Let Freedom Ring!

00:13 - Speaker 2 Top of the morning to you. It's July 4th weekend and this is Dick Foth with Stories from the Road. I've entitled this podcast my thoughts on this podcast. Let Freedom Ring. 00:27 Freedom is the trumpet sound in the history of these United States of America. Isn't it, within that broader freedom, the key thing? When people are asked what do you think about freedom, they talk about it being individual freedom. About freedom, they talk about it being individual freedom. I'm sitting here on July 4th weekend, it's a warm Colorado day and I'm listening to people play in the background and cars go by and I see birds fly over and I'm thinking this is what it feels like to be free to be able to talk to you, to say things I think are important. 01:09 But if you go back 250 plus years, you end up with this thing called the Declaration of Independence. It was adopted on July 4th 1776. It begins this way we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal, that they're endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Then, a number of years later, 11 years later, on September 17, 1787, you have the US Constitution adopted. It begins this way we, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, ensure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense. Provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity. To ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America. The Declaration proclaimed the separation. The Declaration of Independence declared the separation of the 13 American colonies from British rule. The Constitution established the framework for the United States government. One document says this is what freedom looks like. The other says once we have freedom, this is how we keep it. It was attributed, I think, to Benjamin Franklin, after the Constitutional Convention that somebody said to him Mr Franklin, what have you given us? And he said we have given you a republic, if you can keep it. So when we think about freedom, it really gets distilled when you listen to the comments of Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1941, as we were about to come into World War II and as America entered the war, he gave what is called his Four Freedoms speech and he defined it this way the freedom of speech, the freedom of worship, the freedom from want and the freedom from fear. 03:25 I have with me a friend that I've known now for well 19 years. His name is Kirk Foster and he hails from here in Fort Collins, colorado, but he currently is based in Fort Leavenworth, kansas, and I'd like you to meet him. Well, it's a wonderful July morning, a couple days before July 4th, and here we are, not quite 7 o'clock, sitting on the back deck of a friend's house, overlooking green space, with the rabbits hopping around and birds singing. Seven o'clock, sitting on the back deck of a friend's house, overlooking green space, with rabbits hopping around and birds singing, and I get to be here each of us have a cup of coffee in our hands with my friend, kirk foster. Kirk, how are you doing great, it's wonderful to have you here, thank you, thanks for having me. This is where you grew up in this town. 04:20 - Speaker 3 it is graduated this house, this house, this house. Uh, riffenberg Elementary is right there. That's where I went to elementary school. Good, this green space that you're just talking about this is where you know, growing up that tree, that was Billy Kid's hideout, sherwood's Forest, you know, whatever we could imagine, that tree was kind of our, you did there. 04:41 - Speaker 2 That was your adventure spot, exactly. Well, you've had a fair amount of adventure since then. You graduated high school here in Fort Collins and you were 18, and, I guess, trying to figure out what to do with your life. What happened, yeah? 04:58 - Speaker 3 no, I made the decision to join the Army. I remember telling one of my friends he asked me like why are you joining the Army? There's nothing going on right now? This was 2000 at the time and I told him I'm going to join the Army, get four years, have money for college and then just have an adventure and then come back and go from there have a life. Yeah, now I'm about to hit 24 years of service this month. 05:28 At the end of this month, what happened, for Pete's sake, I mean you. So September 11th happened, week three of basic training. So there, your basic training, my basic training, 9-11. Again, you know, not currently in a state of conflict, you know, no, it's going to be. You know we're not currently in a state of conflict. You know, no, it's going to be. You know, army General is going to be a challenge, but I'm excited, doing well in basic training. 05:53 And then, pretty soon, some of the soldiers that we would call KP duty, which is, you know, kitchen washing dishes, peeling potatoes, I guess they start running back to our bay, kind of letting us know what is happening. You know, because they're seeing the TVs that are up. And then that night, drill sergeants kind of come in with an old rolling in TV and they kind of show us news clippings of what's going on. And of course rumors start flying immediately that basic training is going to get cut down to six weeks, we're going to go to two weeks of airborne school and they're dropping us into Afghanistan. Crazy rumors are flying. But the platoon I was in in basic training we all had a RIP contract. We were all on the path to go to Ranger Regiment. 