It certainly has been a while since I updated! Lots of things have been going on!
Jan. 20,21,and 22 was the men's retreat at our church. It was, as it has been for 20 years, at Tadmore Camp.
The speaker was Dr. Phil Howard. He pulled no punches and talked to us men straight about living for God and keeping ourselves pure. I think a lot of men were changed, including me! There was also paintball and pistol shooting, lots of Super Monkey Ball, great food, and great fellowship. I am waiting until someone puts his messages online to comment because they were so good I don't want to sell them short.
As for paintball, our team ran the table, winning both team-elimination games and both capture-the-flag games. The first game I got hit in the face running blindly (my mask was so fogged, I almost tripped several times) toward the other team. The second game none of us got out. In fact, we employed some great military tactics of cover fire and flanking. The first capture the flag game was double elimination, that is you can get shot once, run back to your base and get back in. My boss, Shawn hit me in the face as I was running for the flag but it allowed Joe (a great friend and co-worker) to hit Shawn in the heart area. Joe hit another guy on the other team. This gave one of our guys an opportunity to grab the flag. The second capture the flag game was non-elimination. The judge overheard us discussing strategy and suggested a rather radical one. I left my paint gun at our base and ran full-bore for the flag as soon as it started, with Joe covering with his gun. I made it to the flag and made a grab for it. As paintballs whizzed by I tugged at the flag. It was stuck in the tree. Finally I was hit and Joe right after me. We bee-lined it back to our base and flipped a u-iee, sprinting back toward the flag. This time I reached it and broke the tree holding it. I started to run back toward our base and fell flat. As paintballs flew by and spattered around me I jumped back up and raced back to the base. It was quite exhilarating!
For the pistol shoot they organized a card game. At piece of cardboard was attached to a stand and playing cards were taped on it, face down. A small pack was included and these counted double. The objective was to rack up as many points as possible with 6 shots (revolvers were involved, so 6 was the max). I came in late. Since the rules said "any caliber," I went with my Browning Buckmark .22 since it is almost a target quality pistol, as opposed to my Desert Eagle .40 S&W which is a combat arm. It turned out I tied for 1st and we had a shoot-off. I had already put the Buckmark away because I thought we were on to the next activity. I got 8 points on 2 cards with the Eagle, while the other guy got 1 double card for 14 points. It was great fun. There was even a guy with a blackpowder revolver. Some complained about having to stand downwind of him ;-)
I came back refreshed and challenged. And with Karen's help and the conviction of the Holy Spirit, we will continue in our spiritual renewal.
More later.
P.S. Phil, I have the comments set to "anyone" now! :-)