What Makes for Good Soldiers Yields Honorable Veterans

What Makes for Good Soldiers Yields Honorable Veterans

May 27, 2024

Host: Jamie Mitchell

Guest: Jeff Niklaus

Note: This transcript is taken from a Stand in the Gap Today program originally aired on 5/27/24. To listen to the podcast, click HERE.

Disclaimer:         While reasonable efforts have been made to provide an accurate transcription, the following is a representation of a mechanical transcription and as such, may not be a word for word transcript. Please listen to the audio version for any questions concerning this dialogue.

Jamie Mitchell:  Well, today’s a very special day on the American calendar. It’s Memorial Day and for most it marks the official beginning of the summer season, doesn’t it? But nationally today represents the time that as Americans, we should rightly pause and ultimately thank the Lord for what he’s done for America in the past and in a focused way to honor those who wore a uniform at some time in the past so that we could live free. Now originally Memorial Day was called Decoration Day. It was initiated after the Civil War on the recommendation of General John Logan in 1868. But it was originally established in thought I would say, by President Lincoln on November 19th, 1863 in the famous Gettysburg Address when he urged those then to pay homage to what he said, these honored dead at the dedication of the National Cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. So today we’re going to talk about giving honor to soldiers who served well and neither died in the process, or at least were willing to sacrifice their all for something greater than themselves.

Jamie Mitchell:  So what does it mean to be a good soldier in real life? What’s required to be a well-trained and disciplined soldier so that when unexpected circumstances arise in battle, that the soldiers respond and such a way so as to better ensure victory? Well, today on Stand in the Gap today I’m really honored to have a 20 year veteran soldier decorated and proven. He’s also a good friend who I was able to meet a number of years ago when he was speaking to a large group of leaders and primarily men here in Southeast Pennsylvania. Jeff Niklaus is his name. He received his first assignment in the hundred first Airborne Division and soon thereafter became qualified in the 60 Blackhawk helicopter. He served in multiple deployments, including the famous attack mission in Somalia of the hundred 60th special operations aviation regiment called the Gothic Serpent, where Jeff was the actual real life pilot of the Rescue Chopper or the attack chopper there on which the well-known movie and book Black Hawk Down was based.

Jamie Mitchell:  Jeff comes from a long military heritage with family serving in the US military going all the way back to the Revolutionary War. He’s also now the founder of Compliant Technologies, a 100% veteran owned business dedicated to assisting our dedicated law enforcement, our corrections, security officers, the surfacers and EMS at the local, state and federal levels along with serving our military forces, the tide life chosen for today’s program. The special day is what makes for good soldiers, yields honorable veterans. And with that I welcome to the program Jeff Niklaus. Jeff, thank you so much for taking the time to be with us on this important day.

Jeff Niklaus:        Sam, it is an honor to be here with you today and I appreciate the opportunity to speak on Memorial Day and just looking forward to the conversation that we have.

Jamie Mitchell:  It’s an honor to be here. Yeah, absolutely. And Jeff, when I look up the definition of soldier, of which you were one and many listening were, it says this, A man engaged in military service or a brave warrior, a man of military experience and skill, or a man of distinguished valor. And that’s the definition of soldier. When I consider the definition of veteran closely related, it says this veteran is just one who has been long exercised in anything. So if I condense these definitions, a soldier can be a good and brave, skilled and courageous soldier or simply someone who might don a military uniform. Same with veteran. Veteran is simply someone who has done anything for a period of time. But today, Jeff, to frame this, I want to talk about what it means to be a skilled and courageous soldier, one who serves faithfully for an extended period of time and earns the title of honorable veteran soldier for whom we take off our hats, express our thankfulness for their dedication and for whom God will say when applied in the spiritual sense to all Christians as soldiers of the cross. Well done. So we’re going to weave that thread today to Jeff as we talk about soldiers in real life as well as soldiers of the cross For you, just a quick thought, when you entered military service, having come from a long line, what drove you to consider being a soldier when you knew that that might mean giving up your life?

