Got this thing on Facebook, but it’s very little different from stuff I’ve been getting for years via email. Here it is in full, with picture attached:
***A MUST SHARE***A young man working in the army was
constantly humiliated because he
believed in God. One day the captain
wanted to humiliate him before the
troops. He called the young man and said:
– Young man come here, take the key and go and park the Jeep in front. the young
man replied: – I cannot drive! The captain
said: – Well then ask for assistance of
your God! Show us that He exist! The young man takes the key and walked
to the vehicle and begins to pray…… …He
parks the jeep at the place PERFECTLY
well as the captain wanted. The young
man came out of the jeep and saw them
all crying. They all said together: – We want to serve your God! The young soldier was astonished, and
asked what was going on? The CAPTAIN
crying opened the hood of the jeep by
showing the young man that the car had
no engine. Then the boy said: See? This is
the God I serve, THE GOD OF IMPOSSIBLE, the God who gives life to what does not
exist. You may think there are things still
impossible BUT WITH GOD EVERYTHING IS
POSSIBLE.
To the person reading this, I pray the Lord work A SUPER MIRACLE in your life today that would look like a lie In Jesus Name I Pray..
Write ‘Amen’ to claim this prayer
The weird irregular line lengths, the punctuation, the rumpled language, all are verbatim from the Facebook post, and absolutely typical of the multiply-forwarded stuff I get via email. Whoever does these things has equally meager computer and linguistic skills.
There is so much wrong with this, but I’ll touch on only two items:
First: Considering the level of religiosity the military is known for, the claim that he was “was constantly humiliated because he believed in God” is pure horseshit. It’s KNOWN that atheists are the ones treated badly by the brass.
Second: To me, the really amazing thing about little stories like this is that they’re MADE UP. They’re complete fictions. And yet — and here’s the crucial point — THEY’RE USED TO JUSTIFY BELIEF IN GOD.
I have friends back in Texas who have sent me stuff like this for years. I just know they come across these things and nod knowingly to themselves “See?! See?! God can do ANYTHING!!” — never realizing if the story itself is false, the thing it appears to justify must be on damned shaky ground.
The comments to the piece are a mix of critical and fatuous, and some of the fervent believers — “amen,god can do all things, that man can,t” — are disturbing on several levels.
My daughter was healed of infantile spasms when I decided to take a leap of faith and take her off her medicine.. She has not had a seizure since. Our faith in Jesus is what will make us whole. By his stripes we are healed. Don’t listen to people who are Godless and faithless. Instead pray for them.
I especially liked this one:
To the people questioning if the Army is “serving for god”… I’m not serving for god. I do not believe in god. I believe in freedoms and rights, and I believe in your right to believe in whatever you please. Like, you can totally believe this bullshit post that is completely fake and would NEVER be allowed to happen, and would NEVER be able to happen.. considering all soldiers learn how to drive in basic training.
One commenter really nails it, though:
I’m all for a touching religious post. But this picture is of a soldier, SSG Lonnie Roberts, crying at the memorial service of a fellow soldier named Gregory Huxley Jr, who was killed in action. Whoring his picture out for cheap likes alongside an obviously fake story is shameful and wrong, and whoever created this post is a terrible human being.
And yes, that’s true about the source of the picture, as you can see here: Pulitzer Archives.