What Makes You Come Alive After Hours

Hey, this is Mike Zwick from If Not For God Podcast, our show.

Stories of hopelessness turned into hope. Your chosen Truth Network Podcast is starting in just seconds. Enjoy it, share it.

But most of all, thank you for listening and for choosing the Truth Podcast Network. Welcome to Masculine Journey After Hours, and we are talking about a topic that is yours this week, Jim. And so if you want to share with us, revisit the topic that we've been talking about.

Revisit it. We are discussing what gives us life, what makes us feel alive, what is really our passion when we get down to it. So you could ask the question, or you could make the statement, what makes me come alive is blank, right?

So what would that blank be for you? I was thinking about the breaks. Yeah, we just came off a break. Anyway, we had fun. It was a good break. And so what makes you come alive?

I think that's a question. And I think there's lots of ways you can do that. We were talking in the first show, it's about adventures with God.

But my daughter got married a couple weeks ago. And a couple nights, we got to sit around and play card games or play Yahtzee or whatever. And just the laughter was so good for my heart during that time.

And I would have to say that made me come alive. And I believe God was in the midst of it. God loves family.

God created family. And so there are times that, yes, it's definitely a direct walk with God in certain things. And I'll share more about that later potentially. But also just in some of the stuff that he allows you to be a part of that just fills your heart with joy. And a lot of times that is laughter.

I mean, the break had me laughing. And that's very cathartic, especially when you're feeling a little down, which I have the last few days. But it is, it doesn't matter what it is, if it's an encounter with God.

If that doesn't make us come alive, something's wrong with our relationship with Him. And I think a big part of my loving nature being outdoors, sending pictures to friends that were sitting on top of Mount Mitchell at 60 degrees when they're baking down here in the 95 degree heat. I like picking on people and that was doing both, enjoying nature and annoying my friends. I'm glad you didn't send me a picture when it was 95 degrees. I would not have been as jovial in my response, I'm afraid. God will give you the right people to pick on at the right time. I think He probably did.

Robby, go ahead. Yeah, I was just, you know, recently I, those who know me know I've been studying the 119th Psalm, study, study, study, and which makes my heart come alive in all so many ways. But it really brought to light something that I kind of knew makes me come alive. And it has to do with community, like to be in a community. But even more fun is when you're in that community and you're literally talking about things that you're learning about God.

So the idea is we get to do this, right, when we do this radio show. We're talking about things that we've seen God do or come to understand. And what I found out was the word meditate, you know, when it says throughout the 119th Psalm, He was going to meditate on the precepts or He's going to meditate on the statutes. Well, that word to meditate means a lot more than what I just thought, roll around things in your mind. It also means to talk about it. And so my good friend Harold knows, because he's in two of my different groups that I meet with. He's there with me Thursday mornings as well as Tuesday nights. But see, I process things when I talk about them in ways that I don't process them when I just sit there and what I think meditate.

Right? My sweetheart is the same way. She calls it oral processing drives me nuts. I don't deal well. I don't deal well with half-baked ideas.

That's a nice thing about your your sweetheart. I don't think you're getting any bread. What do you think about half-baked ideas? No, it's one of the cool things is like, when you're trying to flesh out something you believe, you know, to throw it out there amongst of what you would consider to be dear friends that know you well, that can tell you you're full of it and not hurt your feelings.

Or tell you where, you know what I'm saying? And so when you are really trying to work through a passage, work through something that you're trying to understand, and grow in communion with both God and the people that you're in community with, I mean, it really is a spectacular thing. And I think about how blessed I really am, because I can be at the NRB, which I don't particularly care to be at the NRB, because it's just a big circus kind of atmosphere.

And I don't like circus kind of atmospheres all that well. But if I'm doing interviews, here's all these people, and then they put on headphones, and the person that I'm going to interview, one or two, and there's three of us in a discussion in the middle of this circus, and all of a sudden the conversation that goes to something about God, and man, I mean, my heart, it just comes alive, and I'm sitting here in the middle of something that I really don't necessarily enjoy all that much. But man, I'm sitting there just enveloped in this like God-cone of silence, whatever you want to call it. And so I just think of so many different ways that God comes after me, but I really, really love community. And so you come all those mornings, even though we drive you crazy, you take all our verbal processing.

I wouldn't miss it. You know, the problem is that, especially with my sweetheart, she says something where she's working through it. Well, I think I'm hearing the answer, and I'm ready to take action. And then it's, oh, no, you know, you just stumbled.