Jeff Niklaus:        Well, I think most people when they join the military never think anything’s going to happen to them. So they look at the adventure, they look at service the country, they look at serving their fellow man. I think part of it has to do with your upbringing. My dad was, is retired after 20 years in the Air Force. My brother and I both retired from the army, I as a W four and he’s a retired sergeant major. He spent a little more time than I did. But I think it has to do with your upbringing and sense of duty and you learn those traits. As a young kid growing up and I was in the Boy Scouts and I remember sitting in the front seat of a Marine Corps Cobra helicopter thinking this is what I want to do. And it was just that sense of excitement and aviation and thrill learning something new that drove me. It was a combination of things actually,

Jamie Mitchell:  And I’m sure that it is. Now take me to another thought that I’ve had. Many people have wondered this, but you as a pilot, you’ve been involved in flying many combat missions. You’ve been in harm’s way many times. When you look back at your life, you consider through history, soldiers, honorable soldiers and that kind of thing. If there’s one essential attribute or character trait that really makes the difference between a person who just puts on a uniform and is a soldier or is a good soldier worthy of honor and homage, which we do this day, what would be that character trait that you’d pick out most important?

Jeff Niklaus:        Well, I’m sure many people join the military for different reasons in different thoughts, but I think at the end of the day it really kind of boils down to service and that really kind of talks about what the Lord did. He washed the disciple’s feet, he was serving them and he showed us servant leadership. And I think at the end of the day we know that we serve a higher calling than ourselves. When you join the military, you don’t belong to yourself anymore. You acquiesce to the chain of command and those in authority over you and you’re willing to follow those orders to go places. Sometimes you may not always want to go, but you feel that your country’s made the decision that you need to go there. And so you respond to those orders and you’re obedient to ’em.

Jamie Mitchell:  You’re talking more about an attitude, it sounds like an attitude of servant leadership, which I used to be in office. I know that those who call people in office as servant leaders, most of ’em, they don’t have the right attitude, but that’s what you’re talking about there an attitude. So ladies and gentlemen, as we move into the program today, think of that this is Memorial Day. We honor those who have given their lives. A good soldier is doing something out of service to others for a cause higher than himself. And Jeff just touched on that. We’re going to build that out as we get into the next segment, the rest of the program and what actually goes into making a soldier an honorable soldier, we’ll talk about this. I think you’ll be surprised it’ll make application to all of us listening here today, whether you’ve actually been in the service or not.

Jamie Mitchell:  Well, our theme on this special day today is what makes for good soldiers yields honorable veterans, as in all nations, in all times soldiers are trained to fight all nations have soldiers or those nations can’t defend their borders or their people. Being a soldier is in fact an honorable profession of honorable service. Now while the effectiveness of various armies can vary based on numerous factors such as the number of men, the size of the army, the type of equipment and technology they may possess or the quality of their leadership or other factors, there is something that many people don’t consider but can’t be overlooked, be they an official soldier in the army, navy, or air force or every Christian as a soldier of Jesus Christ as described in two Timothy two, three, and four. And that is rigorous preparation. It’s a way of thinking attitudes, what Jeff talked about in that last segment attitude, it’s an understanding of authority and as described by the apostle Paul in Ephesians six 13, for the Christian soldier, the understanding that you have to have the right armor for the fight. Alright, Jeff, so many parallels, but as a military soldier trained and experienced as you are, you’re also a disciplined Christian and understand the remarkable parallels between being a successful soldier in the army of man as well as a successful soldier for truth and the Bible and what every Christian should be. That’s a soldier in God’s army. Now for the believer, we have a Bible as our guide, we know that. But what about the military, Jeff? Is there some kind of a manual that is used in the military that goes into making a good soldier?

Jeff Niklaus:        And you’re very nice to say that I’m a disciplined Christian. I’d like to be more and more disciplined and I’d like to have the fruit of the spirit a lot more. But anyway, that being said, yeah, there’s a parallel and I referred to the bible as a military document and because it says we don’t fight against flesh and blood, so we know that we’re in a battle like you said with two Timothy two, three, and four. What I find interesting is the Bible really kind of answers all the questions that we’d find in a five paragraph off order, which is held within our SOP standard operating procedures and SOPs are simply this. They’re the core plans and principles that we use in basic mission planning, preparation, execution, contingencies and all that in order to formulate plans and to develop a plan and then how we brief and execute the plan. So in other words, in lack of other information, if something happens, I always revert back to the SOP unless someone had briefed me on a specific change to something that happens. So the SOP is our foundational fundamental document that we use when we’re conducting operations just like the Bible is for Christian.

