Baptism on Lake Erie 42°F
Great Lakes Men’s Retreat
“Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
~Jesus~
Hi Men:
I pray by who you are “in Christ,” that you are spending much more time reflecting on His unmerited grace bestowed to you, than watching world events that steal your peace and joy. Paul said in Philippians 4:8 to “dwell on these things.” BUT….. is this your verse?
“Finally, brethren, whatever is false, whatever is disgraceful, whatever is wrong, whatever is impure, whatever is unpleasant, whatever is of bad repute, if there is any mediocrity and if anything, worthy of criticism, dwell on these things.”
Question: How much time have you allocated to being in His Word?
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PHOTO ABOVE
The Great Lakes Men’s Retreat at Beulah Beach was wonderful. Thank you for your prayers. The fellowship with men I met at this retreat was such a blessing. Here is a photo of the group on opening night….
The photo at the top was super special. One of the dads had the privilege of baptizing his son after he had surrendered his life to Jesus Christ. I checked what the temp of Lake Erie was at the time and with a brisk wind blowing off the lake, it was really cold. Even for those of us that had coats!
The teachings were convicting and you saw the Divine transformation in a man’s life as several shared their testimonies. So many things happened it would be hard to encompass them all. One man that I was introduced to was Jordan Kunaszyk. He is an NFL linebacker and played for the Cleveland Browns. We really connected. He is so evangelistic and passionate about the Word. The Browns were part of the NFL’s “My Cause My Cleats,” Jordan put Living Waters on his cleats. Unless I missed it, he is the only one out of 30+ players that had a Bible verse on his cleats [Mark 16:15]. Living Waters caught wind of his cleats and as you can see, Jordan was invited to their ministry and even got some time with Ray Comfort (Jordan is next to Ray).
Jordan and I were sharing how much we love using Steps To Peace With God, but also some of the great tools that Living Waters has to offer, like the Million Dollar Gospel of John. It was so encouraging spending part of the afternoon with Jordan.
I encourage all of you to plan on attending at least one of the MIM conferences that are scheduled throughout the year.
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[Note: I know this is a little long…. thanks for bearing with me]
IN YOUR OWN BACKYARD @ 38,000 ft
Well it wasn’t exactly in my backyard, but I was headed there flying at 38,000′. I departed Cleveland, heading to Phoenix on the 1st leg of my journey home. If interested, here is the exact flight I took: FlightAware I was dog-tired, because I seldom sleep well at these retreats. I even brought a pillow and was in my favorite window seat. I just knew I was going to get some rest on this 4+ hour flight. WHY DO I ALWAYS SAY THAT? The plane was almost full, but in the aisle seat, a rather large woman with her dog was an effective deterrent for anyone occupying our middle seat….. “Thank you, Lord!” The plane took off climbing to cruise altitude and I was just about ready to put on my “noise cancelling” headphones, when I made eye contact with the dog lady and those words just flew out of my mouth, “How are you doing?” That’s all it took, and for the next hour and a half I learned a huge chunk of Nanette’s life history. I stopped her at one point when she mentioned her only son and asked more about him. She got “very” emotional and said he was killed in a car accident. Even though her son, Nicolas, died a number of years ago, Nanette is still dealing with severe grief. She is lives alone and I could tell she is very lonely.
She then asked a few questions and told her about the men’s retreat at Beulah Beach and that perked her interest……. she used to go there as young girl (she lived her whole life in Ohio and was heading to Phoenix to stay with her niece and nephew – they actually want her to move in with them). The story of India came up and she wanted to hear the “whole story”…….. I mean the “whole story!!” So it was my turn….. for the next hour I told her the entire story. When I got to the “Steps To Peace With God” in the cow pasture in India, I pulled out the tract and she wanted to go through the whole thing. I took off my seat belt and took the middle seat. We both read the tract page by page and when we got to the part if there was any reason she couldn’t receive Christ, Nanette shared that she was raised Catholic, but left the church and started attending a Christian church, eventually receiving Christ and then baptized. We continued to read through the end (she wanted to). Wow, so much happened after this I don’t want to make this any longer than I have to……. but we started going through Bible verses. I said I would send her other ones and she was so excited. I gave her the Million Dollar Gospel of John and I said for her to read the first 4 verses replacing “Word” and the pronouns “He” and “Him” with the word Jesus. This REALLY impacted her. Here is a photo of her reading the Million Dollar Gospel of John with her dog Max. As I was typing up all my notes, she was reading the gospel.
