Tag: bible verse

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Some People Burn Rubber; This Family Flung it

When I was in my early teens I had a buddy named Cameron. If Cameron had a super power, it was anything that had to do with rubber bands. That dude had rubber bands stashed all over the house, and he was a crack shot with them.

The house where he lived had a skylight in the kitchen, and every once in awhile a fly would buzz around in there, looking for a way out. It seemed like he could always take those guys out on the first try. He also used rubber bands to make slingshots out of branches he found that were the right size/shape. If we had Instagram back then, we’d have been on it doing rubber band madness.

I’m not sure how it started, but at one point Cameron and I ignited some kind of playful feud with his dad. I was at their house like, all the time, so he was probably looking for a way to encourage me to spend less time there. I wasn’t quite “Steve Urkel” bad, but Cameron’s dad often referred to me as “the infestation.” He wasn’t too shabby with rubber bands, either, and on more than one occasion I had to dive for cover to try to escape the onslaught of flying rubber.

Again, the details are fuzzy, but one evening we anticipated that his dad was on the prowl and looking to light us up somehow. I’m pretty sure the “Home Alone” movies were fresh in our minds, and our heads were filled with ideas whose effectiveness was portrayed maybe a little too generously in the movies.

The way his house was set up, Cameron and his sister had the only rooms on the second floor, and the only other thing up there was a bathroom. He had sort of a cool setup in his room; the ceilings slanted down to the walls, so the room got shorter as you went away from the middle, but on the other side of the walls there was some storage space where the ceiling got uncomfortably short. It was a pain to get in there if you were the size of an adult, but it was great for us as kids. Our plan was to set up a bunch of alarms and traps out in Cameron’s room, and then let them stand guard while we set up a fort in one of the storage spaces so we could defend ourselves.

I don’t remember everything we set up, but I remember I brought some stuff from my house to help us out. I brought a tape player with a cassette tape cued up to a loud spot in a Michael W. Smith song, and I made a trigger out of a motorized Construx creation. I also know I brought a small chain and a bunch of metal jax. Cameron probably set up some kind of auto-rubber band crossbows aimed at the door. We strung a bunch of rubber bands together (I don’t think I can properly explain just how many rubber bands were in this house; it’s like Cameron asked for bags of rubber bands for his birthday and Christmas, and he got them) but we’d take these strings of rubber bands and pull them tight all across the room, fastening them to different things and making a sort of web. From one of them I hung the little chain, and I put the pile of metal jacks right under it, so if something disturbed the rubber band string that held the chain, it would fall onto the jacks and make a distinctive noise. The chain was barely hanging on to the string, so a false alarm wasn’t out of the question.

That wasn’t the big alarm, though. The big one was the tape player I mentioned. It was connected to a tripline that an intruder would set off, and everyone in the house would the loud guitar from the start of “Goin’ Through the Motions” if tripped. I don’t know what else we set up, but I’m sure there were other traps. Once we finished that, we shut off the lights and went to work in the storage space, rearranging boxes, garbage bags full of stuff, and strategically storing rubber band ammunition in various locations. If Cameron’s dad was coming for us, he’d either have to turn on the lights (giving himself away) or risk running through our field of booby traps.

Well, we were focused on the best way to set up a defense, and busied ourselves with strategy, plans, and fall-back areas. We had it all planned out. “The decoy dives over here while the other guy pops up and nails him from over here! When he pivots to focus on that guy, the decoy army crawls through this makeshift tunnel and hits him from the other side of the pillar! He won’t see it coming! ”

While we were making our grand strategy, we both thought we heard something out in Cameron’s room that sounded a lot like a little chain falling onto metal jacks. We both froze, wondering: 1. if we had actually heard something, 2. if it was a false alarm, and 3. now what?

Before we could do anything, Cameron’s dad burst into the storage space, filling the air with a hail of rubber projectiles. Surprised shrieks filled the room as we dove for cover but still got hit multiple times. There were so many rubber bands in the air at the same time, it’s like the guy had four arms with eight fingers and three thumbs on each hand, and they were all working on delivering stinging hits to the two of us. Well, we couldn’t mount any kind of coherent defense, and it was a massacre. Cameron’s dad shellacked us pretty good, and there was no denying who won that particular engagement.

