Sex Charades, Individualism, Gouche-ism, or simple Deception?

What kind of fish are you?

I live a long distance from the so-called cutting edge of societal "progress." But the majority of uninvolved blokes like me used to be able to figure this stuff out. It fell under the category of "common sense," which is increasingly difficult to find....(and when it is found, it's ridiculed). Culturally compromising sexual practices are being encouraged and experimented with. This is stuff that when it was talked about, even behind closed doors, used to bubble the paint on the woodwork and lift the wall paper on the surrounding walls.

For example, it really isn't cool to sleep with your boyfriend, do "hook-ups," decide you're bi-sexual, or make it your practice to chase around promiscuously with the same or the opposite sex, etc. (although we're being told that it is...and never mind the insightful research). Can anyone spell, s-t-u-p-i-d! It's a fact--and you should know it too. Why? Because I'm very familiar--as we all should be--with the dynamics  and tragic implications of addictive behavior.  

American society is increasingly committed to it's own haphazard destruction---and the vast majority of us appear to do our level best to ignore it! That, in and of itself, is N-U-T-S. We humans are amazingly susceptible to our own pleasure producing endorphins. It's a basic tenant of social (forensic and clinical) psychology that "all behavior has meaning." Why? We predictably repeat pleasurable (stimulating) and pain-avoiding (pleasurable) experiences. And, for example, just about nothing is more pleasurable than the sensual payoffs--the endorphin pumps--we get in and around sex and our sexuality. Duh!

Similarly, there is just about nothing more predictable than the growing preoccupation we can observe in, for example, all things sexual or sexually stimulating. As more and more people are doing, exploring, or just talking about "it" (whatever that "it" is),  the social stigmas around "it" declines (since the need for a social pain-avoidance diminishes). At the same time the potential for the experimentation around "it" GROWS. For example, the personal and societal appetite for the physical, emotional, and psychological pleasure associated with "it" gets bigger and bigger.

So, what's so bad about it, if so many people really seem to want "it?" It's ADDICTION. Contrary to the pervasive PC arguments of our day, it's really not about tolerance, character building, diversity, or progressiveness. There is nothing noble, creative, independent, progressive, or even praise worthy here. It's just stupid, permissive, enabling and "falling down drunk" ADDICTION. 

My dad used to say, "Any old dead fish can float down the stream, but it takes a live one to swim up the stream." So, what kind of a fish are you...are you daily practicing your crawl stroke?

NEXT TIME...A metaphor: 70 years of sugar, processed foods and simple carbs, type II diabetes and a society in trouble.

Got Obstacles Ahead?

There is stuff to say about a support raising effort. As I prepare myself for a fruitful outreach ministry at the Colorado School of Mines, the first step is that of raising my needed financial resources...including my salary. Of course that comes through a detailed ministry budget and the administrative oversight of Campus Ambassadors parent organization, Missions Door.

Some people predictably ask me, "Why do you need to raise your own support...isn't ministry hard enough of itself?" One of my answers to that question rehearses how the process helps me discover people with vision and heart who will partner with me. These stand financially and prayerfully behind me--invisible warriors, as they become--for my on-campus presence. Their passion is, in part, because of their financial investment through me for the Kingdom of God. I feel it assigns me a precious and sacred trust.

There's another answer I offer to this question, too. I sincerely believe I am partnering with God in this ministry effort. I want and need to learn to trust Him with it and in it. A big part of my own faith-growth starts anew and matures, often AWKWARDLY, in this support-raising crucible. "Nothing ventured, nothing gained."

So what's next...where does the faith road go from here? God knows and I'll follow Him. What are the challenges ahead for you?  I Peter 1:3-7.

Got a life plan?

"Life's Road"...near Birkenfeld, OR

I had an early plan for my life, but I'm here to tell you that it looked a lot different from the one I'm living. For example, if I was doing My plan...   