Don't fall all the way and bust your nose on the floor. Because for me, with all my years of working in computer programming and systems analysis, I was used to hours of silence and thinking. And when I spoke, it was when it was finished, not when it was halfway through. And you just helped me with a major problem in my marriage.

I didn't realize I have. I'm your wife, and my wife is you. I'll talk through things, and I'll be working on the decision, and she'll hear it and decide that's it. And then we're stuck with that. But now, she's gotten so tired of hearing me talk through things that she doesn't listen anymore. So when I do tell her something, it's not heard or listened to.

That was a debate, didn't it? I have a little saying that I think goes along with that. It says, I know you believe you think you understand what you heard me say, but I'm not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant. I've heard that, and I love it because it's true in almost all of our conversations.

So let me go back to Robby for a minute. No, I do. Because I am one of a group of people that give you a hard time about something that makes you come alive. What God shows you through the Hebrew stuff that you do, and we do enjoy it.

I just love giving you a hard time a little bit more. But that does make you come alive. Oh, it does? Can you share kind of what that does for your heart?

Sure, sure. It's like the building blocks of expression. How unbelievable is it that God expressed himself to us, and he actually built the universe on expression.

He spoke it all into existence, and then he wrote it down, and he gave it to Moses in his own handwriting. And that we actually have that to this day to sit there, to decipher, and to ponder, and to spend time with as he reveals little secrets to me. I'm just like a kid on a date with the cutest girl in town.

Like, really? Just asking her questions and sitting there in Wonderland, you know? No, that's good. And that's something that really speaks to your heart and brings you life. Now, Rodney, I know that you struggled with it, but tell me about when you're out fishing. What is it about being out fishing that really brings your heart to life?

Because I know you love doing that. Well, fishing is one of the things, but it's just the wonder. What's going to happen next? You have no idea. You can't see down in there. You don't know where the fish are.

You're fishing, not always catching. It's the part of, what's it going to be? Am I going to get this?

How do I figure this out? I like being in the problem-solving mode. That's what I do with my career. I solve problems. And I find myself really enjoying that.

And if I can find better ways to solve problems, I like that. But in something like fishing, where I'm such a novice that I really don't know what I'm doing, I have just found so much joy in learning. And just kind of being able to do that, same thing with hunting that I've been doing. It's like, oh, we're going to go dove hunting this weekend. We're looking forward to that greatly. And it's like, oh, this will be an adventure.

Maybe I'll actually hit one this time. But that's always the fun part is going on an adventure and trying to figure things out and being in something that I'm not totally comfortable with, I'm not good at, because most of my life I spent doing the things I was good at. I really am enjoying doing things that, hmm, I always liked watching other people do it, like watching other people have fun with it. Like, I never thought I'd be sitting here and talking to a microphone, doing a radio show, talking about men, God, and Jesus. You know, I just, I just, that's just not, I never would have pictured that, but I'm absolutely loving it. You know, it's just one of those things that makes your heart come alive when you come here and do the radio show. And that's where I'm finding a lot of joy in coming alive is just in things that I would have never have tried or done before that all of a sudden, like, God, why am I here?

And he kind of just slowly lets you kind of in on the story as you go along. Dr. Darrell Bock Jim, can I steal your show here for a second? Dr. Darrell Bock Oh, absolutely. Dr. Darrell Bock All right, so a question that obviously I didn't prompt you with, you know, before, but sometimes I think God kind of gives them to me. We all talk about boot camp, right, and how it makes us come alive. So let's just throw it out there. What is it about boot camp that makes your heart come alive? We got one coming up in November.

We've been promoting it every week. You know, what makes makes it come alive? What makes that come alive for you? Oh, you grabbed the microphone like you had something, Wayne. You stole it from Rodney.

Dr. Darrell Bock He was deferring to the old guy who also had a microphone. You have to get the scene here. There are seven of us that are fighting over three microphones, and it's usually shoving it to somebody else rather than grabbing it.

But I, mine's pretty quick. One of the things that is always, and I've been to, I don't know the number, but quite a few boot camps from Alaska to Colorado to all the places we've been here. And there's never been a boot camp where I haven't had a real encounter with God.

