Ironman Fellowship

Wow! What an incredible evening. Jon Paul Moody at Covenant Ranch in Buchanan, TN has got a good thing going. You can check out Covenant Ranch at: www.sonriseadventures.com

In the picture above, that's Steve Chapman, My son Hunter and Myself. Steve was the featured speaker at the Ironman Fellowship (Of "as iron sharpens iron..." fame). I have been a big fan of Steve Chapman for a long, long time now. I discovered his book "A Look at Life from a Deer Stand," and was drawn to his insight from there on out. By the way, I've used that book a number of times to reach out to many men and get them to start thinking about their relationship to Jesus Christ. It's a great tool to foster discipleship in a really non-threatening way. You can find it on his website listed below, or at just about any Christian bookstore. Anyhow, Steve's presentation was interesting to say the least. He talked about a number of circles in a man's life. Of course, there are more, but for the time we had Steve focused on 4:

Our Friends

Our Kids

Our Wives

Ourselves

For each of these, he simply made some observations and gave a lot of encouragement as it applied to each of these areas. If you'd like to learn more about the ministry of Steve Chapman and his wife Annie go to: www.steveandanniechapman.com

Following Steve's message, Jon Paul gave a sort of impromptu invitation to the crowd of about 150-ish. It must be God's way of entertaining Himself and reminding me of my past, because when the question, "Is there anybody here who wants Jesus to be their Lord and Savior" my son Hunter raised his hand. Of course, what 4 year old kid doesn't want that. For today, I'm so proud to say that Hunter and Jesus have already got a good thing going. There will come a day when his answer to that question will be a little more significant. Or maybe not. Maybe that's the way its supposed to happen. Could it be that our kids should be so saturated with the things of God from the second they're born that their "moment" of salvation isn't so much of a huge leap as it is simply the next step they take as they walk with Christ?

The funny part of that is, as he explained it to me, this was his way of trying to hurry things along so that he could go get a glass of sweet tea!!!!!

What's funny about that? Well when I was a kid, the Baptist Preacher and his family lived across the road from me. Every year they invited us to VBS. One year the child evangelist who came was kind of old school. He made the statement that "We would be there all night until someone finally gave in to Christ and accepted Him as their personal Lord and Savior." I wasn't too old, but I was old enough to know that somebody had to take one for the team. I slowly made my way to the altar where I was attacked by a crowd of deacons. I accepted Jesus so we could go home and go to bed. (As a side note, I had already accepted Jesus the year before). The story gets even better as the next night of VBS the same spiel was made by the same guy. Apparently my "sacrificial salvation" didn't start REVIVAL because that altar remained empty, so I drug my brother to front for the same reasons as the night before. I know, I know...probably borderline heresy, but...

The evening ended with a time of prayer, and if for no other reason than this prayer time, I was glad my son was with me. The room erupted in prayer as just about every man there was praying out loud all at the same time. That's a little different than we're used to in the Cumberland Presbyterian Church. I looked over at my son during this time and his eyes were bugged halfway out of his head. He was totally amazed at all these godly men who were manly enough to bare their hearts before the Lord in public.

What a great night. Ironman meets on the first Thursday of every month at Covenant Ranch. You can be sure I will be there again.