You may have had a similar experience (in the metaphorical sense, at least). You recognize that you’re exposed to temptation from certain sins, and you’ve taken the precautions that you believe will be effective in keeping you safe. As it turns out, though, either your precautions didn’t work or something else went wrong, and you ended up not being as safe as you thought. Maybe you put your trust somewhere you shouldn’t have. Maybe you blocked a specific website but you found a different one you shouldn’t be visiting, or you stopped talking about people behind their backs, but now you disguise the gossip as a prayer request.

These things happen. You have to constantly check your defenses, taking frequent looks at your life to evaluate where you’re vulnerable. Things change rapidly; don’t rely on old measures that no longer reflect the modern vulnerabilities in your life. Know yourself and know what you have a hard time overcoming, and place countermeasures in your life that enable you to stand up to them. (In some cases, that requires a literal fleeing from the situation.)

Rubber bands can sting, but there are things that sting much worse. Set up the protections you know will help you be more effective in standing up to temptation.

For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places. Therefore, take up the full armor of God, so that you will be able to resist in the evil day, and having done everything, to stand firm. –Ephesians 6:12-13

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I Never Expected To See “the Snap” With My Own Eyes!

(Another entry not meant for my regular readers, but for those left behind after witnessing something extraordinary and terrifying…the sudden, inexplicable disappearance of a sizable percentage of Earth’s population.)

So it actually happened. Millions of people across the world just disappeared without a trace. What happened? What does it mean?

It means the Bible is true.

It means that over the next…probably 7 years or so, humanity will witness a level of destruction not seen since the days of Noah and the ark. I can’t put an exact timeframe on it because I don’t know for sure where the Rapture (the sudden disappearance of Christians) falls in relation to the seven years known as the Great Tribulation.

(One of the many confusing things about this era is going to be the fact that there are still people who thought they were Christians who are still left behind. The inconvenient truth they’ll have to face up to is the fact that even if they attend church regularly and do lots of “religious things,” they have not trusted Jesus Christ as their savior.)

I’ve written about this before, but it’s a pretty heavy duty topic, and I’d love to be able to help provide some direction for the people that are still here. If the Rapture actually happened, I’m not here anymore, so I can only help you through stuff I’ve already written or stuff I can point you to. Here’s the part that sounds crazy, but since you’re probably pretty desperate for answers, I’ll just come out and say it. When I say that you’ve been “left behind,” here’s what I mean. God created the world. Humanity sinned and sort of broke the deal that God had with us. For awhile we got by with presenting sacrifices to Him (the days of the Old Testament), but it wasn’t until Jesus Christ came to become a permanent sacrifice on our behalf that it changed our relationship with God. After He rose from the dead and ascended back to Heaven, He left the Church here to do His work until He comes back to take the rest of His followers away so they don’t have to endure the Great Tribulation, which is where God cleans house and lets loose on whoever’s left for thousands of years’ worth of stubborn disobedience.

Don’t worry, there’s still hope for you! The Great Tribulation will see unprecedented levels of both Christian revival and persecution of Christians. Keep an eye out for the Evangelists. There are going to be street preachers, people that hold meetings in big tents, in warehouses, in schools, in sports arenas, people that spread the news about Jesus. They’ll use whatever are the most popular tools of the day to spread the news. Go to them. As long as what they’re saying agrees with the Bible (and no other religious books), they’re steering you toward the truth. (But be careful, 2 Timothy 4 says that many people will be deceived by false teaching during this time.) In the meantime, track down a Bible and start reading it. Start with the New Testament…read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. These are four books that cover the same material, so don’t be confused when Jesus dies four times. Those four books are collectively called “the Gospels.”

To read a little more about what you’re living in (the End Times, the Great Tribulation, the Apocalypse, Armageddon), check out the last book in the Bible; it’s called Revelation. You’ll probably need to read it a few times, and you’ll learn a lot more if you have some kind of study Bible with notes or some kind of Bible commentary. A few other books in the Bible cover the End Times and provide more info…check out the books of Ezekiel, Daniel, Zechariah, and First and Second Thessalonians (again, study Bibles, Bible commentaries, and online resources will be tremendously helpful). Here are a few of the things that are coming, but not necessarily in this order:

  • Mass death. Not only are the four horsemen of the apocalypse real, but one of them is given the power to kill a quarter of humanity (Revelation 6:7-8). Later, four imprisoned fallen angels (demons) are released to kill a third of humanity (Revelation 9:13-15). If we have 8 billion people on the planet right now and this happened, the horseman takes out 2 billion people, and then the fallen angels take out a third of the remaining six, cutting the population in half from 8 to 4 billion.
  • You think the idea of climate change is scary? Earth’s ecology gets absolutely demolished in Revelation chapter 8. The wind even stops in chapter 7.
  • God pours out so much wrath on the planet and its occupants that people abandon large portions of it and move somewhere else (picture Detroit as its population fell, but on a much larger scale). Of all places, Babylon, code for the famous city of Rome, becomes very important; I’m not sure if it actually becomes the global capital or if it sort of becomes symbolic of global debauchery and sin, sort of like how Vegas is for the U.S., and people consolidate there (Revelation chapters 16ish to 18).
  • At least one off-the-scale earthquake takes place (Revelation 16:18).
  • Slavery makes a comeback (Revelation 18:11-13).
  • There will be two missionaries that are invincible for a time, who speak truth to power so effectively that people can’t stand hearing their testimony and try unsuccessfully to kill them. They defend themselves like something you’d see in an X-Men movie, but watch out for the guy that eventually does kill them…he’s super bad news and will seem like he’s awesome, but believe me, he’s not somebody you should follow. Those two witnesses/missionaries also won’t let death keep them down. There will be some worldwide celebration for a few days after they’re killed, but the world will get a shock when the two of them get up again three and a half days after their death (Revelation 11:1-12).

Look, I don’t envy you. I’m writing this in August of 2022, and the past couple years have been pretty nuts from my perspective, but they pale in comparison to what you’re living through. Dig into the Bible, spread the word, and find other believers to encourage and be encouraged by. Dark days are ahead, and you’ll be hunted. If you turn to God, repent, and give your life to Him, He’ll give you what you need to make it to the end.

Don’t give up. It’s going to be worth it.

Want to learn more about specific Biblical references on the End Times? See http://peoplegetready.org/end-times/150-chapters-bible-times/

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It’s A Good Idea To Have Some Backup

In my younger days I thought it’d be cool to get SCUBA certified, so while I was stationed in coastal Virginia with the Air Force, I found a dive shop and got signed up for the course.

I had been on a few “escorted” dives prior to that, and I enjoyed them, so I figured this would be a fun hobby to get into. The course was split up into sections; we had classwork, pool time, and time in a lake.

The academic work made sense to me, and the pool time was a good warm up as far as familiarization with adjusting equipment and figuring out how to operate underwater. The lake was the part I was looking forward to, though.

When the day finally came, we showed up and went over a few things from class. Then we went over the dive plan and a map of the area where we’d be diving. Finally we paired off into teams of “dive buddies” and suited up.

It was much different from the pool. I didn’t wear a wetsuit; I wore a semi-dry suit, which made me very buoyant. It took just about all the extra weight I owned just to maintain neutral buoyancy. The instructors helped me with a few tricks and some extra weight, and got me ready to go. After we got our equipment situated to our liking, we began the dive.

It started off fine. We followed the plan, moving from one underwater landmark to the next without a problem. Over time though, something started feeling wrong. The buckle holding my air tank in place somehow came loose. The tank began sliding out of place, moving down my back.

Because of where the buckle was located and how the tank was seated, I couldn’t get the leverage or the reach to fix things on my own. My dive buddy was in front of me, and I tapped him on the leg to get his attention. He turned to look, and I pointed over my shoulder at my tank, but I guess what I was trying to communicate wasn’t very obvious. He turned back around and kept swimming according to our dive plan. I grabbed him and pointed again to my tank, making more exaggerated gestures. (It was frustrating being so close to someone without being able to talk to them!)

He finally figured out what I was getting at. I turned my back to him, he slid the tank into the right position and locked the buckle in place. After that I was good to go and we were able to resume the dive according to the original plan.

Sometimes, you just need a buddy. My prayer is that something I write on this blog helps encourage you to step out in faith and use the gifts God’s given you to bring glory to Him. My hope is that the fruit of your efforts goes way beyond anything you thought it would be, but make no mistake: if you attempt to give God glory, you’ll run into opposition. You’re going to get discouraged. You’re going to get knocked down. Having a buddy to help you get back on your feet is a great asset to have.

A person standing alone can be attacked and defeated, but two can stand back-to-back and conquer. Three are even better, for a triple-braided cord is not easily broken. –Ecclesiastes 4:12

As you embark on your efforts to employ your God-given gifts and talents, keep your buddy/buddies close, and be quick to lend a hand when they get knocked down, too.