Jamie Mitchell:  Okay, and obviously you were involved in that operation in Somalia that gave rise to the book in the movie of Black Hawk Down. You went there on a mission you didn’t know. I believe exactly what you expect. A lot of men lost their lives, that was a big deal. So you can speak from experience and I’m sure you’ll weave it through as we go into this, but you mentioned this operations manual standard operating procedure and you mentioned five elements within that, like the Bible, Jeff, I’m sure the standard operating procedure for the military, it is not enough to know that they exist like the Bible. It’s fine to know it exists, but unless we actually read it, internalize it and know what it means, it doesn’t do us any good when we actually encounter the challenges of life. It’s got to be the same way for a soldier in uniform. So walk us, just walk down through here now let’s take this first one if you could, of these five specific orders of your standard operating procedure. Identify the first one if you could and explain it and weave it together. We walk down through this.

Jeff Niklaus:        Okay, lemme just back up real quick Sam. So our standard operating procedures is our main manual that covers everything we do within that SOP is our operations order, which tells us how we brief and there’s five aspects of that operations order and that’s within the SOP and those are mission, enemy situation, execution, command and signal and service and support. So we would have to answer all those questions as we, what is our mission, how are we going to execute that plan, what’s our enemy all about? And then what are the resources that we have and who’s going to be the chain of command and how do we communicate? That’s just kind of a broad brush aspect of the five paragraph op order within our SOP.

Jamie Mitchell:  Alright, so take mission, that’s the first one. Who determines the mission? How is that put together? How is that communicated to the soldier who will go out there on that line?

Jeff Niklaus:        So the mission, just from a broad spin for us and Operation Gothic circuit for example, that was communicated down from the National Command Authority and they decided that over a period from March of 93 onward, we developed this package and this package grew to, it became this almost flying armada with several Blackhawks and LittleBird involved with the mission. And so they would tell us that this is our mission and our mission at that point was to go after Muhammad Re ID and his organization. And so in that we actually did lots of planning where we had a lot of scenarios that were possible. We’d know that we’d be working in an urban or rural environment and you add into that maybe a convoy or a single vehicle or something like that. So you have to be flexible. And so we had different scenarios that we mapped out for that mission, but more often than not, it’s usually a single phase mission where you’re going after one individual at one target at one time. And so that mission is telling us who we’re with, what we’re going to do, what’s the timeline that we’re going to do it. And at the end of the day we talk about the planning, the phasing, basically the major muscle movements of what’s going to happen within this execution. And a lot of times the commander’s intent, which is part of mission, they have a last word and they normally say they’re going to reserve their comments to the end. And it’s kind of funny how the Bible reserves the final comments to the end.

Jamie Mitchell:  There is indeed. Let’s move on to the next one here and then we’re going to time together a little bit. What is the second then order? The first one, meaning mission, the plan, the phasing of it, the commander’s last intent, you talked about it. Now what about the second order? Order number two,

Jeff Niklaus:        The next thing we talk about is we start talking about enemy situation. A lot of times we’ll give a little update on friendly forces and part of the enemy situation is the weather and what we’re going to face. But for the most part, enemy situation is, okay, who are we going against? How are these guys equipped? What’s their morale? What motivates them? What do they believe in what? What’s the probable course of enemy action? If we do X, what’s Y? So on and so forth. Are they located right on target or is there a response time? What is that response time? How are they getting to the target? So on and so forth. So we answer those questions and that helps us kind of determine what we’re going to do in the next phases.

Jamie Mitchell:  And so just take these two, we’re going to go through the other ones in the next segment, two more and then the final one in the last segment. But compare, just draw now some spiritual comparisons here, mission enemy situation and put that together. Now make the comparison to every believer who has a well as a soldier of the cross, we have a mission too, and we engage in enemy too, don’t we?

Jeff Niklaus:        Absolutely. It plainly states in Ephesians six, and we can talk about that here in just a little bit, but to be on the mission, I would always tell people that in order for me to be a competent member of the crew or the mission, I would have to know about 25% cold, RSOP. And so I think you need to know the Bible, you need to know a lot of scriptures, you need to know how to be able to walk through them to rightly divide the word of God, to be able to share the gospel, so on and so forth. But the first thing you have to be is part of the army.

