That's it?

I find this excerpt from Desire fitting as we enjoyed our first 70 degree day of the year this week! We're turning the corner! 

Forever and ever? That's it? That's the "good news"? And then we sigh and feel guilty that we are not more "spiritual." We lose heart, and we turn once more to the present to find what life we can. Eternity ends up having no bearing on our search for life whatsoever. It feels like the end of the search. And since we're not all that sure about what comes after, we search hard now. Remember, we can only hope for what we desire. How can the church service that never ends be more desirable than the richest experiences of life here? It would make a HUGE difference if you knew in your heart that the life you prize is just around the corner, that your deepest desires have been whispering to you all along about what's coming. You see, Scripture tells us that God has "set eternity" in our hearts (Eccl. 3:11). Where in our hearts? In the desires of our hearts.

The return of spring brings such relief and joy and anticipation. Life has returned, and with it sunshine, warmth, color, and the long summer days of adventure together. We break out the lawn chairs and the barbecue grill. We tend the garden and drink in all the beauty. We head off for vacations. Isn't this what we most deeply long for? To leave the winter of the world behind, what Shakespeare called "the winter of our discontent," and find ourselves suddenly in the open meadows of summer?

( Desire , 111) 

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a wife's perspective

What does faith in the field look like for a woman? A wife? A mom?


Sometimes faith is just that. Having the faith in my man that he is making the right decisions for our family. The right decision when it comes to being outdoors for the right reasons. To seek God. To look inside himself, search out the good and take hold; find the bad and let it go. To be able to come home rejuvenated with the Spirit; ready to scoop us all up in his arms. Ready to tackle the tasks that accompany the titles "husband" and "dad" with more enthusiasm than he left with.


Faith for me is understanding that this is a ministry and that sacrifice is needed on my part to ensure that God is glorified and Satan is defeated at his attempts to destroy.


To be honest, being a stay at home mom is tough! I love my little chances to get away. So whenever an opportunity arises that I can take, I jump on it. And then, when something pops up to threaten it, I don't respond too well. I've gotten better... a LOT better (hopefully if you asked Jeff, he would agree) :) But it's through times like these, when I don't get my way, that I realize God has a better way. God's way is always better. He is continually teaching me that my "field" is right where I am: being wife and mom to three handsome men. Raising up little boys to become men of faith, men of honor, warriors- what a phenomenal calling. God has placed me in a position to nurture their hearts, flame their spirits, and let them soar. To assist my husband in these responsibilities is a blessing. God thinks I am able, now it's my job to have faith- that I have what it takes. Underneath all the toys, food, stains, toothpaste, diapers, and disasters is God at work in my life. Dying to self is a beautiful thing... it means that God is glorified through those who I am serving.


Finding purpose,
Mindi

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I will never back down.

Many of you are basketball fans, and some of you may have seen this video on during the NBA all-star weekend, but as I watched this again the other day it hit me...this is how I want to be, how we ought to be as Christians. Don't back down, don't apologize, don't be shy or timid, don't be ashamed...be bold, be fierce, and let Christ EXCITE your life. I need this reminder...we all do. BE BOLD.

If God is for us, who can be against us? Romans 8:31

For all you Blake Griffin fans...enjoy....

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Update From the Field

Well, it has been a little over a year since Jeff and I got this Faith in the Field thing going and we wanted to give you an update on what is going on.  But first we really want to thank you for your support.  It is pretty amazing really, that a little over a year ago we put this blog and our email list in motion with just some family members and friends on the list and it has grown to over 300 people in a years time.  The responses we've gotten from several of you through email and the conversations with many of you that we've been fortunate to meet have been really inspiring and has helped keep this dream alive.  So thank you for your support and for your prayers.


When we got started Jeff and I both said that we wanted to create the vessel and then let God captain the ship.  We knew we wanted to make hunting videos that would not only show hunting from an everyday outdoorsman's perspective but also share from a Christian perspective all of the things we enjoy about about spending time in God's country.  God has blessed our efforts and "Seeking the One 10" is selling faster than we anticipated.  Thank you again for your support!


But there is more we felt God wanted to do and our hearts were stirring with ways that we felt He might be leading us into more of a ministry focus.  Specifically God was going after some buried desires that I had deep in my heart that I walked away from years ago.  I went to college and recieved a degree in "Youth and Family Studies/Psychology".  I had dreams of becoming a school resource police officer, a gang intervention officer or something along those lines working with troubled youth.  But the demands of life and the pursuit of a management career with better and quicker earning potential lead me away.  Abandoning that desire has caused me a lot of frustration over the years.  It is really just in the last 4-5 years that I've realized what this discontent with my life was over and I as I began to take it to God and walk with Him closer than I had in the previous 10 or so years He really started leading me back to what He created me for.


