ENCOURAGING ANGELS: Remembering One ‘Private First Class’ And The Weapons Of War Provided Through God’s Word And Prayer For God’s People

This is a repost. This article was originally posted to The Encouraging Angels Blog on May 31, 2022.

By Stan Szymanski

My wife and I went to visit and honor my Dad at his marker in the cemetery today. He passed 19 years ago and he and his fellow deceased veterans were remembered for Memorial Day with special flags and touchstones to commemorate their service to our country.

Stanley J. Szymanski, first American born son (1918) to his Polish immigrant family, enlisted after the events of Pearl Harbor. He trained at Fort Dix. Stan went to Mexico with his new Army buddies on leave and got his first hangover and dysentery all at the same time.

My father literally fought his way (with the help of the U.S. Army) across the Pacific from 1942 to 1945. This personal campaign included stops in the Philippines, New Guinea, Luzon and Leyte, just to name a few places in his tropical engagements.

My dad and his company saw a lot of action and he carried most of those experiences quietly with him during the rest of his 84 years to his final rest.

Dad made note of one South Pacific engagement in particular. His company had been sent to a small island to engage the Japanese and they took up position a few miles from those of the land or the rising sun.

The men had to ford a stream that was approximately chest high so they formed a chain to safely cross the water. The water was rapid; the string of men broke and my father was sent hurtling downstream.

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As he was thrown violently to and fro by the whitewater, he jettisoned his pack, then his rifle and belt. He finally was able to halt his horrendous ride and get onshore a few miles down river. As he crawled ashore, artillery started to fall just above his location. He looked across the tributary and saw a number of the men in his platoon waving frantically for him to run to them. My father had beached himself literally underneath a Japanese position. When the chain had broken in the river, one of the men ran back to their base, told the leadership what had happened and they called in an artillery strike so that the men would have a chance to retrieve Stan.

If not for God’s hand and an accurate artillery barrage, I really do not think that I would be here to write this as the chances of my father making it out of that situation and eventually starting a family would be slim.

Later in the operation in the Pacific and specifically after the battle in Leyete in 1945, P.F.C. Szymanski had a chance to go home on leave for a few weeks. But it depended on he and another soldier drawing lots for a seat on the ship. After drawing his lot, he said that he felt that his luck was so bad that he just turned and left to take a leak in the bamboo. To his shock the commander came to find him to tell him that he was the winner and that he would get a few weeks home on leave.

While he was on the ship in the Gulf of Leyte waiting to cast off, the U.S. dropped the first nuclear weapon on Japan which meant that Stanley J. Szymanski was going home for good.

The U.S. Servicemen and women who fought not only in WW2 but in all wars since then did not necessarily have good luck or bad luck. What they shared in common was a love of country and a fierce commitment to those whom they fought with to protect the lives of their friends and to accomplish their mission.

The fact that despite all of the impending totalitarianism that has been foisted on the American people as of late (and with more in store), we can make up our mind to walk and act as a free people and to fight fiercely for our family and friends to keep, restore and maintain the freedom that the forefathers of this country envisioned for us.

This commitment is what motivated men like my father to enlist to not figuratively but actually to fight for America’s freedom when we were attacked. Today, America is being attracted from all sides in a very different type of warfare. Impending famine and attack in our food supply–oil, gasoline and diesel prices that have all doubled–sky high home prices and rent–lethal untested injections that have killed tens of thousands and injured more than a million people and despots who try to pass legislation take away our rights. This war against America is designed to take our God-given rights and to extinguish us as a free people.

The next time you are at a cemetery and see the grave of a veteran ask yourself if you can muster the same gumption that they did to fight the fight for the freedom and survival of a nation by resisting tyranny where we might once again have freedom, life and liberty for all.

My father was not a Godly man in any way until the very end of his life, but he prayed -many times- while he was in the midst of battle; especially hand to hand combat. Dad did not carry the standard knife issued by the Army. His father was college educated in Krakow but during the depression used his skills as a blacksmith to work in the mills in Pittsburgh in order to pay the bills. He made my father a knife that Dad would carry throughout his entire time in the Pacific theatre. It was perfectly balanced and could cut a limb off of a tree that was as thick as your wrist with one swing.

In the attack that is now put upon America, we all need  weapons with which to strike the enemy that is offered to us by our Heavenly Father-prayer and God’s Word. If you are not a Godly person and are not praying for help to fight and for God’s provision it is because you are not in the fight; you are most likely asleep.

Your enemies are upon you. Sometimes you are in water that is chest high. Sometimes you are cast into the midst of an enemy position. Sometimes you are engaged in the one of the most epic battles of the war (in my Dad’s case, Leyte). Although I could share many scriptures with you on this subject, today I share Psalm 3 with you that you, through the power of God, may take the fight to the enemy:

1 Lord, how are they increased that trouble me! many are they that rise up against me.

2 Many there be which say of my soul, There is no help for him in God. Selah.

3 But thou, O Lord, art a shield for me; my glory, and the lifter up of mine head.

4 I cried unto the Lord with my voice, and he heard me out of his holy hill. Selah.

5 I laid me down and slept; I awaked; for the Lord sustained me.

6 I will not be afraid of ten thousands of people, that have set themselves against me round about.

7 Arise, O Lord; save me, O my God: for thou hast smitten all mine enemies upon the cheek bone; thou hast broken the teeth of the ungodly.

8 Salvation belongeth unto the Lord: thy blessing is upon thy people. Selah. (Psalm 3, KJV)

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Stan Szymanski (or Encouraging Angels) is not a medical doctor. This is not medical advice. In all matters pertaining to the health and care of a human being consult a medical doctor. This is not legal, financial or personal advice. Consult appropriate professionals in those fields for that type of advice.