Jeff Niklaus:        So God is on a recruiting mission first, we’ve got to make sure we’re on the right side of this thing. Who are we fighting for? In Romans 12, one it says, I beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of God that you offer yourselves as living sacrifices holy and acceptable God, which is a reasonable act of worship. So we first have to surrender and sign up just like it says in two Timothy two, four, no one engaged in warfare, entangles himself for the affairs of this life that he may place him who enlisted him as a soldier. So we have to make sure that we’re surrendered to the Lord first and foremost, and then God uses us. He says, he who declares me before men, I’ll declare before my Father. And if you deny me before men, I’ll deny you before my father. And then in Romans one, I believe it’s 16 and 17, it says, I’m not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Jeff Niklaus:        I believe our mission is threefold. One is to establish relationship with God. Two, walk in light of his word under his obedience, under his authority as a good soldier of Christ, try to obey his word, praise his name and thirdly, recruit other people into the rank of your army and tell the people about the Lord and what he can do for them. And then the enemy situation is being situationally aware. We know that in two Peter five, eight talks about the devil, how he likes to walk about like a roaring lion seeking whom he maid of our Jesus said in Luke, if you’re not with me, you’re against me. And he does not gather with me scatters. So we know that our enemy is real and we know that that war started in Genesis, Genesis three when God told the serpent, you will bruise his heel but he’s going to crush your head. So he was given a death sentence right then and there and he’s been fighting tooth and nail ever since that time. Even though they know they’re defeated because of what happened, the gsem and democ came up to Jesus.

Jamie Mitchell:  Okay, just hold that. You have to hold that Jeff, we’re just right out of time ladies and gentlemen. Bear this in mind now we’re talking about soldiers. What makes for a good soldier? It starts with a mission. Do we understand that we’re in a battle, we have to start there. We’re in a war. What’s our mission? Can we say that? Can we identify that? Do we know who the enemy is? Well, we should. If we don’t, we can’t win. We’ll come back. We’ll continue in the standard operating procedure. Well, on this memorial day, we really truly honor all of those who as soldiers fought and died that we could be free. It is right that we do that. But you know that we should also daily honor all of those who serve right now or have served faithfully as good soldiers, our honorable veterans because it’s the right thing to do.

Jamie Mitchell:  Now, as there are good and faithful and courageous soldiers, there are soldiers who are cowardly, even traitorous. Same thing with politicians, same thing with veterans. It’s across the board right now in a biblical sense, there are faithful soldiers. According to two Timothy two, it says in that passage, soldiers who are obedient to the commander, there always must be a commander. Somebody’s got to be in charge If you’re a soldier, that passage talks about a good soldier being one, able to endure hardness, not some softie who gives up and throws up his hands at the first encounter of difficulty. No, no describes a good soldier as one who is faithful to the mission. We just talked about mission in the last segment and one who’s able to remain focused during times of distraction and in times of battle and there’s always distraction in times of battle.

Jamie Mitchell:  Well, it’s this soldier who either on the literal physical battlefield or engaged in the spiritual warfare as the Bible is as our standard operating manual so describes it’s this individual that we really want to highlight and honor today. Because what it is that makes a soldier worthy of commendation by the general or the president or the king or in the case of a Christian, not necessarily in physical uniform, but a Christian as a soldier worthy of hearing. Well, we want to hear, don’t you? That phrase by our king of kings. Well done. The parallel was just incredible. Anyways, let’s move. Let’s move further now, Jeff, you don’t mind. You described the first two mission and then enemy situation. We’ve got to know what are we about? We’re in a battle. What’s the mission? Where are we going? What are we trying to achieve? And then they got to know about the enemy. Got to get inside their head a little bit, know a little about how they’re going to respond because so much of a strategic, but let’s go into the third one here. Now what do we need to go? What is the third order as you are defining them?

