear with me. He said, “I’m not afraid of being hurt. I’m not really all that afraid of that, even dying…I’m afraid of killing. I just don’t want to have to do that. When it comes down to it, I’ll do it. But I told my wife, that after this I’m out. I can’t kill people.” So many that I speak with have the same misgivings. They know that when it’s down to kill or be killed, they will know what to do. They will kill. And they’ll do it not as much for their own sake as for the sake of the soldier at their side. “Deliver me from bloodshed…”

Can I proclaim the goodness of the Lord? We’re going into hard places, and soon. The Division begins moving to Kuwait this month, and then Iraq. I will proclaim the Goodness of the Lord, and we’ll wait and watch. I think my version of what it means to be “BLSSD” is going to change…but I suspect the Goodness of the Lord will not.