CCC staff pastor, Dan Casey is a retired Pontiac police officer. He's my guest blogger for the next two weeks. 

Many Blessings!

Pastor Tony

Pastor Dan’s Stats from the Pontiac Police Department:

Served: January 7, 1974 to December 7, 2001

Uniform: 1974 to 1987

Plain-Clothes Surveillance Unit: 1987 to 1988

Narcotics Enforcement Unit: 1988 to 1992

Uniform: 1992 to 1994

Crime Area Target Team (CATT) Special Ops Division: 1994 to 2001

“I Can” Series 

Pastor Dan Casey (To be continued.)

My career as a police officer began in the early winter of 1974 after eight intensive weeks in the police academy. Much of my career as a Pontiac officer was spent alongside my partner in a regulation uniform and a marked patrol vehicle. Then, in early 1988, my job drastically changed when I became assigned to Pontiac’s narcotics unit.

The narcotics unit consisted of eleven officers, two sergeants and one lieutenant. As a team, we worked together night and day conducting drug raids and undercover investigations, many of which required us to make hand-to-hand drug buys. Needless to say, as a unit we became very close. We developed an almost unbreakable bond as often our well-being and even our very lives were dependent upon one another.

In the summer of 1992, we received a complaint of an active drug house so frequented it was actually causing traffic jams on its residential street. Due to the increasing activity on that street, it was decided that an undercover officer wearing a wire would go into the drug house and attempt to make a purchase. With the officer inside, the remainder of our team waited in a raid van parked down the street ready to move in when we were signaled.

The undercover officer, aka “U. C.” made his way down the street and entered the drug house without incident. Once inside, however, the raid team could hear over his wire that the officer was being threatened with an intent to rob and potentially expose him as an undercover officer.

Immediately, the team moved into action, each member having a very specific assignment. Outside the house were four officers positioned to arrest anyone attempting to escape. Next were five officers tasked with the job of entering the house. First in line was the “Ram Man.” His job was to carry an 80-pound steel ram designed to break down the entry door of the house.

First through the door, though, was the “Shotgun.” His job was to sweep the house and order all occupants on the floor. As he checked all rooms and yelled out, “Clear!” that signaled the other four officers to drop out of formation and handcuff the residents as needed until everyone in the house was secured.

This night in the summer of ‘92, I was “Shotgun.” One detail you definitely want to know is this, all this activity: the lining up of officers, the ramming of the door, the clearing rooms, and securing suspects took place in under a minute. It was crucial, critical even, that each man on the team not only knew his position but knew how to execute it efficiently for both everyone’s safety and the success of the mission.

Apostle Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians that each and every one of us is part of the body of Christ. As with any body, there are many moving parts, but we function together as one unit. You, dear saint, are a vital part of this body of Christ at CCC. If right now you’re thinking, or have ever thought for that matter, that you’re insignificant, too old, too young, too inexperienced, or have nothing of real value to offer, you, my friend, couldn’t be more wrong. God has created and arranged each part of the body, every one of them, and made them to function exactly as He designed. A body that does not have full effective use of all of its members is essentially disabled.

1 Corinthians 12:12

Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ.

1 Corinthians 12:18

But in fact, God has arranged the parts of the body, every one of them, just as he wanted them to be.

1 Corinthians 12:27

Now you are the body of Christ, and each one of you is a part of that body.