Mark Ellis, seasoned ASSIST senior correspondent, brings a great testimony:

Navy Chaplain Carey Cash’s unit lost the first man in the US invasion of Iraq known as Operation Iraqi Freedom. They also fought the most pivotal battle in the collapse of Baghdad. Through it all, God proved himself mighty in battle, sending angelic protection during the most intense fighting of the war.

‘We had the first man killed in action in the whole war in our unit and fought what many believe is the most decisive battle in the fall of Baghdad,’ the great grandnephew of legendary singer Johnny Cash, told Baptist Press recently.

After 40 days and nights in the Kuwaiti desert, the First Battalion, Fifth Marine Regiment crossed the line into harm’s way in Iraq on March 20, 2003 — the start of the invasion that led to the toppling of Saddam Hussein.

 

 

 

 

 

Chaplain Cash leads men in prayer in Kuwaiti desert

 

Revival, even in Hussein’s palace…
Chaplain Cash played a key role leading many to Christ during a crucial period in the run-up to the war. As they camped in the Kuwaiti desert awaiting the invasion, he asked the men if they would like to explore what it means to follow Christ, proposing that they join him for a 12-week Bible study.

The first half of the Bible study took place before the invasion. During those 40 days and nights, Chaplain Cash held classes and conducted daily counselling sessions with Marines who grappled with the claims of Christ. As the eternal consequences of battle confronted them, their hearts softened. Just before crossing into combat, 60 Marines received Christ and were baptised.

Several others were born again and baptised while in combat, including one inside Saddam Hussein’s palace on Palm Sunday.
In that Marine battalion of 1,000 men, Carey Cash said, ‘About one out of four had a profound spiritual awakening.’ In all, more than 250 men either made professions of faith or rededicated their lives to Christ. In addition to those baptised during the deployment, many more were baptised in their churches on returning to the USA.

Prayers answered during invasion
When his battalion crossed the border in the early morning darkness of the invasion, they were surprised to encounter a line of Iraqi tanks.’ Intelligence had not reported their presence,’ Chaplain Cash said. ‘Their turrets were levelled at us and they were fully manned. We were exposed, at a point of critical vulnerability.’

Amazingly, the Iraqis never fired their guns and 3,000 enemy soldiers surrendered. The following day the company commander told Chaplain Cash, ‘If their main guns had fired all it would have taken is one round to hit one of our armoured personnel carriers and 20-30 Marines would have been dead in an instant.’

Chaplain Cash saw it as a direct answer to prayer. ‘I remembered countless letters I had received from churches saying we are praying specifically when you cross that border, that God would restrain and confuse the enemy,’ he recalls. ‘The fact that those guns never fired and 3,000 enemy soldiers surrendered en masse tells me God answered the prayers of the people back in the US.’

Angels fighting for them
The battalion also endured a nine-hour ambush in the fight to take the presidential palace of Saddam Hussein. The ambush hit at 4am when 1,000 of Saddam’s best troops unleashed all their fury, with 1,500 rocket-propelled grenades shot at the lead elements of the company.

When Chaplain Cash interviewed the soldiers the next day, he was shocked by what he found. ‘What I saw was not a battalion licking its wounds, but it looked like a group of men who walked through the Red Sea,’ he told CBN. Many of the men felt the divine protection of angels helping them in the battle.

‘They shared that rocket propelled grenades would come right at them and then curve and go around them. Untold Marines told me that rockets would come at them and then dive down as if batted away by some unseen hand. We had one rocket go through a Humvee passenger-side window and explode in the compartment. Without a doubt that should have killed every man in the vehicle,’ he noted.

But something miraculous happened instead. Inexplicably, the explosion blew the front of the windshield out – it exploded out instead of in – and not a single man was injured.

Over and over again Chaplain Cash heard amazing reports. Psalm 91 – the ‘Soldier’s Psalm’ along with Joshua 1:9 – were carried close to the men’s hearts, convincing them they were not in the fight alone.

Afterward the invasion
Following the war, Carey Cash became the lead pastor at Evergreen Chapel, the nondenominational church at Camp David. In that role, he often preached to President Obama.

 

 

 

 

 

Evergreen Chapel at Camp David

 

So not only did Chaplain Cash play a critical role influencing hundreds of fighting men, he also had the ear of their Commander-in-Chief, whenever the Obamas visited Camp David.

In 2004 Lt Carey Cash wrote a memoir of his Iraq experience, A Table in the Presence – regarded as a ‘great easy inspiring read.’

 

Available from Koorong Bookstore – See Resources.

 

 

Mark Ellis is founder of the acclaimed www.Godreports.com. Also recommended: www.assistnews.net