And the doors are now opening!  Through putting Faith in the Field out there we have met some great guys out in the McMinnville area who God had been leading in ways that were just as unique to them.  He brought us together through email and we started discussing ways we felt God was leading us to use our outdoor passions and pursuits as a ministry.  Long story short we've been meeting with these guys and we feel like God is asking us to step up the ministry side of Faith in the Field.  Here is what is happening....


-We have established a board of directors.
-We are completing the work I started a year ago to submit forms to become a   501c3 non-profit organization.
-We have a group of guys working on starting a ministry for fatherless and troubled boys where we will get them outdoors to enjoy fishing and hunting as well as be mentored by Godly men who can point them to the true Father who will never abandone them.
-We have a team working on a program and developing materials for fathers to get their sons and daughters outdoors and lead them into adventures but also lead them into a deeper relationship with Christ and help them to discover the desires that God has placed in them.
-We will continue to make great outdoor videos that fit our vision of "Introducing people to Christ through the glory of creation."


We are really excited as we move forward with where God is leading us.  Support has already been pretty amazing from peple saying that they have land that a kid could come hunt on, guys saying they have LOP tags that they would donate to kids in our program, a few people have said they would support us with money, and we've had a few people say that they would like to be a part of the ministry.  Lots of evidence that God is at work here.  EXCITING!


Things will be changing a little over the next few months. We will be introducing our board of directors to you and we may be able to get them to write a blog from time to time so you don't have to keep hearing from me and Jeff every week.  Our website will be changing soon. We are talking about changing the logo a bit to include a young person standing with a man or men by the cross.  And we are hoping to bring you some stories very soon of young people whose lives will never be the same as a result of meeting Christ in very real ways while involved in one of our programs.


Now more than ever, please keep us in your prayers.


Seeking the One,

Scott

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The End Of The West?

I just finished a fascinating book on the life and tragic death of Pat Tillman.  If you remember he was the defensive back for the Phoenix Cardinals who in the aftermath of 9/11 put his career in the NFL on hold to join the military.  I finished the book last night and in the postscript I was struck by some truth in the midst of some of the propaganda.

In 1992 Francis Fukayama wrote an artical that stirred some major political contraversy called The End of History and The Last Man.  He basically wrote that modern democracies, education, the desire for more material possessions and meeting our own personal needs has become the new way of life.  And he states that the higher educated among us will not risk our lives for a cause because history has taught us that it is pointless.  In the modern age men will be content to sit at home and congratulate themselves on their open mindedness and lack of fanaticism. 

Lee Harris, in his book "The Suicide of Reason" argues,

The Problem is not that Fukayama is dead wrong; the problem is that he is half right.  Unfortunately for us, the wrong half.

In the West we are perilously getting down to our last man.  Liberal democracy, among us, is achieving the goal that Fukayama predicted for it:  It is eliminating the alpha males from our midst, at a dizzyingly accelerating rate.  But in the Muslim societies, the alpha male is still alive and well.  While we in America are drugging our alpha boys with Ritalin, the Muslims are doing everything in their power to encourage their alpha boys to be tough, aggressive, and ruthless....We are proud if our sons get into a good college; they are proud if their sons die as martyrs.

To rid your society of high-testosterone alpha males may bring peace and quiet; but if you have an enemy that is building up an army of alpha boys to hate you fanatically and who have vowed to destroy you, you will be commiting suicide...

The end of testosterone in the West alone will not culminate the end of history, but it may well culminate in the end of the West.

Pretty Strong words!  And scary even if only partly true.  And I think we may even be closer to the "Last Christian Man" than the "Last Man".

We have an enemy that hates us more than the Muslims do.  And he and his army are taking out masculine christianinty in wholesale droves.  We've sort of been left with this 'religion' of do's and don'ts and being nice and polite and wearing a big smile.  But when the trials come we fall apart.  Or when things are going well we get distracted and start following the world.  We start seeking selfish desires.  Our sons need engaged fathers who will model for them and lead them into an authentic masculine relationship with Christ.  But instead we leave it up to their Sunday school teacher or their mother to do this.

You look around at christian men held up in your church as examples to follow.  Are they men who draw their sword and go into to battle to rescue someone who needs it?  Are the fierce?  Or are they just nice men?

We need a cause to live for.  We need to be sold out...to be a fanatic.  And we need to rescue our boys before it's too late.

-Scott

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The power of your actions

The law of unintended consequences is as applicable to human nature as it is to science.  We recently received this story of a young man and the results of his simple act of friendship:


One day when I was a freshman in high school, I saw a kid from my class walking home from school.  His name was Kyle.  It looked like he was carrying all of his books.  I thought to myself, “Why would anyone bring home all of his books on a Friday?  He must really be a nerd.”

I had quite a weekend planned—parties and a football game with my friends on Saturday afternoon—so I shrugged my shoulders and went on.

