Living Hope Welcomes Back Vallas as a Marine

On Sunday, February 13, the Living Hope community welcomed back Gus Vallas, who had spent 15 weeks at boot camp to become a Marine. His graduation was on January 28, 2011. Back in November, Living Hope sent Vallas off with prayer, asking for the Lord to protect him and return him home safely.

“The first month of boot camp was really tough,” Vallas said, “because they break you down. The second month you go up to Camp Pendleton where they train you, and this is where you begin to adjust and get your head back. By the third month, you feel as though you have made it – and they bring you back into the civilian world.”

He also spoke about “The Crucible,” a 54-hour training event that requires Marine recruits to overcome mentally and physically-demanding obstacles as a team. In total, they are allowed just 10 hours of sleep and three meals. But it is the end goal that keeps the recruits going. As part of the training, they must climb what is known as “The Reaper,” an incredibly steep incline that recruits must mentally and physically prepare for weeks to overcome. Once that is done, however, they are officially Marines.

“Since training, I have appreciated a lot more things,” Vallas said, “from eating—including being able to talk while eating—and just sitting down. There are days that we’d stand for 18 hours straight, except when we ate.”
 
Each Sunday Vallas also said he looked forward to attending church, as did several others in his platoon. It was another way for the recruits to feel more connected with one another, and their faith.

Vallas returned for Infantry Training Battalion on Tuesday, February 15. It is the training that will prepare him to go overseas should he be deployed. The training will last around three months, after which time he will return home. He will participate in Marine exercises one weekend each month from that point forward, unless he gets the call that he has been deployed.

And deployment is not unfamiliar in the Vallas family since Paul, the oldest, has been serving as a Navy Corpsman Medic since 2008, and is now somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. Because he is in Special Operations, his exact location is unknown, although Sharon, his mom, said they know he is working with people who have HIV and AIDS. 

“I think that today was a good sermon, because I can’t worry about it,” Sharon said, referring to the day’s sermon “Worry: What is it Good for?” taken from Matthew 6:25-34. “I always try to turn it into a positive, or an adventure—like how cool it is to be on a ship and serving. On the other hand, I still hope that they will not be in a crisis situation—that is where I still do worry, both for their mental situation and for them physically.”
 
The Vallas family will continue to remain in the prayers of the Living Hope community.