06:43 - Speaker 2 So a RIP contract means Ranger training. 06:46 - Speaker 3 Right, so nowadays it's called an Option 40. Rip has been changed to RAS, the Ranger Assessment and Selection Program. I see. 06:56 - Speaker 2 So that's where you came in the door. Everybody was surprised. You were surprised, but you didn't stay. Four years. You're now coming up on 24 years. You're 18 years old. You stood up, raised your right hand and said to whomever was leading the oath of this commissioning I promise, I covenant I don't know the exact words, but I promise to defend the Constitution of the United States an idea against all enemies, foreign and domestic, so forth, and so on. When you think of that covenant, when you think of that promise, I mean obviously you have now done that for 24 years. I mean you've been places I wouldn't dream of, I would be scared to go to, and so forth. What does that promise or that covenant mean to you? What has it meant to you? 07:52 - Speaker 3 For me, it's like you were saying that there's something worth fighting for and that you, you're prepared, if need be, to make the ultimate sacrifice for something. That you, you're prepared, if need be, to make the ultimate sacrifice for, something that you know is bigger, and you know, uh, than you, something that is, you know, like this nation that we have. You know it's, it's not. We're not swearing it to a person, right, you swear to the constitution, just knowing that you have an opportunity to serve, you know the citizens of the United States could come at the ultimate cost but you think of it. 09:04 For me, it's really like what we're doing right now. We are able to just sit out here on this porch, have a cup of coffee, talk about whatever we want to talk about. It could be anything. We're not scared of any repercussions. We aren't going to jail for this Right. 09:21 As far as we know, yeah, we aren't going to jail for this Right as far as we know. Yeah, so and then you know, the kids inside you know are going to grow up. I mean, they can, they'll come wake up and soon they'll be outside running around. Sure, you know, playing. They're not scared of anything. 09:40 - Speaker 2 You and I met on a Sunday some years back. Well, you were 23 at that time. How old are you now? 42. 42. I can almost remember that year. 09:56 - Speaker 3 I do remember you were a guest pastor at Timberline, A speaker, yeah, and that you know forever. At the end of the service, my dad, I'm like, hey, I was getting ready to deploy. 10:13 - Speaker 2 Yeah, you were going to be deployed for what number. I think that would have been my fifth deployment, Fifth deployment into a combat area and you were 23. 10:26 - Speaker 3 I was a fire team leader going into, knowing that we were headed into Ramadi, which this would have been the second deployment back to Ramadi. And a fire team is what? Four soldiers so a squad. A squad consists of two fire teams and then the fire team leader is kind of that. First leadership position, the point person Right. 10:48 - Speaker 2 Tip of the spear. 10:49 Yeah. So here you are almost 20 years later. Over the years in combat situations you've been deployed many, many times now you are now a sergeant major many, many times now. You are now a sergeant major and you say in the Army they kind of throw that together and say sergeant major, right, it comes out like and it's the highest enlisted position someone could have, and a lot of people spend their whole careers, serve well and all of that. You have a unique distinction in that some years ago your picture was on the front page of the Army Times with nine other fellas, as the, as one of the ten most decorated folks since 9-11. I'm just gonna say this it's. 11:37 It's hard for me to say. It sounds crazy for me to say there are folks who go their whole career. They get Purple Hearts for being wounded in battle, they get commendations and so forth, but to have a Bronze Star, for example, that's a high accolade. You have two Silver Stars and five Bronze Stars. Now last time we talked you had three. I don't know what you've been doing, but you have five Bronze Stars and three Purple Hearts. I mean just for me to say that is a mouthful. How do you see it? Because you don't swagger around or wear them on your jacket all the time. I mean, how do you reflect on that? 12:25 - Speaker 3 I mean, how do you reflect on that? Yeah, I'm definitely proud of, you know, the awards, right, but it's always never been, that's never been a focus, it's not a goal Right, because I mean each one of those you know circumstances actually means something is not going well. Ideally, a perfect mission would be no shots fired. Everybody comes back. So lots of those things are not going as planned. So I'm proud of what I've done, but would give them all back for a couple of my buddies to still be around. 13:04 - Speaker 2 I just have to stop here for a moment and reflect on what Kirk just said. I'd give them back in a minute if I could get a couple of my buddies to still be here. The idea of the value of life in this battle for freedom is so profound and so deep. When he said that, I have to just say it took my breath away. 13:36 - Speaker 3 But they're also for me. They're good reminders of what my experience and how I can take what I've been through and use it to train the next generation. So, if they ever go through similar circumstances, they're better prepared than I was, and I would say I was decently prepared, sure, but we could always be better. 