Jeff Niklaus:        Well, I kind of refer to, as I’ve been looking at second Timothy really is kind of the cliff notes of where we find ourselves in the world. And as deciding especially as America, you could kind of use that as that book, as your whole operating procedure for what we need to do until the Lord comes back to get us. And so that it talks a lot about execution, really talking to Timothy about fighting the good fight and maintaining his character, maintaining the truth, and always teaching and teaching others, so on and so forth through discipleship. So we see a lot that the Lord talks about how we’re to take up our cross daily and follow him. We’re supposed to deny ourselves, we’re supposed to tell other people about. And it’s like we already mentioned Romans one 16 and 17. I’m not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Jeff Niklaus:        And I think that as we do this execution and we don’t know, that’s what I really believe. We’re going down this road in life. We have no idea where the twist and turns are. Just like in the military, we always say in the military the plan is only the foundation for change. You just never know what’s going to happen and when. And I remember we went through some trials and some business things that we dealt with at one point. And my question to my wife at the time who’s a strong believer, I said, are we Christians or are we Fairweather Christians? You were just bringing this up, Sam, about how you act. And that time determines really, it shows who you belong to. So we need to execute letting people know whom we belong to and that we’re not ashamed of our commander in chief, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And I think that’s what we do. We just continue to move forward. We continue to press on and just like the song says, I’m a Christian soldier marching off to war,

Jamie Mitchell:  Jeff, it’s a little tough to be a soldier just in theory, right? I mean, I suppose you do have to have individuals in the military who sit back and read the books. That’s important. You do have to know about these things. But if a guy or someone in a uniform only ever sat in a room and read books and talked about what was or whatever, but never actually got out there on the field, pretty hard for me to consider that person certainly not be an engaged soldier, right?

Jeff Niklaus:        Yeah. I mean look at this. It wasn’t in the book of James. It doesn’t say that you have your salvation by works, but I’ll show you my faith by my works, right? And you look at Paul, Paul, the ministry he talks about in SEC Corinthians, the light afflictions that we face. And here you look at a man that was beaten five times minus one. So when they beat him the fifth time they pulled down his shirt, they just saw a man who was riddled with scars, stoned shipwreck. A day in the night in the deep, there’s a man that walked his faith and he talks about the martyrs of the apostles. People would say they were either insane or they saw something, experienced, something they can’t explain that really gave over their lives to the mission of telling people about Jesus and their experience with him as apostles.

Jeff Niklaus:        And so this Holy Spirit moves in with us to help us to execute. Jesus said He has my commands and keeps them as he who loves me and he who loves me will be loving my father and I will love him, show myself to him. And so I think it’s a matter of just a constant denying, a constant surrender and a constant just moving forward, even though our fun meter gets pegged, and it’s not always where we want to be, but it’s where God puts us and it’s how we respond where God puts us. That really matters when we’re in this fight because it is a fight

Jamie Mitchell:  Mission, understanding the enemy that we’re in a fight. Third is execution is talked about that. I mean, soldier does something, doesn’t sit on his hands. And as a Christian, we’ve got to do something. If we just sit in our hands, we’re not a soldier. Let’s go to the number fourth, and I’m going to ask you to pull this together and share just a bit if we can about how some of these things actually you experienced it in that Somalian attack. But order number four, what is that?

Jeff Niklaus:        The fourth paragraph is command and signal and command and signal basically outlines, okay, who’s our chain of command? Where are they located? If I need to call them, what is their call sign? We have an execution checklist in different phases of the operation and we talk about contingency communications and things like that. And so command, we already know who our chain of command is. We already talked about the enemy has a chain of command, their spiritual wickedness, high places, dark forces, and all the other things that are listed in Ephesians six. But we know that our chain of command is God the Father, God the Son. And God the Holy Spirit lays out in, I believe his first John. It says they’re all one. And Jesus said in Matthew 28, 18 to 20, all authority has been given unto him. So we know who we belong to, we know who we’re serving, and we know that he’s the commander.

Jeff Niklaus:        He’s given us his intent and his intent is to obey his word. And so we know that we can fall back on the SOP, what it says, how we execute, but the command and signal, it’s setting everything up just to make sure that we know how to communicate. So God, how do we communicate? God gives us his word. Two Timothy three 16. All scripture is breathed out by God and prophet for teaching with proof, correction and training and righteousness that the man of God may be competent, equipped for every good work. So we know that we can trust in the Bible, that we know that it’s God breathed and that we can act upon those words of His. And then also in communication and prayer, one Thessalonians five 17, pray ceaselessly. And we know that as we go, we’re able to communicate with the Lord. We know he hears us. And one of the things that I need to work on more, and I’m sure a lot of people do, is just sitting and meditating being still because I don’t know how to be still to listen to the Lord speaking to us. And that’s I think that we’ve kind of lost sight of and just sitting listening to the norm be still and know that I am God.

