Life’s Healing Choices – Wholeness and Holiness

Life Hurts, God Heals

At our church we are preparing for an eight week journey called Life’s Healing Choices. We have been praying for God to work in our lives to heal our hurts, get us over our hang-ups, and to release bad habits to God. The campaign starts on September 27, and we are doing lots of preparation in the next two weeks.

When we have a life relationship with Jesus Christ, our sins are forgiven. But there are still those hurts, hang-ups, and habits that can linger. And sometimes we struggle with sin itself. God wants us to be whole and holy; and here’s the best part of this: He doesn’t just tell us to be whole and holy, He has given us a plan and way to be just that.

We’ll be learning that plan and working through it together. We’ll look at the plan on Sunday mornings in our worship service, then work through it together in small groups.

I’m SO excited for the possibilities of what God can do if we will just let Him!

Phase I

9/12/09 – Phase I of the Marathon Journey begins…

I did Week 1, Day 1 (w1d1) of the Couch-to-5k running program this morning. It is a nine week program, and I will use the time format to get me running for 30 minutes continuously. If I stay on track with no problems, I will complete this on November 14. Then I’ll run about 3.5 miles every other day until the Run like the Dickens 5k on December 12.

Other elements of Phase I are walking with Laura 3 times a week, weights 2 times a week, and 45-60 minutes of cardio one day a week. I’m also starting to ride my bike a little bit for more fun.

I’ve lost about 30 pounds at this point and my blood pressure is trending down. I had my physical this last week and all is good, although we don’t have lab results yet.

It’s a long journey, but the beginning is looking very good!

Day Hike – Sand Lakes Quiet Area, August 27, 2009

Warning:  If you are a geocacher there are a couple of spoilers in this article.  One would be if you looked at the image of our GPS track, and the other is in a paragraph towards the end.  There will be a line of =========’s and another warning just before that paragraph.

 

Pre-Hike

We dropped Tom off at LSSU on the 26^th and took a couple of days off at the cabin in Manton.  This is pretty much our 25^th Anniversary celebration.  These are notes and images from a big day hike that we took on Thursday, August 27, 2009. 

We parked at Guernsey Lake SF Campground; Laura was having good memories of camping there as a kid.  We found the geocache (GC) Big Guernsey Lake and then headed for the Loop trail.  Left the van at 10:17a, arrived back at 6:17p, and did 11.29 miles with geocache side trips and backtracking for water in that 8 hours according the GPS track, then another half-mile round trip to find the last Sand Lakes Challenge Cache.  11.29 miles in 8 hours is 1.4mph so that seems pretty good with breaks, geocaching and all.  We know we walk about 3mph at the track, 20 minute miles.

  

The GPS track of our adventure.

 

We saw a fawn and a doe, a couple of black squirrels, a snake (!), and a bad swarm of ground bees (!!!).  Both of us were stung just above our hiking socks.  We saw maybe half-dozen people on bikes on the trail, and there were a few camps set up near the real entrance (opposite where we started on the loop).  We saw fungus of many colors, including purple, pink, red, yellow, and white.  They were all very interesting and pretty.

The main feature of the Sand Lakes Quiet Area is the five Sand Lakes.  The North Country Trail goes through the area and there is a loop around the lakes, with spurs into the lakes that are further inside the loop.  The Sand Lakes are all beautiful and the fish were jumping.

 

 

 Things we learned or need to do when we do something like this again:

• Glasses strap (Chuck), Glasses case (Laura)
• NEVER take off with the GPS w/o the extra batteries, especially late in the day.  We didn’t have any problems, but the batteries died while getting data from the GPS back at the cabin.  That’s how close we were.
• We need to make sure we have preps for bee stings, at the very least replenish what we used.
• Check your boots.  Chuck learned that the heels on his were blown out, but it was a little late to do anything about it.
• We should have told someone more details of where we were going and when they should expect a call from us.
• A more comfortable neck strap for the GPS, maybe a neck strap for the camera to keep it handier.
• We had plenty of food:
  • Rye krisp and cheese
  • Two bags of trail mix
  • Two bags of jerky
  • Two apples
  • Two Clif bars
• We ate:
  • The Clif bars
  • The apples
  • Some of the crackers and cheese
  • A tiny bit of the trail mix and jerky
• We had 3 quarts of water; I’m not sure we drank enough, and if we hadn’t been able to refill (didn’t know it when we started), I’m not sure we had enough for the day, and it wasn’t that hot.

We had perfect weather.  It was overcast most of the day, probably got to a high of 70, but we never took off our long sleeve shirt outer layer, and shorts were very comfortable.

 

 

The map I had from trails.com was kind of usable, but the post numbers were off much of the way.  We went clockwise from Guernsey.