14:05 - Speaker 2 I don't know what truck this is. This could be a tank. Is this a tank? I thought this was gonna be a nice quiet. It's a garbage truck. We just like a little ambiance, folksiance while we're chatting. 14:33 When I think of you, I think of when you got married in in, uh, near Destin, Florida, if I remember correctly military reservation, Um, and I was just there but walking in where you signed the book to go, and you had pictures of some of two or three of your buddies who who didn't come home, and at least one set of their parents, if I remember correctly, were there. You're in this, in this company, this, this family of young men and young women who make a promise, and I can't speak for the whole nation, but I can speak for me and say thank you. No, I appreciate that. I just. You know, I'm always reminded because I've been at several services at Arlington Cemetery over the years and the folded flag and the taps being played and the officer kneeling before the grieving party saying you know, here's the service of your son or your brother or your father from a grateful nation. 15:48 When I asked Kirk how his rise through the ranks worked, he described it in a very interesting way. I think many of us listening would look back on our lives and see similar things happening. So here he is. So here you are, started at 18, and now 24 years. You never thought I don't think you never thought you'd be here. This is a surprise to you. You're a Sergeant Major. That's the highest enlisted person. Now you were gonna go for four years get a college degree. What happened to that? 16:21 - Speaker 3 Yeah, so I was actually really so I was able to get my degree while in service. So last time we talked, so you did get a degree. Yeah, the last time we talked I was attending the Sergeant Major's Academy. Right, I was able to. From there, I finished the Sergeant Major's Academy, got my bachelor's degree and then I went to the 101st Airborne and did four years there, two different positions there. 16:47 - Speaker 2 What was your degree? It wasn't in being a good shot, no, it was leadership and kind of crisis management yeah sure Crisis management would be an understatement here. 17:10 - Speaker 3 So I was just I want to be the best soldier I can be and I'm not really worried about the pay. And then, as I was moving up every time, it was, you know I guess I can do this next enlistment, like I'll be an E6. I could do the squad leader job. I think I could do that. You know pretty well that's how it happened. And then you know I get to that position and then like, okay, now I think I could actually make pretty good impact as a platoon sergeant. And then you keep, and then now you know, even leaving the Sergeant Major Academy, it was I'll go do my ops, sergeant Major time. And then you know, call it good there. But then that battalion Sergeant Major, and then now I have the opportunity to influence, you know, 700 plus soldiers every day. And then with my background I just it's almost, I feel like a responsibility that I have. What I've learned and gone through, it's my duty, you know my privilege, to pass that stuff on to these next soldiers. 18:18 - Speaker 2 So now you're traveling around the world in your current position, out of Fort Leavenworth, with a colonel and some advisory generals, some general officers, to help train troops where they are, and you're in that collaborative thing. I have a friend, as you know, who came out of college during Vietnam, ended up going to the Navy four years leaving. Come back they re-recruited him and he ended up leading the Navy between 2000 and 2005, admiral Byrne Clark and he tells the story when he's a young officer, on a destroyer and a chief petty officer came an older guy which would be you on the Navy side right, came up at one point, put his arm around this young, freshly scrubbed lieutenant or lieutenant commander, whatever it was, and said son, I'm going to help you be a good officer from general officers. But there's a certain sense in which you are helping not just people who are in the trenches, but people who are going to be commanders or captains and majors and so forth. Be good captains and majors, right, right, learning the hard work of being in the trenches, right. 19:36 - Speaker 3 Would that be fair to say? No, absolutely, and I think that's one of the added benefits of my current job is at level worth majority of uh, my unit is majors, colonels, lieutenant colonels, a lot of them are about to take on that next leadership role and that's what I've been able to tell them is, you know, my door is always open, sure, I mean, we've had some great conversations with majors that are getting ready to go take, you know, be promoted, go to their pre-command course. You know, lieutenant colonels, sure, just being able to kind of talk to them about what I think officers have done, well, you know, how they can maximize their involvement of their NCOs who would not if they were thinking people and I'm sure they are how they can maximize their involvement of their NCOs. 20:28 - Speaker 2 Who would not if they were thinking people and I'm sure they are want to go and sit down in an office, you know, because you can have younger officers who are freshly scrubbed in their 20s you're 20 years older come in and sit down with somebody who has two Silver Stars and five bronze. I mean, who wouldn't want to do that? And I'm only bringing that up, not because you would bring it up, but I'm saying to have been in those situations and survived and desire to pass on what you've learned is just for me, sitting here is just a profound thing. You're talking to a guy who's on his 84th trip around the sun and his military record is one semester of Air Force ROTC at Calvert. Talking to a guy who's on his 84th trip around the sun and his military record is one semester of Air Force ROTC at Cal Berkeley. 