We hugged and said good by as I raced to my flight to Vegas (I was the last person to board….whew). There is way more to this story, but after she got to her nieces, she sent me a text saying, “I’ve already cried once when I read the Philippians scripture.” Please join my wife and I in praying for Nanette.
Men, the opportunities are everywhere. Those 4 hours were exhilarating.
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The more we die, the more we live!
Thank you Jesus………..
Your joyful slave,
Dan
(Galatians 2:20)
One more photo: Jordan and yours truly “BIG & SMALL” 😎
Men: When I read this again, I thought of what we have said many times, the two greatest problems in the church today are:
- People have lost the “Fear of the Lord”
- People want to serve God on “their” terms, and not His
The majority in the Body of Christ today would most likely disagree with some if not all of what is stated in the devotional below. But if they are wrong, what would that look like as they stand before God on That Day?
Affirmation by Silence – Day 124 Red Book
The purpose of these devotionals is to help you think Biblically
Solomon said, “As a man thinks, so is he”
Important Review
Significance is to be found only in giving your life in exchange for that which Jesus gave His life: People!
Men: The following link was a message by Walt on the Lordship of Jesus Christ. He made five major points from Chapter 12 of Ecclesiastes. Here is the link to the message and the Five Principles (57 minutes):
Audio of the Week: The Five Principles
Ground Rules for Living – – – – – from Ecclesiastes
1) Mortality is 100%. Life at best is brief
2) The work of man’s hand is Vanity
3) For reasons all of his own, God has declared man to be of worth
4) Significance is to be found in giving your life in exchange for that which God gave his life (Note: if you save your life you will lose it. Happiness is found in giving your life to people and not things)
5) For good or for bad, for the Christian and the non-Christian alike, how we perform on earth will appreciably affect how we spend eternity
Link: Turret2.DiscipleshipLibrary.com/G395.mp3
SPIRITUAL WARFARE
by Chris Martin
“For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh, for the weapons of our warfare are not of the flesh, but divinely powerful for the destruction of fortresses. We are destroying speculations and every lofty thing raised up against the knowledge of God, and we are taking every though captive to the obedience of Christ”
II Corinthians 10:3-5
Men: This is a profound article. Please read it carefully and avoid skimming over it. Here are a couple sentences from it:
Imagine being in a temporal/earthly war and not realizing or acknowledging that you are in the war. What would be the likelihood of survival for such a man?
The same principle applies to a man in the spiritual realm; we need to be aware that there is an ongoing spiritual battle active in the world in the “macro,” as well as a spiritual battle active in the “micro,” in our individual lives. To not be aware of this truth every day ensures defeat…the man of God needs to be engaged in the spiritual battle.
Always Count the Cost
by Tim Challies
Men:
Great article that Challies put together with teachings by J.C. Ryle.
“A Christian should be willing to give up anything which stands between him and heaven. A religion that costs nothing is worth nothing! A cheap Christianity, without a cross, will prove in the end a useless Christianity, without a crown.” J.C. Ryle
There are at least four costs to being a Christian—costs that we do not pay once, but over the whole course of our Christian lives.
- First, it costs our self-righteousness
- Second, it costs our sins
- Third, it costs our love of ease
- Fourth, it costs the world’s favor
Please read the entire article
Men:
If you haven’t read this article that D.A. Carson wrote for Decision Magazine 15 years ago, you need to read it. And for those of us that have……. time to reread it. Send it to a friend……
How Should We Wait for Jesus?
BY D.A. CARSON | APRIL 30, 2009
Men: This quote by A.W. Pink is worth your serious contemplation…………
In a future Friday letter I will be putting in our brother, Bill McCurine’s talk on HELL. You will want to listen to it again.
What the heck……… one more!
Jonathan Edwards couldn’t have said it better!
