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From the time she was a tot, Kellye Cash Sheppard
wanted to be a Navy fighter pilot, just like her dad.
Captain Roy Cash, Jr. flew over 300 combat missions in
three tours to Vietnam, she shared with an audience of
some 142 business, community and government leaders at
the Chamber of Commerce Annual Prayer Breakfast
Thursday, April 15.
Filled with love and pride for her father, she was
dismayed when visiting the Navy base meant navigating
past throngs of war protesters. In fact, on a visit to
her grandmother in Memphis, a beaded and emboldened
member of the media - aware Cash had shot down a
Russian-made MiG, for which he won the Silver Star -
asked the young girl, in a sarcastic tone, "Do you know
what your daddy did?"
"My daddy shot down a mean man!" she responded, and,
standing tall with her hand clasped to her heart, began
with strident voice to recite the pledge of allegiance.
During those years, when her mother, Billie, would lead
Kellye and her little brother, Carey, in prayers for
their father's safety, she discovered her father "would
be nowhere without his faith in God and prayer."
That fact became clearer than ever on Father's Day,
1972, when, from his base aboard the U.S.S. Kittyhawk,
while on a mission over a safe zone in North Vietnam,
he was shot down, his malfunctioning parachute
shrouding his body before he was plunged into the
waters of the Gulf of Tonkin. His brief prayer, "God
help me", was rewarded when he looked up into skies he
was certain framed the face of Jesus. Calmed, he
accepted the fate he thought would be burial at sea,
but was astonished and grateful after being rescued by
a frogman who had jumped from a helicopter into the
waters to save him.
Far removed from the drugs and alcoholism that plagued
her great uncle, Johnny Cash, Kellye laughs that she
was subject to a different type of "drug": drug to
church every time the doors were open.
Over many years as she grew into a young woman, she
found prayer to be her friend time and again, when she
felt different from other children - never in sync with
the fashions or accents at new locations - and found a
father who "didn't go to sea all the time."
Her fervent prayer abated when she entered college,
until, in 1986 during her junior year, she was
approached by a fraternity hoping to sponsor her in the
Miss Memphis State contest. Originally offering a
feminist retort, she then gave the offer prayerful
consideration, in the end repeating her continuing
prayer, "If this is what You want, this is what I
want."
She joined a health club to make the best of her
God-given beauty, and was first runner up in the
contest, an effort that spurred her to win the Milan
Crown and Scepter pageant in March. The following
month, she captured the Miss Tennessee title and in
September, the same year, became Miss America.
It was while competing for the Miss America title,
confronted by "50 perfect women", that Kellye's
insecurity in her own appearance almost got the best of
her, until her mother "stunned her with wisdom."
She reminded me of the prayer I'd prayed for the past
six months, said Kellye, referring listeners to 1 Peter
3:3-4: "Your beauty should not come from outward
adornment, such as braided hair and the wearing of gold
jewelry and fine clothes. Instead, it should be that of
your inner self, the unfading beauty of a gentle and
quiet spirit, which is of great worth in God's sight."
"Once again, God changed my life," she continued, and
continued her prayer, "If this is what You want, this
is what I want."
Kellye didn't become a fighter pilot; instead God gave
her the wisdom to realize the power of prayer, golden
beauty to open doors so that others could hear her
testimony, and a voice as powerful as the engines that
powered the planes her father flew; so powerful that
during her a capella rendition of the Lord's Prayer,
her little daughter, Tatum, in attendance at the prayer
breakfast, quit drawing long enough to cover her ears,
while the rest of the audience sat enthralled by a
voice honed by ten years of classical piano and voice
lessons prior to her pageant winnings. She had prefaced
her remarks with a remarkable performance of "God Bless
the U.S.A."
Kellye learned she had the courage of her father, as
well, when it was discovered her oldest child, Brady,
was severely hearing impaired. While prayers did not
heal his affliction, he has instead learned to have a
full life despite of it, now 12 years old participating
in the play, "The King and I"; Destination Imagination;
and several sports.
And she and husband Todd, who met in high school in
California, learned everything in their lives didn't
have to be perfect.
"We found out God is bigger than that," she said.
Her brother, Lt. Carey Cash, a Navy Chaplain, was
serving with the First Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment a
year ago, on April 10, as they prepared to enter
Baghdad.
"They marched into downtown Baghdad only to find
themselves ambushed," said Kellye, recounting the
stories of Marines who watched, amazed, as rockets,
bullets, and missiles on certain paths were deflected
by an unseen power.
The battle claimed one life among the battalion,
Gunnery Sgt. Jeffrey E. Bohr, age 39, of Ossian, Iowa,
who was killed by rifle fire while calling for
assistance for his wounded driver.
Cash compiled the stories into a book titled, "A Table
in the Presence". Hot off the press, the book has
already sold 38,000 copies in its first week, according
to Kellye.