It's different every time, or multiple, but I've never had one where there wasn't one. So I can look forward to going to boot camp and knowing I'm going to sit down and God's going to give me something. Wayne For me, Robby actually kind of called it out the other day. I called him. He didn't know what I was doing, the adventure that God had me on, but I needed to hear something from Father. And it really is one of the things that brings me alive is in these boot camps. And in life in general, the Lord has given me a gift in being able to listen to others and look and see the glory in others. And not just see it, but call it out.

Call it out and give them confidence, like you said, that they have what it takes, that God has gifted you. Robby calls it the special sauce. You know, I love how Robby calls it the special sauce. And all of us have got that. So that's one of the things that kind of brings me alive.

Okay, Harold, let's start over to you. What is it about boot camp that makes you come live? Well, I enjoy the talks of the way that the clips are thrown in there. But I'd have to say that the to use Danny's phrase, the cone of silence, our covenants of silence that that we have. That's a very special part of it for me. Thank you.

Anyone else got something they want to add? While Rodney's getting his fixed, I want to come to Danny's defense. We use both cone of silence and covenant of silence. And they mean extremely different things, but sometimes we'll screw them up and switch names. So it makes it fun. But then again, we're never silent. No, we try to be. Robby, you got anything about boot camps that makes you come on?

It'd be easier to say what doesn't. But clearly what you get to do, you know, on every boot camp I've ever been to, there have been men there that I've seen hear from God for the first time and know that they heard from God. And sense that there's a relationship there that's available to them that they really did not see on their horizon. And so to see people enter into that adventure, you know, and again, I'm with the covenant of silence, I'm with the clips, you know, all those things. And if anybody knows, I'll be one of the first people to be there and I'll be fishing, I'll be one of the last people to leave because, you know, it calls to my heart in so many ways. But it, you know, we will do that broadcast on Saturday with the guys talking and you'll be able to hear that and listen to these guys as their hearts are coming alive and they're having the experience that I did at my first boot camp and realize, oh, God wants me to be a man. You know, God's calling me to more than being a parking attendant, you know. He wants me to be a warrior for the kingdom.

He wants, you know, and it's just a cool thing. Yeah, and all of that is in our own special way because he's calling each and every one of us to do that. And I think for me was the discovery through other men that seeing what God has done in their life and what God did in, like, let's say, Corey's life, that very first boot camp that I was with. And I was just, just to sit there and watch that, I was just, I was just in shock. I was like, oh my gosh, this was so impactful, so life changing for one person in particular. And then it's like, oh, that happens every boot camp to somebody, to some degree. Some of us know about it directly because we are fortunate enough to be somebody they kind of talk to or confirm with or have deeper discussions with or that's one good thing about being on the team is that when you go there, it's like then we meet and we get to pray over people at night and we get to learn about so many different stories that are going on in the camp that that week that it's kind of overwhelming. It's like all these things are going on at one time and how different things connect in people's lives.

I love it when we come in to that night. And I love when like specifically Sam was talking about things were going on with Eli and Caleb and we had the listening prayer and there was things that went on during that specific time because Eli was in mind that came to me and I was saying but then Eli wasn't saying that eventually it's like, I talked to Caleb and this came, somebody said this and Sam's listening prayer and it's like all this stuff came together and it's like, oh my gosh, Lord, you're working and you've got all these things going on in different places that come together to one point that, oh, Sam and Eli needed to talk about something. When you have those kinds of things that you could never ever paint, you couldn't write it out, just like the Bible itself, you can't ever picture anybody coming up with these stories.

Nobody could. And all these many different authors could not have weaved something that's so perfect. So you know it's from the Holy Spirit. And when you have those kinds of moments where it's like, oh, there's a bigger story, I'm just a small little pea in this great vast world, it is just so cool to sit there and live and love on other men at that same time. And I think what you're talking about there is really important for those that are listening and all of us is that we are all different. You can get caught up in watching other people's story and listening to other people's story and wanting to live their story, wanting their piece, their part, their gift. I want to be like Paul or Peter or this person or that person. And God has made us all different on purpose.

We all see in part we're all individuals in this grand big story. If somebody comes to the camp, they'll notice that I don't do a lot of talks. I don't really do any.

I did one one year. And I'm okay with that because I spend a lot of time with the guys. And that's where I'm supposed to be. That's where I get to do those things and get to love on these men and be Jesus to them and let them see him. It's important that we all see that we are different and we all have a different piece apart, a different place in the story. We're not all in the same places.