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It’s Time to Cowboy Up

The apostle Paul, in his closing salutation to the Colossians, made a unique remark to the readers of his letter.

In the second to last verse in the whole book, he told them something to pass along to somebody he knew, somebody named Archippus. I don’t know exactly who he was, some think he was probably the son of Philemon (as in…the book of Philemon, verse 2). In Colossians 4, verse 17, Paul says And say to Archippus, “Take heed to the ministry which you have received in the Lord, that you may fulfill it.”

It’s so simple that you may have read right over it without even thinking about it. Why would this text even be included in the letter?

My guess is that Archippus was like a lot of us. I’m openly speculating here, but I’d guess Archippus was waffling about proceeding with the charge God had given him.

We read the well-known Bible stories and think “well, yeah, if God talked to me from a burning bush, I’d know what He wanted me to do, too!” Gideon got two chances to make sure he really got the message and that God wasn’t just messing with him.

For the rest of us though, God’s calling can be a lot more subtle. Sometimes it takes a lot of prayer, seeking, and waiting. Other times it’s dropped in your lap. Once you know it, though, you’re on the hook. It’s not just a dreamy “someday goal,” it’s something you’ve been charged by God to do, and it’s up to you to take steps toward making it happen.

It’s a sobering thing. Receiving a calling, great or small, means you have the opportunity to rise to the occasion. It’s God saying “okay, now let’s see how you do with this one.” It means you have the chance to step out in faith and act in obedience in a way that will enable you to look back later in life and be proud that you chose to honor the Lord when He gave you the invitation. You might take it, you might not; nobody’s going to make you. I don’t know what level of sadness is possible in Heaven, but I imagine that remembering lost opportunities on Earth to worship the King of Kings is probably one of the saddest things you could dwell on.

So with that perspective, I’d love to encourage anyone like Archippus…do it. Follow through. Take heart, because God you this charge…this ministry…for a reason. You might not learn it this side of Heaven, but it will all become clear someday. Fulfill that calling, and think of it as performing an act of worship.

Need a little motivation and a reminder about who you are? Check out this video. Take note of the thoughts you have while watching it, and don’t be afraid to take action.

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Your Tax Dollars (Not) at Work

Hiding on Grandma’s couch is one of the only things this camo pattern’s good for

Right after Basic Training I got shuttled off to another section of Lackland Air Force Base near San Antonio, TX. It was here I began the long road to become an instructor for Survival, Evasion, Resistance, & Escape, or SERE.

Of course, right after Basic, you’re not much good for anything aside from doing what you’re told. It’s nothing personal…you just don’t know anything yet. You have to hang around for awhile and learn how things are done (sadly, the thing that makes the most sense isn’t commonly done). Our first week or so after arriving at SERE was spent doing what we call “in-processing,” which in our case consisted of some paperwork and sitting around listening to lots of briefings. We didn’t interact with the SERE instructors during that week other than to say “hi, we’re here;” we did our in-processing en masse with administrative troops that did it full time.

One day, probably the week after we finished all our in-processing, I think our instructors had some stuff they had to take care of at the school building, so they sent us back to our dorms to do our details…where we cleaned up and were supposed to make the place shine. One thing that’s important to understand…this was in early 2004; we were in the midst of two wars and the military infrastructure to support them was crying uncle in some places. Rumor had it that the dorms we were staying in had been condemned, but had been pressed back into service for the war effort. We could do our details for weeks, but it was only going to make the place look so nice, you know? Sending students to do details in the dorms was just a way of keeping them out of our instructors’ closely cropped hair for awhile.

Now I was still pretty new to this, but apparently we didn’t get sent back to the dorms to do details very often, and when we did, it was seen as a great opportunity to goof off. The training was pretty intense, so having some free time was a nice thing to have, because we were all wound up pretty tight.

I guess I happened to be standing in the wrong place at the wrong time. One of the more senior students pointed at me and said “You, you’re on Sergeant watch.” He sat me by a window where I could see the main entrance to our building. If I saw anybody that wasn’t a student approaching the entrance, especially any of the SERE instructors, I was supposed to raise the alarm.