• My boys would have had a great deal more familiarity with the Pacific Northwest...and a relationship with their Grandparents--my parents!
• My dad and mom, sisters and brother--and my life's earliest friendships--wouldn't have been truncated by a 35-year hiatus to the Front Range of Colorado.
• I'd be a seasoned builder of custom homes with a reputation for creative, innovative inside-outside living designs.
• Yada, yada, yada, ...and you get the idea.

As a general rule, life just doesn't work our way. Either life gets in our way all by itself --and God permits it--or GOD himself gets in our way to change-up our plans (eg., Jonah 1: 1&2; Acts 9:3&4; Proverbs 16:9).

Today we're marking the 12th year since those horrific events of 9/11/2001. we're all remembering, as confusing as it may be sometimes, that God permitted some of the worst to happen in and around NYC. Lives were lost and other lives were dramatically changed--and let's not to forget the influence those events have had on all Americans as a whole!

Perhaps you're wrestling with something today--maybe even something other than 9/11? It may be that whatever it is, it seems to make no sense? Hmmm. Might you be wrestling with God or against something else he has permitted to impact your life?  

Of course I can't know, but I know there is that for which we can be completely confident, and it's this: HE promises--and has already demonstrated conclusively that our existence, our life, yours and mine in time and space today, right now--is not all there is. He promises his followers he will make-up for the sacrifices, the disappointments and the hurts we experience here, if we will just trust in HIS rewarding plan and faithfulness for our forever future (1Peter 1:3-8).  

So, together, let's swallow hard. Let's challenge ourselves to assume an attitude that says, "Yes, I will trust Him...and with his help I will persevere!" Then, let's watch what God can and will do through our dedicated lives.

"For God is at work in you, both to will and to do for his good pleasure."...and..."I know in whom I have believed and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him--for his safe keeping--until that day." Philippians 2:13 and II Timothy 1:12.

Bless you.

Dick

Entangled in a web....of my own making?

I walked into our chicken house and found a poor scared little mouse. At first I thought she was just hanging out in some string dangling in a corner of the feed area. But she didn't run away--and then I realized she couldn't!

A closer look discovered she was painfully hung-up in the string. Yes, in her nest-building effort she had become entangled in the very strings she was trying to drag away to her nest. She was horribly stuck! Check out this video of the situation.

What happened next? As you observed, my best attempts to help her wiggle from her confines didn't work. She was terrified, so I couldn't touch her for fear of being bitten. At the end of the video I had to put my phone down to retrieve some scissors. I'd carefully cut her free....and that worked, but even then it wasn't easy. Probably hours of wriggling had tightened the the strings across and around her little belly and back legs. She was wearing a tiny string girdle. Gradually my persistence to free her and her not so unconfused patience with my help prevailed. She was finally able to slip down, scamper across the floor, and then race out the door into the yard. 

It occurred to me how this little Mousie Incident might offer a valuable instructive lesson. How easily we can become imperiled by the very things we think are in our best interests. (Proverbs 16: 9) What we may initially anticipate as a blessing can sometimes become...a curse. But how does and how can one discern the difference--before it's too late? I think the key is time and wise (informed) perseverance. When or as we become (let's say) "vexed" by our effort to persevere, and fearful of missing out on our dream--one that's intended to be in your very best interests--it's important to be asking some prayerful questions in the counsel of and with the input of some close, caring friends. 

As you know, I'm in the midst of a challenging support-raising effort. God willing its successful outcome will place me in a ministry role on the CSM campus. BUT I have a time-limited window of opportunity to make that happen. That fact alone could emotionally impale me. So far the effort isn't going well, which could make me really fussy. But I'm not going to let it beat me; I will not allow myself to be vexed by the to-this-point-poor-outcome of my best efforts, nor will I allow myself to assume OR DEMAND that the support-raising success HAS TO HAPPEN! (Proverbs 3: 5 & 6) I will trust in the God of the challenge, not in the nature, promises, or outcome of the challenge.