The community, you guys were talking about that a minute ago, the community is so important in what we're supposed to be doing. And you're going to see more in that. You talked about hope earlier. In the midst of all these things that are going on with COVID and things like that, that's the hope in this is because it is going to start bringing us closer together. We're going to start having these stories where we're talking about what God is doing in our lives. What is he showing us? I read this the other day. We're going to see more of this. We're going to see more of the body becoming the body again. That's good.

Danny? Well, unlike most of y'all, I can't count how many I've been to. It's pretty easy at this point, but hopefully that will change. I got into the Wild at Heart message years ago, and the beauty of it has been for me that there is a community, a local community. Talk to this crazy Christian car guy about coming to a boot camp and all that stuff. We came as a group at the time. But what it means to me and what makes it so alive is this message is more about manhood and makes you more alive than anything I've encountered. I've been to many men's functions and seven easy steps to Jesus and all that good stuff. But this just seemed to speak more to my heart than anything. To see people living it out was really exciting. It still is. I'm still hanging with you. Y'all haven't ruined me off yet? That's amazing.

Harold? Well, obviously the most important thing coming alive is a lot of what's been talked about already, which involves our Lord and our service and His kingdom. But I wanted to point out that I think it's also okay that we come alive with other things, like Jan's niece from out in Houston gave me a birthday present on my 80th birthday that says, All I need is Auburn football and my dog. My wife didn't particularly like that. To me, a lot of the things that we enjoy, such as fishing and hunting and, like in my case, football, those things are also things that God provided.

To me, it's okay that we enjoy, but we should see God in that. One of the things that I used to experience that I don't get to do now is on my motorcycle. Some of my closest encounters, I can't sing worth a flip and even less now that my voice is getting weak. But boy, I sounded great in my motorcycle helmet, riding down the road at, well, I won't name a speed, but I could really sing good. Did you zip in and out of traffic?

Absolutely. I was just wondering if you might have. For me, for boot camp, the answer would be seeing over the weekend how God hits people's hearts exactly where they need to be hit. Maybe it's a breakthrough in spiritual warfare where the enemy's been attacking them and they've not had the eyes to see it.

Maybe it's in healing, that they've had a place that they've not let anyone touch, but they let God in to touch it and start the healing process. The parts that He allows us to play in that, I guess I can just speak for me that sometimes something that feels like it just popped in my head and comes out, God uses for somebody else to have breakthrough. And how incredible that journey is and how humbling that journey is. It's always amazing to see Him at work. And you can't help but feel alive when God's at work and He's changing people's hearts.

That's a pretty cool thing for me. And then specifically, I was going to share, I'm not going to play the clip that I had, but I asked God the other day, because sometimes I talk to Him. And I was driving along and I said, God, what makes me come alive? And He said the word hope, which made me laugh because it's my word for the year that I'm really negligent on working on. And I'm like, good one, God, thank you.

And I said, no, really, what do you mean by that? And He said, well, what's the opposite of hope? Which would be despair, but in my case, it tends to be more fear. And it reminded me of this quote that I read the other day. And I don't know who it was from, but it says, fear does not stop death, it stops life.

And worrying does not take away tomorrow's troubles, it takes away today's peace. And that's where I spent a lot of my life, letting my joy be robbed, letting my life be robbed, letting the hope be faded. And over the last whatever period of time, more than this year, God's just bringing it to light to me this year is how important hope is to the way I feel alive. Because when you feel like there's no hope, is there any reason to have a feeling of feeling alive? And He helps me find hope in a lot of places that I wouldn't necessarily have looked in the past. No hope is death. It's certainly not life.

We're probably going to miss two clips, but that's okay. I heard from God, and it's for the men out there and women that don't feel like they did. I mean, I was a Christian a long time and believed Jesus died for my sins before I really felt like I heard the voice of God.

And there are men out there that should come to boot camp, because this is an opportunity. I had an encounter with Henry Blackby that had more effect on me and anybody else in my life. He said, when I asked him, how do you know when you've heard from God, that His sheep hear His voice. And if you were my person in church, I'd walk alongside you, my brother, and take you to a place where you would be listening.

Because you will hear His voice. So if you haven't, come to boot camp. We'll help. We'll walk alongside you. Thank you, Jim.

Absolutely. And you can go to boot camp by registering at masculinejourney.org. I know sometimes we say Masculine Journey Radio, both links work, but masculinejourney.org coming up November 18th through 21st. We'll talk to you next week. This is the Truth Network.