 

 From the image of the map, we did the trail in this order, by trail post number:

15 to 14 is a spur from the SF Campground to the North Country Trail
14 to 13 is NCT to the SLQA loop
13 to 16 took us into the southern part of the loop
            From 16 we took an old fire lane a half mile in (and a half mile out!) to GC SLC #4
16 to 17
             From the 0.8 label at the closest point of the trail to Sand Lake 5, we went in about .2 to get GC SLC #5.
             We sat on the shore for a bite on the shore and fish jumped the whole time that we rested there.
17 to 18 to 19 to 20
20 to 4, picked up GC SLC #3 on the way
             From 4 we went west about .2 miles and picked up GC TTT Sand Lakes, part of the GC Trekking Traverse Trails series.
4 to 3 to 5
When we got to post 5 the first time, we didn’t see the well or toilets.  We went on to GC SLC #1, then started to bushwhack back to the loop trail to go back and find the water well, went about 300 feet and decided that it was a bad idea.  We saw the snake after turning around and heading back down the hill from GC SLC #1.  We went ahead and got the GC Quiet Area Cache, dealt with the bees, then to GC SLC #2, then back to the trail that runs straight north/south through the loop; went north to the loop trail then back to post 5 and found the toilets and well pump closer to the lake from the trail.  We stopped near the well for a rest, a little more to eat and to do decode the clues from GC’s SLC 1 – 5 to get the true coordinates for GC SLC Final. 

Around Sand Lake 1, post 5, people haul stuff in from a parking area, about half a mile, with wagons and such to camp around the lake.  That is pretty neat, actually, and allows them to spend overnights in the Quiet Area.

5 to 7 to 9 to 10 to 11 to12 to 13, back on the spur to 14 then 15 where we started.

The trail in a lot of places was wide enough to easily walk side-by-side which was really nice.  The trails were in excellent shape.

 

Geocaching helped to break up the hike, and added a lot of interest to an already beautiful day.  This was a record geocaching day for us.  We found 9 today, our previous record was 3.  It nearly doubles our total count.  We didn’t have any problems finding any of them; the GPSr worked great and we are starting to develop “geosense”.  The main caching goal for the day was to complete the Sand Lakes Challenge.  Five caches, one at each of the lakes, have clues that are needed in order to get the true coordinates for the sixth and final cache of the challenge.

Starting at the campground where we parked, we found them in this order: (I may not have logged them at exactly the time we found them, but you get the idea…)

1. Big Guernsey Lake – didn’t mark the time, but shortly after 10a
2. SLC 4 – 11:24a
3. SLC 5 – 12:07p
4. SLC 3 – 1:59p
5. TTT Sand Lakes Quiet Area – 2:19p
6. SLC 1 – 2:58p
7. Quiet Area Cache – 3:23p
8. SLC 2 – 3:53p
9. SLC Final – 7:00p

The snake was lying on a hill below SLC #1.  I was about 2 steps from putting my foot down on or near it.  It was coiled up and never moved.  (whew)  I took pictures; that thing must have been 16 feet long!  After looking it up on the internet, I believe it was an Eastern Hogback.

 

The bees were a few yards, maybe 20, pretty much east of Quiet Area Cache.  I must have stepped on them; I was getting stung when Laura told me she’d been stung.  I looked back, saw a BUNCH of them, and we hightailed it out of there, stopped and realized that they were still following us, so we fast-stepped further and each took a Benadryl from the FAK.

Warning to geocacher’s:  The following highlighted paragraph and image contain spoiler information.

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When we put the clues together and realized the general location of SLC Final, we decided that the best way for us to do it was to finish the loop hike back to the car, and then drive closer to SLC Final.  We drove north on Guernsey Lake Road, then West on Sand Lake Rd.  According to the GPSr, we were closest just before Broomhead Road and it was about .23 miles from Sand Lake Road to GC SLC Final.  We parked, bushwhacked in and grabbed it.  After looking at the map later, we realized that the cache was much closer to a parking area just a little bit north on Broomhead.  (On the picture of the trail map, find the parking symbol at the far northwest corner.) Oh well… 

There was a travel bug (TGMRL6) at SLC Final.  We were so tired and inexperienced that we got the number to discover it but didn’t take it to move it on.  duh

 

Back to the cabin for a 25^th Anniversary dinner of spinach salad, baked salmon with dill and lemon pepper, asparagus, fudge brownies with raspberries, and Crème Brule coffee.  Showers and to bed, exhausted, at 10:30.

It was a perfect day, and may have ruined other day hikes for us!  Years ago, we went to Disneyland in Anaheim, CA.  I think we went on a Tuesday and it was a gray and rainy drive from San Diego.  We parked in the first row at the park and the first couple of things we did were under cover.  Then the sun came out and we didn’t stand in a line all day.  We realized that we’d probably never have another amusement park experience quite like that again.  This hike was reminiscent of the feelings we had after that day.

Life’s Healing Choices

At church, we are preparing to go through an 8 week campaign from Purpose Driven called Life’s Healing Choices (LHC).  I am very excited about the possibilities of what God can do through this time.

We will be trying some new things, asking different people to be involved in different ways, and praying.  Would you pray with us and for us?

Life hurts, God heals.