I sincerely appreciate your ongoing prayers on my behalf...and please stay away from "mousie hang-ups!"

Dick

 

MAD Goals

The Greater Boston Area

I received a very impact-full text late last week. It came at a great time--and on a day when I really needed it. It was from my friend, Jeff, in Boston. Thirty years ago--in the early 80's--he was an undergrad at the University of Denver. He had committed his life to Christ there at DU. He became one of my student leaders--a member of the CA "Team" for several consecutive years. He also became a loved, "adopted" member of our young family. Today he serves a professional counseling role at a county outpatient resource in the Boston area.

His text included this: "...I want you to know I used something in my group yesterday that you, Richard Brandow, taught at one of our Campus Ambassador's retreats. It just came to me. It was that goals should be MAD...measurable, attainable and definable. I hope one of my clients remembers it 30 years from now!"

Wow.

That was both really humbling and exquisitely challenging...for sure! May God grant me--and you too--the opportunity to influence many more "Jeff's" in the course of our lives. "He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep for that which he cannot lose." Jim Elliott

Dick 

My Missions Door website

Of Hair and Worship

Yup, a barber pole

Think about this with me. I get to the barber every two weeks. You? As a general rule the ancient biblical character, Samson, never darkened the barber's door. He was a Nazarite from birth (Numbers 6:2) and a biblical Old Testament Judge. He actually worshiped GOD by not cutting his hair. It was a vow he swore to keep from his childhood. If you've not revisited that story for a while, check it out in Judges 13-16.

When I was younger, Samson  was a bit of a  puzzle to me. I saw him as physically STRONG and morally weak. I said "weak"--not corrupt. Now, as an older adult, I look at him through a different set of lenses. I observe, for example, that Samson was amazingly used by GOD despite his singular weakness. Even way back then--in the Old Testament--God demonstrated His GRACE in Samson's life, because it wasn't until his vow was compromised--until Delilah cut his hair--that his amazing strength t-e-m-p-o-r-a-r-i-l-y left him.

So I ask myself, "what do I love?" How does what I love influence the way I am spending my life--my day-to-day? Why? Because as a child of God (John 3:16) I too have a vow, a love-obligation to worship HIM. Just like Samson, I am privileged to serve the gracious eternal GOD with all my strength (Romans 12:1,2.) as he was similarly privileged to do. Throughout his amazing life Samson was obedient to his vow--with just one short and painful vow-related slip-up. 

Can I say that about me? Nope. For me--and for Christ-followers in general--perhaps even more jaw-dropping and encompassing than Samson amazing life and experiences--is my awareness that God has called me to worship HIM through and in my life-style choices (John 4:25 & 14:6, Philippians 2: 5-7 and Romans 12: 1 & 2, again). Worship, by God's grace, becomes my life-style and effects all my daily choices. So, it's not about hair cuts per se, or about Sunday-go-to-meetings, praise songs or musical worship events, what movies I see or the books I read, or about Bible memory, do's and don'ts of all kinds, "the company I keep", or my career or vocational choices, etc. It's about all of those things and no one of them in particular and influences them all in general (e.g., Matthew 6:33).

So the next time I visit my barber I'm going to look in the mirror, think of Samson, and then ask myself, "Hey bro, how's your worship goin...today?

Dick 
PS: Here's a fun, virtual "barber visit"

Step-by step forward

This support-raising effort sure isn't for the faint of heart. There us so much on the line for me, for Judi, for our future...and for the potential impact I can have and bring to students on the CSM campus. 

I know that God knows all that, and that's very reassuring, but this effort to build a team of friends who partner with me to get there, and then be there, is a huge GUT check...every day. Its back and fourth both painful and exhilarating, so I have my good days and not so good ones...the gut check ones.

So, I revel in your prayers for me through this process...and of course I get really excited when the staff in the Missions Door office emails me to report a new pledge. I am again reminded...
"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and don't lean on your own understanding...." Proverbs 3: 5&6.

Dick