I have no idea what everyone else was doing, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t what we were supposed to be doing. If one of our instructors had snuck in the back door and caught us, we would have paid pretty dearly for it. I was still young enough in my Air Force career not to know it, but punishment through physical exercise was something you come to embrace in SERE Indoctrination. Uniform look like garbage? Get down and start doing flutter kicks. Is your hair too long? That’s a set of pushups for each hair that’s touching one of your ears. Suffer an egregious lapse in judgment during the weekend? Heaven help you.

After staring hard out the window for awhile, one of our SERE instructors rounded the corner of the building, heading toward our door. I was still so new that I didn’t even know the guy’s name. “It’s Sergeant…one of the sergeants is walking up the path!”

One of the more senior students rushed to the window to get a better look, and sure enough, he saw Joe walking toward the front door. With a muttered curse, he ran out of the room and down the hallway, letting everyone know they needed to look busy…now. About 10 seconds later, guys were mopping the halls, vacuuming the Day Room, washing windows, dusting stuff that didn’t have a speck of dust on it, and scrubbing stuff you never even thought about scrubbing.

Joe wasn’t a sadistic dude, but if he had caught us goofing off, he would have dropped the hammer on us! It would have been one of those “everybody do pushups until I get tired” moments. Then after hearing us struggle for awhile he would have said “are you getting tired?” When we said yes, he would have said “okay, roll over on your backs and start doing flutter kicks.”

I wouldn’t say we performed our duty in an honorable way that day, but it provides a different bit of context to a famous Bible verse about being watchful. First Peter 5:8 says Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour.

I don’t think Joe came there to try to catch us doing something we weren’t supposed to be doing. He was probably just coming to the dorms to say “okay, we’re ready for you to come back now,” but if he had seen what we were actually doing, you can bet he would have devoured every last one of us. Whether he was intentionally trying to catch us or if he caught us as targets of opportunity, the result would have been the same: we’d be toast.

The devil is the same way. Constantly on the prowl, he’s looking for believers to devour. I don’t think he bothers too much with nonbelievers…he already owns them, so why would he waste effort on them? He’s looking for enemies to pick off. Sometimes he’s targeting a firmly planted Christian through an ongoing campaign against them, and other times he comes across a Christian that’s teetering on the edge of something they’re not supposed to be doing. If he sees that, he’ll put his campaign on pause and pounce on the target of opportunity. Enticing that believer to sin enables a whole host of tools that can be used against them to cripple their effectiveness as the hands and feet of God (guilt, shame, desensitizing of sin, fear, doubt, follow-on consequences, etc.).

Therefore, as Peter says, be on your guard and on high alert, because your enemy’s looking for an opening where he can nail you. Don’t give him the opportunity.

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Of Course THAT’S When She Walked Through the Door!

Years ago I found myself bringing my toddler son out in our backyard to give him a change of scenery. He was a curious little guy, and sometimes even just bringing him to a different room or out in the backyard kept him busy for a little while.

Our yard at the time was very small, but it had plenty of stuff for my little guy to explore. It was fenced in, had an HVAC condenser unit, a shed, and a little sandbox. There was always something to clean up back there, so I busied myself doing that while my son set about exploring his environment.

I think I noticed a strange look on his face right around the same time my wife came outside to join us. Having “Mom Radar,” she spotted his expression right away and hurried over to him and opened up his mouth. To her disgust, my son had picked up a little Roly-Poly (a pillbug) and put it in his mouth. She fished it out while half laughing and half scolding her husband. If only she were married to someone responsible, he could be trusted to care for the well being of this little boy out in the backyard!

Man, I blew it. Daddy fail. There are other fails, but this is probably one of the more mild ones. I still have the teenage years ahead of me, so I’m probably going to blow it on multiple occasions when the stakes are higher.

This Sunday is Father’s Day. Everyone out there has a father. Maybe you have a fabulous relationship with your dad. You may have had a terrible father. You may not have ever met your dad. Whatever the case may be, I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that if he hasn’t already, your dad is probably going to let you down at least once (I’m certainly no exception). Even if he loves you, he’s human, and humans make lots of mistakes. (It’s not a dig at you, Dad!)

I can also guarantee you, though, that not only does your Heavenly Father love you, but He does NOT make mistakes. He loves you enough to rebuke you, to discipline you, and to steer you in the direction He wants you to go in, even if it’s not the direction you’re trying to go. Whereas I try to let my kids be kids and encourage them in some of their interests without knowing what they’ll someday become, the Lord controls different aspects of your life to get you to arrive exactly where He wants you to be, right when He wants you to be there, with the right experience already under your belt.

