SAN ANTONIO (BP)–Although enlisting in the Army in November of 1988 as a fresh high school graduate had its benefits — including college funding and following in his dad’s footsteps — it was God’s calling on his life that led Chaplain Aaron Nowland to join. Captain Nowland said he continues to feel that sense of calling and purpose, even while battling kidney stones.
“There were lots of scared 19- and 20-year-old soldiers,” Nowland said of the recent deployment to Iraq. “I wanted to encourage young soldiers and help change people’s lives by introducing them to Jesus Christ.”
God gave him good opportunities to talk with them and share his faith. “It was brief, but good,” he added.
Previously, Nowland pastored Shady Oaks Baptist Church, a mission of First Baptist Church, Malakoff, Texas. While on base, he attends Protestant services. At home in Mississippi, he is a member of Skene Baptist Church.
His wife, Liz, further described her husband’s calling. “He is a very high energy person for the Lord. He has this call on his life — all his life. He’s very enthused and wants to be there to help soldiers, to give back to his country,” she said.
Nowland described his feelings while in Iraq. “I had a sense of how easy it is to take things that we have here in America for granted.”
While overseas, Captain Nowland developed some problems with his kidneys and rested in a battalion aid station, waiting to return to the United States. Despite the pain he experienced resulting from his kidney stones, he was able to minister to military personnel in the hospital. Nowland led six people to Christ during his hospital stay, including an Iraqi citizen. One experience stands out.
Waiting in an Air Force holding facility in Kuwait for his plane flight, Nowland spoke with a young private from the Third Infantry Division named Jim who wondered how he survived a rocket-propelled grenade that hit his vehicle. Shot from a shoulder-hoisted launcher, RPGs are powerful and deadly, Nowland said, adding most people don’t survive such a catastrophe.
Nowland learned more about the private’s family as they spoke at the hospital, and he learned the man had attended church in the past. As he shared his own testimony, Nowland told of his salvation experience as a 7-year-old and described the godly home in which he was raised. He told Jim about the various times in his life that God had helped him through difficulties and tragedies.
God led Nowland into ministry at a young age through the tragedy of his junior high friend committing suicide, the chaplain told the hospitalized soldier. He continued to talk with Jim about God’s faithfulness and strength in tough times. When his 32-year-old brother-in-law passed away last year, God comforted the family through the trauma, he recalled.
When Nowland asked Jim if he had ever accepted Christ as his personal Savior, he said he had not, opening the door for Nowland to explain the plan of salvation. Lying in his hospital bed, Jim accepted Christ and asked Nowland if he could be baptized in the holding facility. To accommodate his request, a plastic tarp and Kuwaiti water were used to baptize the young soldier.
God worked in the midst of the suffering and tension of Operation Iraqi Freedom to bring salvation for Jim and others, Nowland said.
Nowland is currently at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, ridding himself of his kidney stones and preparing to “go down range” to join his battalion in Iraq.
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This article first appeared in the June 2003 edition of the “Texas Baptist Crossroads,” a publication of the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention. Used by permission. (BP) photos posted in the BP Photo Library at http://www.bpnews.net. Photo title: DIVINE APPOINTMENTS.