Jamie Mitchell:  Jeff, so well stated, don’t have much time left, but just a little bit. Can you think of a circumstance of something that happened in that attack there in Somalia that black, what gave rise to Black Hawk down movie in book? Can you think of something of one or more of these points so far that you actually put into effect that you would otherwise would not have done had you not known this standard operating procedure?

Jeff Niklaus:        I can’t say that I can’t pick out any one thing, but here’s what I will say when we talk about anything can happen at any time, nobody ever thought this was going to happen. And what should have been a 30 minute mission turned into a 24 hour ordeal. And so there was a lot of fluidity. And had we not been able to communicate via our radios, we were going to different places in the operations area, whether they’re going back to gas or going to holding or waiting for follow on orders, we would’ve been up the creek, so to speak. So communication and understanding the chain of command, you just can’t go willy-nilly doing what you want. You ask permission to do things before you do it. Had we lost control of that, the mission would’ve been even more chaotic. And I will tell you that there’s a lot of people that hold people in high esteem, and I tell you the guys that were on the ground that day, I hold in high esteem because they were outnumbered and outgunned and they fought their way through and came out the other side with minimal loss compared to the enemy.

Jamie Mitchell:  Ladies and gentlemen, there’s a little bit of a thread you’re seeing here. My special guest, Jeff Niklaus, was one is the Black Hawk Pilot in that event in Somalia years ago. And when confronted with circumstances that were going awry, they went back on and they navigated. Those people did because they knew standard operating military procedures. Some of those we’re going through now. Well, same in our Christian life, same in our is exactly the parallel is just amazing. Now, the last one, there’s a fifth one, I’m going to tell you what it is, service and support. We’re going to talk about this last one and tie this whole together in the next segment. Well on this special day, Memorial day. And I hope that you’re having a great time with your family or you did if you’re listening to this program later in the day with your family or others, but that you’ve taken time to consider and give honor to those who have given their life soldiers.

Jamie Mitchell:  And if they’ve done, they’ve lived a long time and done it well, they are veterans. We’re talking today as we bring some things together, what makes for good soldiers yields honorable veterans. And if you’ve been listening, we’ve woven together the soldier on the battlefield of real life, the man in the army or the woman in the army or air force or the Navy, that kind of soldier. But scripture talks about all of us who know the Lord as soldiers we’re soldiers of the cross. And so there’s a parallel we’ve woven through here. Now, while the Bible and Jeff or my special guest today, Jeff Niklaus has compared the Bible as our operating manual, our standard standard meaning commonly accepted for all believers operating procedure, telling us how to conduct ourselves, that that is really the paramount example of what is in fact a military document approach of standard operating procedure that he and others learned when they’re in the military.

Jamie Mitchell:  And that he put into practice when he was a part of that group that went into Somalia and engaged horrendous firefight. And they did come out victorious even though there were 18, at least American military who died in that event. But here as we wrap this thing up, while the Bible in our reference to it is not a military document per se, it does describe the qualifications of a good soldier. It does talk about fighting well and dying well, it does talk about mission, discipline, weapons, courage, commendation and reward, and Jesus Christ as king of kings and the Archangel Michael, for example, as the leader of the army of heaven. So it talks a lot about military and soldiers. While the Bible is not an education document per se, it does talk about learning knowledge and truth and God in the Bible as the embodiment of all truth and wisdom.

Jamie Mitchell:  Then while the Bible is not a medical manual per se either, it does talk about health being of a sound mind of physicians and God as the great physician, doesn’t it? And while the Bible is not a financial or accounting document per se, either, it does talk about business, profit and loss, debt or surplus, and that all wealth comes from God and that we are to be his stewards in all things. And while the Bible’s not a political document either, it does talk of government servant leadership, honor, justice, and forbidding, bribery, corruption and lying. And it does say God is the law giver, the judge and the king before whom we will all one day give a full account. So the Bible truly is the operating manual of all operating manuals in all areas of life. Today we’re just applying it to the military. So Jeff, as we’ve kind of woven through these things in light of a military standard operating procedure that you put into effect that you learned, and you described it a little bit, knowing and doing it as we do in life toward God, they’re two different things, knowing and doing two different things.