Many are the plans in the mind of a man, but it is the purpose of the Lord that will stand. –Proverbs 19:21

“And I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to Me,” Says the Lord Almighty. -2 Corinthians 6:18

Happy Father’s Day to the dads out there!

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God Hasn’t Changed One Bit

About a year ago we had a brief reunion to celebrate some milestone birthdays in our family. It was a special time where we got together with loved ones, some of which I hadn’t seen in about 15 years. I also returned to my uncle’s house for the first time in 25 years. It was a wonderful time of celebration and it was so good to catch up with everyone.

In the course of traveling to the get-together, we spent a couple nights at my parents’ house. This is the house where I grew up, and now I’m bringing my kids there for visits.

Although my whole family’s been to my parents’ house plenty of times, on this particular occasion I took the opportunity to take a walk by myself around the neighborhood and see what things looked like.

There were parts of the neighborhood I haven’t seen for probably 15 years or more, but it had been 30 or so since I really knew it well. So many memories came back as I walked around (some of which I’ve written about before). I used to cut through that backyard all the time on my bike until the owner yelled at me for leaving bike tracks in his lawn. I got stuck in the mud when that house was new. I wonder whatever happened to the people that used to live here? I helped build that house right there. Oh wow, those people were awesome, I wonder how they’re doing?! Don’t go trick-or-treating there, that lady hands out little boxes of raisins. Here’s the hill that a friend and I went flying down on a piece of plywood nailed to a skateboard. A bunch of us did backyard wrestling all the time right over there on that grass.

It was crazy to see how much things changed, but at the same time how much they stayed the same. Like going back to visit your elementary school as an adult, the place just kinda seemed smaller than I remembered. Trees that were small when I was young had now reached full size, while others had been removed. That house looks like it’s in shambles, but that one looks great. Between when I lived there as a kid and when I went for a walk around the place, some houses in the neighborhood had been sold and resold an unknown number of times, but other houses still had the same owners. At the homes where my friends had lived (and where I had spent lots of time), I wondered what the insides of the houses looked like now. Was that crack in the drywall still there?

It was a bittersweet trip down memory lane. As a kid I recognized everyone’s car, but now if someone drove past and waved, I probably wouldn’t have a clue who it was. The weird part was that the driver could be someone that was a child the last time they passed me in a car.

Whether it’s houses, cars, or people, none of it lasts forever. Time relentlessly marches past, and the older we get, we become increasingly aware of how quickly it passes. I’m incredibly grateful that even though I’m becoming more and more aware of just how fleeting this life is, God hasn’t changed one bit in the entire time I’ve been walking this planet. Cultural shifts about what is and what isn’t acceptable continue to change, and so does conventional wisdom. Through it all though, the God watching over me today is the same one that set the planets in motion, who brought the Israelites out of slavery, and who blinded Saul on the road to Damascus. Only His covenants have changed, and they’ve only gotten better with time.

Of old you laid the foundation of the earth,
    and the heavens are the work of your hands.
They will perish, but you will remain;
    they will all wear out like a garment.
You will change them like a robe, and they will pass away,
    but you are the same, and your years have no end. -Psalm 102:25-27

Praise be to the everlasting One, and all glory to the One who invites us to spend eternity with Him (in bodies that don’t degrade)!

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Don’t Underestimate the Importance of Solid Footing

After I passed the SERE Indoctrination course in Texas, the Air Force moved my fellow course graduates and I up to Fairchild Air Force Base in eastern Washington state. Fairchild AFB is the site of the Air Force’s main survival school.

In some ways the environment was more relaxed. The screening course was about two weeks long, but the upcoming course was six months long. With such a lengthy course that starts only twice a year, if you missed the start of one class, you could be waiting around for awhile before the next class began.

While waiting we had various tasks and activities to perform. We’d work out together in the mornings five days a week, with every Monday being a PT test that the rest of the Air Force only did once or twice a year. On Monday afternoons we’d do a 7-mile timed ruck march. The other afternoons during the week usually involved some sort of training in a section of the base where we could practice using an ax to fell trees or split wood, perform other firecraft training, or practice building shelters. Another afternoon was usually spent cleaning a particular building, repairing equipment, or prepping and resupplying stuff we’d used previously. Every now and then we’d spend a few overnights out in the forest somewhere, learning to use the skills and tricks we’d picked up.