 Chronicled in an interview for CBN News, Cash recounted
some of the stories he was told following the April 10
battle: "Our battalion was given orders to seize the
presidential palace on the Tigris River, and we went
into the center of that city, not realizing that about
a thousand Fedayeen were waiting for us. And at four in
the morning, in the dark, they literally unleashed all
their fury. It became essentially a nine-hour ambush,
from urban fighting, close quarters - the results of
which should have yielded untold casualties and many,
many Marines dead, just because of the sheer volume of
fire. We suspected anywhere from a 1,000 to 1,500
rocket-propelled grenades were shot at the lead
elements of our convoy. When I got to the palace the
next day and began to talk to the Marines... what I saw
was not a battalion licking its wounds and overwhelmed
with the fight they had just endured. But literally it
looked like I'd come upon a group of men who had walked
through the Red Sea. Over and over the stories kept
coming out to me, and I would realize the debt that I
had, to begin to record these (accounts)...
Rocket-propelled grenades would come at them, and
literally curve in mid-air and go around them. Untold
Marines shared with me that rockets would come and
literally dive down as if batted by some unseen hand.
We had one rocket go through a Humvee passenger-side
window, and explode in the compartment. Without a
doubt, it should have killed every man in that vehicle.
And yet when the explosion came through, it blew out
the front of the windshield, and so it exploded out
instead of in, and not a single man was injured. And
over and over, the accounts of that day were so
tremendous, that I realized I had stumbled upon
something amazing."
The men relied upon Psalm 91, said Cash, known as the
Soldier's Psalm. He also quoted Joshua 1:9, which
declares, "Have I not commanded you to be strong and
courageous? Be not afraid. Be not dismayed, for I will
be with you wherever you go."
"This became, literally, God's word to us, to remember
that we are not going through this alone," he said.
Kellye told about the letters sent to the Marines by
her middle child, Cassidy's, class, that said, "We love
you; we're praying for you."
"I feel blessed to be living in a small southern town
where teachers allow children to write (letters like
that,)" she said.
Her brother's remarks during the interview were
similarly inclined.
"I think that the churches prayed for our men during
the major hostilities," he said, "But we have to
remember that now, more than ever, we need to pray for
those men. We need to send them letters. It was like
life, getting letters on the front line from churches
saying we are praying for you. We are praying this
psalm for you, we are remembering you daily in our
Bible studies. Churches and Christians all across our
country need to remember that this war is still
ongoing, and they need to send letter and care
packages. We need to adopt battalions, like we did
during the war, and lift these men up daily to God."
Praising the Chamber of Commerce and expressing
thanksgiving for the freedom to gather in prayer for
the community and country, and declaring there is no
separation of personal faith from politics in the lives
of those who love God, Kellye thanked Jeal Atwood,
assistant to Huntingdon Mayor Dale Kelley, for a
prayer, attributed to George Washington, that Jeal read
on behalf of the nation, as a guide in what "seems to
be an uncertain future."
The prayer was a rewritten version of a paragraph from
a letter written by General Washington to the governors
of the thirteen states upon his retirement from the
Continental Army. The original reads: "Now I make it my
earnest prayer that God would have you and the State
over which you preside, in His holy protection, that He
would incline the hearts of the citizens to cultivate a
spirit of subordination and obedience to government, to
entertain brotherly affection and love for one another,
for their fellow citizens and the United States at
large, and particularly for their brethren who have
served in the field, and finally, that He would most
graciously be pleased to dispose us all to do justice,
to love mercy and to demean ourselves with that
charity, humility and pacific temper of mind which were
the characteristics of the Divine Author of our blessed
religion and without an humble imitation of whose
example in these things we can never hope to be a happy
nation. I have the honor to be, with much esteem and
respect, Sir, your Excellency's most obedient and most
humble servant. George Washington."
Kellye outlined instances from the Bible when God used
devout men to correct government leaders: "When there
was government oppression in Egypt, God sent Moses to
Pharoah; when Saul was disobedient, God sent Samuel;
when King David was in deep personal sin, God sent
Nathan the prophet; when the direction of the country
was wrong, God sent Elijah to King Ahab.
"Political foreign policy was formed by Elisha. Every
political move Israel made was made as God's prophet
told the king what to do. King Hezekiah was
discouraged; Isaiah went to encourage him. Prayer was
prohibited in Babylon; Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego
prayed anyway, as men of God realized that God's law is
higher than man's."
She thanked the citizens of Carroll County for putting
prayer "right there in the front lines like the men and
women in Iraq do every day."
Presented with an oval, gold-rimmed plaque depicting
the sun's rays in silver, accented by a gold cross on
either side of which were praying hands and a Bible
with golden bookmark, Kellye remarked that, of many
gifts she has received for speaking at various
functions, "This may be one of the nicest things I have
received."
Other citizens offering eloquent prayer during the 7:30
a.m. event were: Dan Bradfield of McKenzie Feed and
Grain and Power Supply, who offered the invocation;
County Mayor Kenny McBride, who prayed for the citizens
of Carroll County; Walter Butler, vice president of
business affairs at Bethel College, prayed for local
government leaders; Huntingdon Mayor Dale Kelley prayed
for students and teachers; Bob Rutledge, owner of Bob
Rutledge Advertising Specialities, prayed for
businesses; Jerry Legett, chaplain for the Baptist
Memorial Hospital of Huntingdon, prayed for the health
care profession; and McKenzie Mayor Walter Winchester
prayed for the military and veterans. Amy Carter, a
loan officer and vice president of Carroll Bank and
Trust, had the pleasure of introducing Kellye to the
audience while chairman of the board, Melissa Powell,
presided. |
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