With only a few days left of month 9 of my World Race, I thought I would write a blog and tell you a little bit about we’ve been experiencing this month here in Guatemala. It’s been quite a challenge some days, but so incredible.
For any of you that still don’t know, this month was our “MANistry” month. Basically the men have done ministry separate from the women for the past few weeks. Not slamming on the girls, but it was a much-welcomed break. Not because we don’t love our girls, but more for the switch up. It’s good to work along side folks you don’t normally get to serve with, and just being able to sit down and hear their hearts and what the Lord has been doing in their lives. Also, I think it’s very important to allow time for the women to be women and us men to be men, haha.
This month we’ve done A LOT of different things. As I stated in my previous blog, we’ve done dump ministry, nursing home visits, evangelism in schools, prayer walks, lead church services, and a few other things. It’s been pretty great getting to be involved in so many things. We’ve met a lot of incredible people, and almost more importantly, knocked down a lot of personal walls in our own lives. To be honest, guys have a tendency (as you probably already know), to be very “tough” and not very transparent when it comes to emotions and things like that. For whatever reason, sometimes we just don’t let people see too deep into our hearts.
I’ve realized this month though, that no matter who you are, where you come from, what you do or don’t do, we all have insecurities. You can set there all day and say, “I’m ok”, but sooner or later, you’re gonna break. And I believe more than ever, it’s healthy, for everyone around. We’ve all done things we aren’t proud of and have pasts, but until you allow others in, it’s hard to find the healing you need. I think we all needed that this month. Being able to set at a table with 9 other godly men, and ask hard questions is something all guys can benefit from. It isn’t always “Purdy”, but conflict breed’s intimacy. Intimacy that we all genuinely desire somewhere in our hearts. None of us can do this alone. And for men to have other men to spur each other onwards towards Christ is a beautiful thing.
I think we’ll all look a lot different after this month. Realizing what a godly man is supposed to look like is so important, because we are called to be the spiritual leaders of the household. Sadly, that is greatly misrepresented for the most part in the culture we all live in. It’s time for us to rise up though, and time for us to lead and love, the way that Christ loves His Church.
One of my coolest memories of this month will be a day we all spent at the mountain springs. It was beautiful! In more than one-way. One of my fellow squad mates, allowed us to be part in something pretty incredible. After a little while of crawling in underwater caves, looking for lizards, and jumping off waterfalls, he asked us to be part of his baptism. Something that he’d been thinking and praying about for several months now, he felt that it was the perfect time. So we all spent a few minutes praying over our brother in Christ, and after that we all headed out into the water and baptized him.
Down with the old man, up with the new!
It was such an honor to witness this new chapter in his life and to be able to run this race along side of him. I’m grateful for the work that the Lord has been doing in his life and excited about the work that is still to come.
I wanted to share that with you though, and give you a little bit of insight into something’s that have been going on this month. Lives are being changed, daily. I’m gonna write another blog before this week is over, but I’m still trying to process it all in my head. To give you a little teaser, we’ve had the pleasure of seeing over 50 people come to know Christ as Lord as Savior this month! Hallelujah! Real heart changing decisions and lives being added to The Kingdom!
That’s all for now. I encourage you, men. If you are not part of a healthy, biblical, community of godly men who can ask the hard questions and spur you on, please find that.
It’s time for us as men to rise up and be courageous…
Love yall.
P.S… August 5th, 2012… Only 67 more days!