One of the cool things we regularly got to do was grab our loaded rucks and pile into a bus and we’d get driven to state parks or national forests or some kind of wilderness that was open to public use, and we’d go on 10+ mile hikes to help prepare our bodies for the upcoming training. The only real rules given to us were that we had to carry a decent weight in our packs, we had to bring water, and we had to wear the boots we’d use in training, but aside from the boots we could wear whatever we wanted. It was a relaxed version of intense training and we’d get to apply more things we’d learned along the way.

About this time of year, April or May, we went for one of these hikes up in the mountains somewhere. There was still a lot of snow on the ground, but it was warm enough that the snowpack was melting.

Someone tell that goober that his survival vest doesn’t go with that outfit

We came to one spot where some small evergreens were sticking out of the snow. As we walked through the patch of trees, a few guys started sinking waist-deep into the snow. It was a total surprise to me. I had no clue what was going on…it almost seemed like some kind of snow shark was swimming around underneath us or something, picking us off one by one.

It turns out that during the winter, as the snow fell, the evergreens acted like umbrellas. The snow piled up around the outside of the trees, but near the trunk a snowless void remained. Weeks or months later when some unsuspecting Air Force students came walking along and got too close to the trees, the snow shifted underneath them and started to swallow them up. Though the trees looked small, their full height was hidden from view. In this picture, Carl walked right between two trees growing close together, and after sinking into the snow he had to get a hand up. The surface he had been walking on, despite its appearance, was not as solid as what he had imagined it to be.

Two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor. For if either of them falls, the one will lift up his companion. But woe to the one who falls when there is not another to lift him up. -Ecclesiastes 4:9-10

We live in strange times. Up is down, black is white, right is wrong, and wrong is right. The snow that humanity stands on is shifting around us, leaving us in a state of confusion with unsteady footing. As the world goes off in search of today’s version of a moral compass (and gets ready to change it tomorrow), build your life not on the shifting footing of the world’s ideology, but on the firm foundation of Jesus Christ, which does not change.

“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.”-Matthew 7:24-27

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That Was Just a Warning Shot, God Doesn’t Miss

How tolerant is God?

We all make mistakes, right? Sometimes they’re accidental and sometimes we do the wrong thing even though we know it’s wrong. So…what’s God’s level of patience with us?

Fortunately, God often gives warnings before He gives punishments. We just need to be sensitive to hearing those warnings and being humble enough to change the thing we’re being warned about.

In the Old Testament we see a lot more examples of God “letting ‘em have it” as a result of bad behavior. In one instance, the book of Numbers, chapter 11, tells of a recently liberated Israel growing restless with God’s miraculous provision. By this point it had been over a year since God first provided manna, and the Israelites were getting pretty sick of it.

I can certainly understand how eating the same thing for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for over a year would get old. When you’re not carrying any spices, there are only so many ways you can alter the taste of something that’s already bland to start with. The first part of Numbers 11:1 says “Now when the people complained, it displeased the Lord; for the Lord heard it, and His anger was aroused.” The notes in my study bible say that this wasn’t just a passing grumbling; their complaining was outward and loud. I can imagine God saying “Oh, I’m sorry, you’re not pleased with the fact that I spared you from the horrible plagues that beset your captors, then I set you free from bondage, and now I’m bringing you to a fruitful land you’ll call home? I’m feeding you what you need and your clothes and shoes aren’t wearing out, but I’m not moving fast enough for your liking? Did I miss anything, your highness?”

Moses wrote the book of Numbers, and sometimes it’s kind of funny to see how he was in a hurry or just didn’t feel like taking the time to elaborate as he wrote things down. Maybe writing materials were in short supply. Here’s verse 11:1 in its entirety. “Now when the people complained, it displeased the Lord; for the Lord heard it, and His anger was aroused. So the fire of the Lord burned among them, and consumed some in the outskirts of the camp.”

It seems like God doesn’t take the same approach these days. Imagine if He unleashed His wrath every time we did something displeasing to Him? There’d be nobody left!

