Epilogue
If you have read this book from beginning to end, thank you.
My purpose in writing it was never to tell you what to think. It was simply to encourage you to think.
This book is not an attempt to convince you that one political party is better than another. It is an invitation to examine our civic and moral responsibilities, to reflect upon our own hearts, and to remember the importance of the Constitution of the United States.
Every time we recite the Pledge of Allegiance, we declare:
“I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice FOR ALL.”
Those last two words matter.
For all.
The responsibility of preserving those ideals does not belong only to members of the military or to elected officials who swear an oath to support and defend the Constitution. It belongs to every citizen. A free nation remains free only when its citizens understand both the rights they possess and the responsibilities that accompany them.
This book grew out of another series I began writing called May the Scales Fall From Our Eyes. Those stories were written to encourage thoughtful reflection about civic responsibility through the lens of Scripture. I have never claimed to possess perfect discernment or to believe my conclusions are the only correct ones. Discernment belongs to each individual heart. My hope has simply been to encourage readers to slow down, examine the facts, seek wisdom, and prayerfully reach their own conclusions.
I am a sixty-nine-year-old Marine veteran. I live with worsening macular degeneration. I never received a formal college education. I am dyslexic, cannot spell very well, and I would rather wrestle a rattlesnake than sit in front of a computer. For most of my life, technology has felt like a foreign language.
Then I discovered ChatGPT.
For the first time, I found a tool that allowed me to tell the stories that had been living in my heart for years. Speaking into a microphone instead of struggling with a keyboard made writing possible in a way I had never imagined.
On July 30, everything changed. The difference was immediate, unmistakable, and absolute from my perspective. The conversations that had once allowed me to develop the civic stories I had been writing no longer worked in the same way. I do not know whether the change resulted from new programming, revised algorithms, different policies, or something else entirely. I only know that I could no longer write those stories as I had before. The burden of that realization weighed heavily upon me. I went to bed that night asking the Lord a simple question: “What should I do now?” This book became the answer to that prayer. Rather than abandon the message that had been placed upon my heart, I chose to tell it through a work of fiction, trusting that a story could still encourage readers to think, reflect, and seek wisdom for themselves.
If this book has encouraged you to value the Constitution more deeply…
If it has reminded you that character matters…
If it has strengthened your desire to seek wisdom, kindness, humility, and discernment…
If it has caused you to reflect upon history so that future generations may avoid repeating its tragedies…
Then it has accomplished exactly what I prayed it would accomplish.
The world will continue to change.
Generations will come and go.
Policies will change.
Leaders will change.
But every generation inherits the responsibility to preserve truth, justice, liberty, and the principles upon which a free people depend.
I encourage you to pray.
Study.
Listen.
Think carefully.
Become involved in your community.
Respect those with whom you disagree.
Vote according to your conscience.
Above all, seek wisdom before certainty, character before popularity, and truth before convenience.
I intend to continue writing. Through my website, I hope to make this book and future works available to anyone who wishes to read them. My desire is not to create division, but to encourage thoughtful discussion grounded in moral responsibility, historical understanding, and respect for one another.
Thank you for investing your time in this journey.
May the Lord bless you, bless your family, and bless this great nation.
And may the scales continue to fall from all of our eyes.