Photo taken by SPC Matthew Serpa when our plane touched down in Afghanistan. Most of those seated her around him were part of his unit--the 55th Sustainment Brigade.
On September 11th, 2001, hijacked airplanes struck the World Trade Center, Pentagon, and a field in rural Pennsylvania. One of the rallying cries of American patriots after that day was "Let's roll," the last words recorded from one of the heroes who fought the attackers on the plane that went down. Matt Serpa was 9 years old when that all unfolded.
Nine years later, straight out of high school, Matt Serpa joined the United States Army and was assigned to the 55th Sustainment Brigade at Ft. Belvoir, VA. He drilled with the unit prior to Basic Training and thus wore "civvies" (civilian clothes) instead of the uniform. His baby face could not mask his uncanny intelligence and wit. He convinced a long-time soldier that he was a reporter and asked him a series of probing questions. Obviously, Serpa had a since of humor as well.
As Serpa quickly ascended the lower enlisted ranks, he also quickly gained a place at the DFAC (dining facility) tables where the deeper discussions were held. Outside the DFAC, he knew how to take orders without asking "Why?" Within the DFAC, his natural skepticism and intellectual curiosity made "Why?" his automatic response to any assertion.
He was always a bit reclusive, often choosing to venture out on his own during free time, or listen to music alone on his bunk at night. But he was loved. When the soldiers of the deployment element of the 55th were given their assignments for Afghanistan, he learned that he would be sent to Camp Spann in the north, along with MSG McKissick and SFC Creamer--both wily vets with extensive experience in the military. Both of them took Specialist Serpa under their wing--a mother and father of sorts for the youngest kid in our unit.
When I traveled north to visit my soldiers at Camp Spann, I mostly spent time with Serpa. We went for walks together and ate pizza together. He told me about how much a group of older, cigar smoking Canadians and Americans meant to him. One Canadian officer recalls the depths of the conversations he enjoyed with Serpa then. He was impressed by Serpa's breadth of life experiences at the age of 20, but also felt it his job with some of the other older men to educate Serpa on the great music that pre-dated him.
Serpa turned 21 in Afghanistan--an event that usually provokes a raucous party. Instead, he enjoyed "near beer" with Americans, Canadians, Germans, and others in Afghanistan.
Specialist Serpa returned with a third of our unit in January of 2014 as part of the draw down (reduction of forces) in Afghanistan. 152 of us deployed to Afghanistan together. All 152 would return home, but only about 30 were in this group. The number was then whittled to 3, as Serpa, MSG McKissick and I hopped aboard a plane on an unusually icy day at Ft. Hood for home.
We enjoyed first class on that flight, and were honored when a flight attendant announced that we were returning home from Afghanistan. The moment was fleeting, however. When we got of the airplane, Serpa went to a catch a taxi and went out into the night, alone.
Being the intelligent, tech-savvy entrepreneur that he was, Serpa was soon accepted at Columbia University. Once there, he joined a fraternity and switched roles from young underling in the Army to worldly counselor for your undergrads. One of his fraternity brothers described Serpa as full of ideas, and always welcoming to those young collegians who needed to talk. This was a side of Serpa not often witnessed by his fellow soldiers, but one that was probably brought to the fore by his deployment experiences.
Unfortunately, deployments don't only reveal sterling attributes, but long dormant heartaches as well. The effects are often unpredictable:
Most of our soldiers had gone their separate ways and I had lost contact with Serpa. I did not know of his burden, of the weight of his struggles. I looked forward to catching up with this kid I had known since his first day in the Army.
Three days later--one year ago, today--SPC Matt Serpa was dead.
****************************************************************************
Matt Serpa was a casualty of war--not simply the War on Terror, but the war experienced in every human heart, soul, and mind between the original dignity imprinted upon them and the brokenness wrought by mankind's fall from God. But Serpa was not the greatest casualty in this story. We are the greatest casualties. The people who now live with his death. Even in writing this tribute, I felt the old weight of grief returning and had to stop writing.
For some of you, Serpa's death may have left you in utter darkness--depressed and incurably bitter over his loss. Staying in such a state is a disservice to Serpa's memory. The brokenness of this world has not entirely obscured its original beauty, and the brokenness of Serpa's final hours do not entirely obscure the beauty of his life. Those 22 years were a precious gift for him and for us.
For others of you, there may be a temptation to sweep away the brokenness in the false beauty of cliches and hollow comforts. That too is a disservice to Serpa's memory.The beauty does not obscure the brokenness. The world was created through Jesus Christ, the Son of God, in infinite and impeccable beauty. This fact was the basis for Christ's heaving sobs at the tomb of Lazarus, his friend. The tomb not only representing the loss of that precious person, but the loss of so much beauty, life, and love in this world. Nobody knew that more than Jesus.
The most healthy and appropriate response to the loss of Serpa is to bind the beauty and brokenness together, as the loving purposes of God were bound together with the evil purposes of man in the crucifixion of God's only beloved Son--the savior of sinners. Christ didn't simply weep at the tomb of Lazarus--He raised him from the dead and bore His own tomb. He overcame death with the beauty of His own brokenness, so that we can cry "Where, O death, is thy sting? Where, O grave, is they victory?" So now, in Christ, we may (and certainly must) grieve, but we can now do so with inexhaustible hope.
Around the time of Serpa's death, three of our deploying soldiers (myself included) had beautiful baby daughters. One soldier whose wedding I conducted prior to the deployment just had her first little one. I conducted two weddings for soldiers in our unit, and another soldier happily married a great gal down in South Carolina. In all these things, we remember that "love is strong as death" (Son of Songs 8). And Christ is the life-giving pinnacle of that truth.
*****************************************************************************
Roll Call:
(In the Army this forms part of the memorial ceremony offered for our soldiers.)
WO1 Rainey. Present.
SPC Rojas. Present.
CPT Roberts. Present.
SPC Ruelas. Present.
SPC Serpa. (Silence)
SPC Matthew Serpa. (Silence)
SPC Matthew Serpa died on January 20th, 2015. He was a son, brother, friend, and battle buddy. Most important, he was loved. And he will be missed.