Let’s consider what He did, though. Yeah, He let some of His anger off the chain, but He didn’t go as far as He could have. Israelites became known for their complaining. The fact that He focused His wrath “on the outskirts of the camp” suggests that He intentionally limited the damage. God doesn’t miss. It’s not clear how the fire started; I don’t know if we’re talking about raining literal fire down from Heaven or if it was “just” divine fire that sprung up in certain portions of the camp, but the outcome was the same…God made an example out of a relatively small number in order to serve as a warning to everyone else. The text doesn’t tell us who bore the brunt of God’s wrath that day, but from what we know about Him, I’ve got to think that they weren’t totally innocent of wrongdoing.

God tends to give warnings before He metes out punishment. In our current era, having people fall over dead doesn’t seem to be quite as common as in Bible times, but He has other ways of warning us to get back on track. A conscience is crucial for doing that. You’re also more likely to heed small warnings if you have a humble spirit. I can’t be sure, but I’m thinking the folks in Numbers 11 probably weren’t all that humble. God turned to straight up death and destruction as a warning. In your case, if you’re doing something you know you shouldn’t be doing, hopefully you’ve got enough humility that reading a post like this is enough to get you to say “you know what? I need to make some changes.”

God will give only so many warnings before He gives you over to the path you’re choosing. Are you doing something you know you shouldn’t be doing? If so, let this post serve as one of those warnings to you. It’s time to face the fact that changes must be made, and that you’re the one to do it.

Search me, O God, and know my heart;
    test me and know my thoughts.
See if there is any wicked way in me,
    and lead me in the way everlasting.

Psalm 139:23-24

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Is the Clock Being Run Out on You?

In the world of sports, if you’re winning near the end of the game, one of your biggest goals is to keep the clock running. You work within the rules of the game to avoid doing things that will stop the time from ticking away.

The goal is to make it harder and harder for the opponent to do anything significant in the diminishing amount of time that’s left. In football you want to tackle runners before they get out of bounds. In basketball you want to chew up as much of the play clock as you can before taking a shot. In hockey you want to control the puck and make the other team come to you. It’s all meant to use up as much of the clock as you can in order to give the opponent less time to mount a comeback, ultimately increasing your chances of victory.

So now let’s put a spiritual application to this.

Consider Satan’s situation for a moment. First John 5:19 says “We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one.” Since each member of the human race is born a sinner, we are all initially part of Satan’s domain and are destined to spend eternity separated from God. The only way he can lose those souls is if they accept Christ and cross over to His domain. In that sense, Satan doesn’t need to play to win, he just needs to play to not lose.

Time is the one thing that everyone has the same amount of. Whether talking about the unsaved or believers that aren’t striving to go deeper with God, I’ve got to imagine that one of Satan’s biggest strategies is to run out the clock. Let’s look at unbelievers first. From Satan’s perspective, as long as they’re preoccupied with something that has no eternal impact, they’re in a good place. “Learning about 18th Century French literature (or physics, or social activism, or anything else that consumes your passion and drive)? That’s great…you get after it with everything you’ve got!” As long as that person’s busy with something that takes a lot of their brain power, there’s not a whole lot left over to take a look up at the stars in the night sky and wonder about their creator.

It’s the same thing for those that have accepted Christ but are preoccupied with the here and now. If you have a talent that Christ has called you to use, but instead you’re spending your time streaming the latest season of whatever show you happen to be enjoying, in all actuality, that’s keeping you on the bench. I’m learning that life moves pretty quickly, and it seems like it moves a little faster with each passing year. I have no idea how much sand I still have left in the hourglass, and you don’t know how much you’ve got left in yours, either. The things we thought we’d have plenty of time to do don’t actually get done unless we live with intentionality. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy shutting off my mind through a variety of ways, but there’s a difference between a little bit of relaxing and a seriously large amount of cumulative hours.

So I have to ask…what’s your biggest time-suck? Facebook/Instagram? Netflix? Some sort of mindless games? YouTube? Wordle, anyone?

Some of the cheerier armchair philosophers will say that this life is really nothing more than sitting around and waiting to die. For those that aren’t following God’s lead and using their spiritual gifts…maybe those philosophers are right.

I urge you…live your life with eternity in mind. We only get one go-round to make a lasting difference, and we’re supposed to be taking this opportunity to glorify God and be part of building His kingdom. Don’t let the adversary run out the clock on you when there’s still so much left to do.

Lord, there are so many distractions out there today. It’s easy to become overwhelmed by sensory overload. Help me know the difference between healthy forms of unwinding and plain old wasting time. When giving to You, finances are usually the first thing to come to mind, but show me where and how You want me to honor You with my time, as well. Amen