Going to the United States Army War College is an honorable and desirable assignment. Located in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, the War College has a one-year master’s program that is setup in two semesters. The students and their families arrive in the summer for a year of get-togethers and classroom learning.
“During Mark’s first semester, the Senior Leadership Branch contacted him (along with eight others) about going to Iraq in December. It is unheard of to pull students from the War College. So this was a big deal,” Sandy Troutman explained of her husband’s one-year deployment to Iraq. The students would finish the following year.
Some children “keep their own counsel.” One day Sandy took her children, Anna and Nathan, to Boyds Bears near Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. There they could build bears by stuffing them with meaningful colored beans: yellow for laughter, green for imagination, blue for friendship, red for love, and purple for bravery.
“I was helping Nathan fill the bear, thinking he might want a full rainbow of beans,” Sandy said. Nathan only wanted two colors: red and purple.
“Mom, this bear is for Dad. I want it filled with love so that Dad is filled with love. So he knows God loves him, we love him and that he has all the love he needs. Dad needs a lot of courage right now, so the rest is for courage,” Nathan said quietly with earnest eyes.
“I managed to choke out something along the lines of ‘his bear being just perfect.’ Needless to say, we did not fill the bear with many of the other colors.”
“As I carry this story in my heart, I realized that for all of my expertise in the human heart, Nathan knew with the simplicity of a child what was needful and really counted. His words expressed a love so pure that it hurt in its blinding brilliance.”
Nathan named the bear Mark Bear. It stayed with him for a long time, quietly going where we went, and in Nathan’s arms every night. Anna and Nathan also sent a tiny bear to Mark from Boyds Bears that day as a symbol of the bears waiting at home for him. When Mark returned in October 2005, Mark Bear faded onto the shelf of beloved but no longer necessary toys. The bears took Mark and Nathan to the other side of a very long year.
Thank you for speaking to the heart in remarkable ways.
“For out of the overflow of his heart his mouth speaks.” (Luke 6:45b)