As I was walking, I saw a bunch of kids running towards him.  They knocked all of his books out of his arms and tripped him so he landed in the dirt.  His glasses went flying, and I saw them land in the grass about ten feet from him.  As he looked up, I saw terrible sadness in his eyes.  My heart went out to him.  I jogged over to him as he crawled around looking for his glasses, and I saw a tear in his eye.  As I handed him his glasses, I said, “Those guys are jerks.  They should really get lives.”

He looked at me and said, “Hey, thanks!”  There was a big smile on his face.  It was one of those smiles that showed real gratitude.

I helped him pick up his books and asked him where he lived.  As it turned out, he lived near me, so I asked him why I hadn’t seen him before.  He said he had gone to private school before now.

We talked all the way home, and I carried some of his books.  He turned out to be a pretty cool kid, and we hung out all weekend.  The more I got to know Kyle, the more I liked him, and my friends all felt the same.  Over the next four years, Kyle and I became best friends.

Since Kyle was the valedictorian of our class, he had to prepare a speech for graduation.  I was so glad it wasn’t me having to get up there and speak!  Kyle was one of those guys who had really found himself during high school.  He’d filled out and actually looked good in glasses.  He’d also had more dates than I had, and all of the girls loved him.

I could tell he was nervous about the speech, so I smacked him on the back and said, “Hey, big guy, you’ll be great!”

“Thanks,” he replied.

A few minutes later, he cleared his throat and began his speech.

“Graduation is a time to thank those who helped you make it through the tough years—your parents, your siblings, maybe a coach . . . but mostly your friends.  I am here to tell you that being a friend to someone is the best gift you can give.  I’d like to tell you a story.”

I listened in disbelief as my best friend told the story of the day we met.  He had planned to kill himself over that weekend.  He spoke about how he had cleaned out his locker so his mom wouldn’t have to do it later . . . that was why he was carrying so much stuff home.

Kyle added, “Thankfully, I was saved.  My friend saved me from doing the unspeakable.”

I heard a gasp go through the crowd as this handsome, popular boy told us all about his weakest moment.  I saw his mom and dad looking at me and smiling the same grateful smile Kyle often displayed.  It was only then that I realized its depth.

Never underestimate the power of your actions.  With one small gesture, you can truly change a person’s life—for better or for worse.

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Time in Nature = Time with God

This last weekend, Scott and I spoke at the 14th Annual Sportsman's Breakfast in Blodgett, OR. Thank you to all who were a part of the event; it was great spending time with everyone there, enjoying some great grub, stories and trophies! In this week's blog I thought I'd write out some of what we spoke about last Saturday...

Romans 1:19-20 says, "The truth about God is known to us instinctively. God has put this knowledge in our hears. From the time the world was created, people have seen the earth and sky and all that God made. We can clearly see His invisible qualities, eternal power and divine nature, so we have no excuse whatsoever for not knowing God." 

Every person you’ve ever met, and ever will meet, knows God. They might not acknowledge Him, but they know Him. God's placed a knowledge of Himself in EVERYONE.  



The earth and sky and all that God made are among the most undeniable revelations of Him that we find in this life. Of course God is found in church and through people, and the fullest reflection of God in this life is a Christ centered marriage, where the Godly attributes of a man and woman are rightly united as one (this is also why Satan tries his hardest to devour Christian marriages). BUT, I don’t know any perfect people, perfect marriages or perfect churches…yet creation is perfection each and every time we experience it. And because of that, as the verse says, we are without excuse. God’s placed, within us, the desire to enjoy His creation because it’s one of the only settings where He is perceived as flawless and untarnished. Ultimately, the desire to spend quality time in nature is the desire to spend quality time with God.

Again, whether we recognize it or not, whether we admit it or not, our desire to be in nature comes from our desire to be with God... he’s placed that desire in us! Realizing this has been profound!

Take this scenario as just one example... how many of your wives are a little uneasy when you leave to go hunting? And why is that? They have to take care of the kids, they’re alone at night, they never get to leave for a week... lots of reasons… ultimately though, wouldn’t you say that their complaints stem from the thought that your hunting is a selfish thing that won’t produce anything but your being gone?


How many of them would be uneasy if you made it known that your trip was about spending quality time with God? And not making known by just saying it, but by actually taking the approach and realizing that your desire is to kill a big buck, yes, but every ounce of enjoyment you get from your outdoor experiences comes from time spent with God. How different would your wife's reaction be if your voice (and attitude) said, “Honey, I’ll miss you, kids, I’ll miss you, but daddy’s going to spend a week with God... killin’ creatures in His name, amen!" Okay, you can leave that last part out, but don't miss the point. ;)


Our desire to be outdoors is the God given, instinctive desire to spend time with Him… let’s recognize that.

-Jeff

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