Jamie Mitchell:  But there is one last order. Number five. I’d like for you to identify this principle as we conclude the special program today. What is that? Number five? And tie it together with the previous four, please.

Jeff Niklaus:        Yeah. The fifth paragraph is service and support. How are we going to be equipped? What other support mechanism do we have in place and exactly what do we have to meet the enemy? If you look at service and support, we know that we have our commander in chief. Jesus says that at the end, we’ve already referenced Matthew 28, but the very last part of those verses in 20, he says, lo, I’m with you always. Ephesians says, we’re sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise. God has filled us with this Holy Spirit because we know that we bring nothing to the table, but our sin, God allows us to come along with him in this thing we call life. But the factor is we’ve got to be part of that military. We’ve got to be part of his force, part of his army, to enjoy the benefits of that service support like he talks about in Philippians, when we can rest in him and he’ll give us the piece that surpasses all understanding. He talks about when we give, he presses it down, shakes together, and our cup runs over. So the idea here is a total surrender, a total understanding that God has everything that we need, that we may not always have it when we want it. He gives it to us when we need it. And I just think that we pointed out today how very much a military operations order, five paragraphs fit into all the aspects of walking in this world while we’re here as soldiers of Christ until he calls us home. And at the end of the day, we all want to hear well done thou good and faithful servant.

Jamie Mitchell:  Or at least we should, shouldn’t we? I mean, you’re a decorated soldier, are you not,

Jeff Niklaus:        Jeff? Well, I have some things they gave me. Yeah. Okay.

Jamie Mitchell:  Alright. We’ll leave it there. Yes you are. You have received commendation, but we have not stood before our Lord, the commander of all commanders, the king of kings. Yet I know you want to hear that word. Well done. Just exactly what you said. As a soldier, I want to hear it as someone who served as a minister of God in government for 18 years and doing what I’m doing now. Every person listening ought to want to hear. Well done. Let ask.

Jeff Niklaus:        Let me just say something real quick. Sure. Yeah. Matthew seven, it talks a lot. I used to think about broad and wide is a road that leads to destruction and narrow way the way to find that that enters into eternal life. And few there in that find it. I always thought that that meant people outside of Christianity, but it’s actually at the very end of that chapter, God said, they said to the Lord, did we not cast out demons your name and do all this stuff in your name? So my point is this, if you have a head knowledge and you haven’t truly surrendered to the Lord, you’re really not as his army. And you may need to go back, sit back and evaluate where are you in your life right now? What are your priorities and where are you heading? That’s my thought.

Jamie Mitchell:  Oh, that’s a great thought. That’s a great thought, Jeff. It was several weeks ago. We had Dr. George Barn on this program and shared some recent information. It’s just incredible. It had to do with the change in values and spiritual beliefs of Americans following and during the pandemic just last three years, the biggest change occurred in those who said they were born again. And that group of those who said they were born again in America by 40% moved away from God, they moved away from God at a time when challenge comes. That’s what we’re talking about today here, ladies and gentlemen. A circumstance does not determine, well, it doesn’t determine the man. It determines what kind of man it was there. So as Jeff put out that plea right now, okay, if you are a soldier of the cross, you think you are. Well, what is your relationship with the Lord?

Jamie Mitchell:  Because just knowing the Bible doesn’t make one a Christian, it’s a relationship through Jesus Christ and faith in him alone. We have just a little bit of time left here. Not much Jeff, but this question, service and support, many soldiers in battles find themselves losing because they don’t have the support and the service at that point. Just quickly as a soldier, Christian soldier, actually, we’re out of time right now. We’re not going to have it. Ladies and gentlemen, I’m going to put it in your mouth, Jeff. Ladies and gentlemen, what is your source of service and support? It should be the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit, if he lives within you, gives us as a soldier what we need when we need it. Jeff Niklaus, thank you so much for being with us on this special day. God bless you in your service to the country and your service, to our Lord, God bless you. Ladies and gentlemen, hope you’ve had a great day today on this Memorial Day.