Phase 0 – Marathon Goal

After committing to the goal of running a marathon, the plan started to take shape.  Now it’s execution time.  Phase Zero is before any running.  In a nutshell, here are the basic pieces of this phase:

• Get a physical – still need to make an appointment, I’ll ask for Sept. 3 or 10
• Walk w/ Laura 3x per week – 3 miles on Tuesday and Thursday, and 3.5 miles on Saturday
• Cardio 3x per week –  20 and 30 minutes at 70 – 80% max. heart rate, and 20 minutes at 80 – 90% MHR
• Weight workout (5 basic exercises) 2x per week
• Recording what I eat and targeting around 2000 healthy calories / day, drinking lots of water, etc.

This has actually been the schedule for the past month or so.  The plan is that walking and weights will remain somewhat constant through the plan.  The variety of activities makes it easier to stay on track.  Spending planned time with Laura is a huge bonus!

This seems like a lot, and it is compared to the first part of July.  The objectives of this phase are general preparation and to lose as much weight as possible before Phase 1.  Phase 1 begins September 12.

New Plan…

I have a Big Hairy Audacious Goal – to run a marathon.  I’m looking at the Bayshore in Traverse City, MI, on May 28, 2011.  I’ll be 50.  Here are the steps and stops I’m mapping out along the way:

• Couch to 5k program
• Run Like the Dickens 5k, Holly, MI, December 5 or 12
• One Hour Runner program
• Crim Training Group summer 2010
• Crim 10 Miler, Flint, MI, August 21, 2010
• Maybe a half marathon late in 2010
• 18 week marathon training program starting January 25, 2011
• Bayshore

Catching up…

It has been a great few weeks; some good projects and work, as well as some time away in Florida for rest and renewal.

At church, we are 5 weeks into the book of Revelation. It’s been a great series to prepare, and we have a long way to go. We added some “features” for this series: sermon notes, recordings for CD and podcast. The podcasts are at sermon.net/FentonFMC ; the FentonFMC part of the URL is case sensitive.

I have learned so much, gathering opinions of others and forming a couple of my own. I am not at all tempted to guess at a date, but I am more convinced that we should be working and watching, waiting for Christ. Not for a day, but for the Lord. That day will be awesome, but it will just be a day; Jesus Christ loves us now and forever. We wait for the day, but only because of Who it brings.

I fought bronchitis from the middle of December until the end of January. The days are getting longer and I am getting anxious to get on the bike.

Friends…

I love people.  At least most of the time.  I don’t consider myself to be really outgoing, but once I make a friend or connection, I love to maintain it.  I appreciate social networking, e.g., Facebook, for this reason.  I’m able to kind of have community at some level with friends and family that I haven’t before.  I try not to be a friend-hound, but I will admit to asking to be added as a friend by Dave Dravecky who has been a bit of a hero of mine.  He hasn’t added me (yet) but he’s still an inspiration.

I am writing this from the family room of some great friends.  They have been and are a great blessing to us in so many ways and on so many levels.  We have ties that go back decades and decades; that is cool to me.

Friends, community, human connections… we all need them.  God Himself created community in the Trinity, and we are designed to thrive in right relationships with others.  I do, and I am.

Obligatory New Years Eve post

The folks of our congregation, at my prompting a few months ago, gave me some questions and topics that they wanted to hear addressed from the pulpit.  It was quite interesting to get the input, and almost all of the requests included something about prophecy, the Book of Revelations, etc.  With a new stack of books and websites in my library, it has been interesting to watch the events this week as Israel has decided that they were tired of the Hamas rocket attacks and that they weren’t going to sit back and take it anymore.

But this morning, in David Jeremiah’s recent book, What in the World is Going On?, something really struck me.  The question was something like this: What would you like to be doing when Jesus comes back?

Too often we are driven by guilt or negative influences, and there is a risk of thinking that way while pondering this question, but try to stay on the positive.  What would I like to be doing when Jesus comes back?  Let me list a few of my choices:

• challenging people to be and make fully devoted followers of Christ
• loving someone, telling them about grace, mercy and truth
• giving a cup of water to someone who is thirsty
• doing the best that I can, offering the effort and outcome as gifts

These fit whatever role I may be in, husband, father, pastor, son, IT support person, friend, and so on.  I’ll be thinking more about this in the next few days.

What would you like to be doing when Jesus comes back?

Happy New Year!

Some Random thoughts…

Listening to Handel’s Messiah and the Christmas CD from Denver and the Mile High Orchestra are personal traditions for me at Christmas.

I’m praying that God can and will use me tomorrow in front of people who are wondering what the earthly future holds.

I’m thankful that some people seem to have been shaken out of commercialism at Christmas.

Is committing to run a 5k on March 28th.  Chuck’s Challenge returns!

I will be glad to have all three kids home this weekend.  Kids?  Well, they are my kids, even as adults.

I have a new phone (refurbished Samsung Blackjack II for free!), and I’m waiting for a mp3 player (refurbished Sandisk Sansa e250) to arrive today.  I like new gadgets!  The mp3 player is for my running (wogging, really) and to listen to audio books or preaching during the 8 hours I’m  commuting every week.

I am very proud of Andy and Tom who are running the Run Like the Dickens 5k today, and Laura, who is using her gifts at the registration table.  I was too embarrassed to even go; there I said it.

I use too many “I”‘s when I write…