21:09 You know this, that's like a philosophy class, and so I have to say that I'm in awe, in the best sense, of who you are, what you've done, and you're this down-to-earth person who not only knows stuff, but you've done stuff. As I talked to Kirk and he explained just all of the things that he's been involved in and his hopes and his assessments of how things might be or could be. I wanted to ask him the deeper question about what it meant for him to have made a commitment to another kingdom beyond the United States of America, to this idea of the kingdom of God not the idea, but the essence of the kingdom of God found in a commitment to Jesus Christ. 22:01 - Speaker 3 And this is how he responded absolutely, because for one it's um, I do feel like out here playing soldier. My senior quote was from the ranger creed like I'd always, I mean, join the army. The military was something you know I knew I was gonna do as well. I mean I would. I know that was what the Lord was calling me to do and then never wasn't really ever aspiring to be a leader. God has put me in. I think I was where I was at, where I needed to be, throughout my whole career. 22:40 So trying to again have the opportunity to positively shape soldiers on a daily basis. So I take that responsibility, just am humbled by it and then being able to show them through my faith how you can do that the right way. You can be a lethal soldier but also be a good husband, good father. You train hard, do all those things and be a follower of Christ. There's power in that. Knowing that he's looking out for you, you know where you're spending eternity, that when you run off the back of the helicopter you know where you're going to end up, regardless of how the mission turns out, you know where you're going to spend eternity. So a little bit, I definitely feel like I'm doing what God has wanted me to do. I've trusted in Him. My career has had many turns that know, turns that I did think was where it needed, where I wanted it to go, but it's always worked out for the best for me and my family, so you know, and saying thank you sir. 24:22 No, thank you Again. It's really just great just being here where it kind of all began, just making me reflect as we approach Fourth of July, probably one of my favorite holidays, just because you know what we kind of talked about Sure, freedom, patriotism, and when you have served you've lost. You know friends, but then you also have, you know, with my family. It allows me to be very thankful for what opportunities I've been given and you know the blessings that I do have and the opportunities in the future. 25:03 - Speaker 2 Great, god bless you Thanks, thank you. God bless you, thanks. Thank you as I wrap this up on the 4th of July weekend, 2025, I'm always drawn back to the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC, where for 15 years we were there, and when people would come to see us, I'd always take them to see the monuments at night. And you couldn't go to the Lincoln Memorial any time two in the afternoon, two in the morning without other people being there, oftentimes foreign nationals or people who are traveling from other countries, because the Lincoln Memorial really is the symbol for freedom in a lot of ways. And if you turn to the left as you're looking at that seated statue of Lincoln, if you turn to the left, you see the words of the Gettysburg Address 272 words chiseled on the wall. It takes two and a half minutes to read it, but it's two and a half minutes of power. This is how it starts. Many of you know it. 26:19 Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation. Here's the line Conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal Goes on to say in the middle of it. The world will little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. And as he closes he captures it this way For us to be here. This is our task, dedicated to the great task remaining before us that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion, that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain. That this nation under God will have a new birth. That this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom there's the word again and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. 27:24 When I read those words, when I say those words, I get goosebumps, because Lincoln captured the essence of what we are about as a people, as a nation and as individuals, if we're concerned about individual freedom in a way that no other has. And with those words I say thanks for listening. God bless you, god bless this nation, god bless all the peoples around the world that long to be free. We'll catch you next time