Boot Camp Activities

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This is the Truth Network. The heart of every man craves a great adventure, but life doesn't usually feel that way. Jesus speaks of narrow gates and wide roads, but the masculine journey is filled with many twists and turns.

So how do we keep from losing heart while trying to find the good way when life feels more like a losing battle than something worth dying for? Grab your gear and come on a quest with your band of brothers who will serve as the guides in what we call the masculine journey. The masculine journey starts here now. Well, Sam has escaped to Las Vegas. Somebody has to do it. Leave it there, Sam. Whatever happens in Vegas, let it stay there. Apparently it's going to stay there, yeah. And, you know, meanwhile, we're left here to do another shameless plug for boot camp.

Or 13th or something like that. Actually, this is a really fun shameless plug. The whole show is like a shameless plug for boot camp. And it really is, Andy.

It was your idea. Yeah, but before that, since you're back, you've got to give the Eve update. The Eve update? How many Eves to boot camp? Oh, my goodness.

I guess in the neighborhood of 20 boot camp E-V-V-V-V. Lesser now, isn't it? It might be.

Might be down to 17. Yeah. So anyway, we've got a neat show tonight. It was your idea.

Lay it on us. Of course, so I'm going to give the full inspiration a little bit later after we do the bump. But basically, we've never done a show. At boot camp, you hear a lot about covenants of silence, the talks, the food, a lot of different things.

But we haven't really ever done a show. And it's a big part of our camp is the activities we do in the afternoons when we have breaks. You know, activities range from, you know, airsoft to sleeping, you know. So we have to do a lot of different stuff. So we felt like we would do a show to give a flavor for kind of what you can experience some of our stories about what we experience and really how we experience God in the activities because I do believe that's part of the adventure that the Father wants to come with us on. So man, you're not believe this, but we actually have a clip of Jim snoring.

So, you know, if you have a wall that needs the paint removed, this might be your time. I didn't know we were doing the whole sleeping thing. No, just kidding.

Don't have that. But we do. I was wondering where you were going there, but I get it now. One never knows where Robby is going.

Unless he happens to be the president, and then everybody knows where he's going. This was a preemptive strike because I knew where we were going. Jim, you've got a clip for us.

Yeah, I do. And it is about one of my, it probably is my favorite activity is the combat we get into used to be paintball. And this is a tribute to paintball.

What would you call us? Anyway, this is one of my earliest memories of Robby. And, uh, it was fun because he was the only one without a paintball gun and he was the president and he's the only one that rivals me and being a big target and he was, so this is a tribute to him and paintball. And now we do airsoft and our, uh, competitive natures have blossomed over the years.

Over the years with the different, uh, ways of shooting at one another. That's one of the games we play, which is really, really fun is protect the president. And so each team, because you get two different teams and they each have a president and everybody else's secret service. And of course, Jim was the president on the opposing team that won this particular battle that he's referring to because you'll get this through the clip, what actually happens.

It's quite obvious. And there's no relevance to his name being Jim, just saying, um, I was the president on the other team. Things didn't go well, but you have got to get the president to safety. Okay, yes, I'd say that man is alive, she's dead, she's dead, she's dead, she's dead, captain. He's dead, she's dead, she's dead, she's dead. We're dying. He's dead, she's dead, he's dead, captain is dead. And I think that's probably going to be on my tombstone. He's dead, Jim. It was worse than dead. Come on, Bones. What's the mystery?

His brain is gone. I couldn't help but think of Robby. Yeah, it was really, really fun. It really, really was fun.

Stephen there was a she's dead. And, you know, the other interesting thing to me, Jim, is we'll meet guys that we haven't seen for, you know, almost a decade or whatever, and they still clearly remember that protect the president fiasco. Or not, as the case may be. You know, Lincoln had no comparison to the wounds that I suffered.

I don't know that I remember this correctly, but I'm pretty sure none of the Secret Service agents were killed to thank you either. But anyway, you know, it is a way, Andy, that we bond, right? You know, when they are getting their president shot to pieces, there's a certain affinity that grows between them.

Absolutely, yeah. Yeah, there's a lot of camaraderie and then you see people talking that have, you know, done Airsoft or shot or whatever. When they go to dinner or whatever, they'll sit together or whatever, because you just you do get that camaraderie. I know it takes us back, again, where a lot of times we don't take the time to play.

Guys have to have time to do those things. And whenever you get out there to do that, you know, our hearts come alive. It's part of the part of the adventure, as I said earlier. Yeah, and in fact, you know, since I know we're going to play Airsoft from day one, I'm sizing up who I really want to shoot. And I begin to, you know, don't you guys want to come out and play Airsoft? What's cool about it, too, is I got an identity from it. You know, Robby named it the Andy's Airsoft Experience.

So not only did I get a name from God, I got a name from Robby. There you go. That's because Andy is such a big target.

He just wants to moderate it. Absolutely. And I run slow. Well, one of the other really, really huge highlights for every boot camp, and we have mentioned it before on the air, but we, you know, we have a clip from Wayne here, is Wayne's, because I tried to give everybody a name, Gaither's Gun Experience, you know, and we have Brian's Bass Experience, but this is Wayne's Wildfire. And we had a wildfire. Yeah, I was afraid this last one was definitely a wildfire. Never, ever will I ever forget. Really, the last two Wayne wildfire experiences were just unbelievably powerful, not just from the fire, but from the discussions. Well, there was more than that. You just don't remember because you didn't come to the other ones.

Isn't somebody supposed to protect the president? He's dead, Jim. Yeah, this clip is from a great movie, Stand By Me. The boys are sitting around a campfire after a long day of already, you know, this great adventure as they've all lied to their parents. Don't do that, kids. They lied to their parents about staying over at each other's houses and ended up going on this great camping adventure.

And if you can imagine that as a preteen, you know, what an adventure that was. But but yeah, awesome conversations around the fire, around the fire. Hey Bruno, where's the radio? Let's see if we can get some sounds. We talked into the night, the kind of talk that seemed important until you discover girls. All right.

All right. Mickey's a mouse. Donald's a duck. Pluto's a dog. What's Goofy? If I can only have one food for the rest of my life, that's easy.

Pest, cherry-flavored pest. There's no question about it. Goofy's a dog. He's definitely a dog.

I knew the $64,000 question was fixed. There's no way anybody can know that much about opera. He can't be a dog.

He wears a hat and drives a car. Wagon Train's a really cool show. Did you ever notice that they never get anywhere?

Just keep wagon training. That's weird. What is Goofy? Not one of us mentioned Ray Broward, but we were all thinking about him. Oh Wayne, let me just tell you, I'm pretty sure that Goofy is a dog.

Yeah, the nose and the ears give it away. It's definitely my favorite time of boot camp. Not because it's called Wayne's Wildfire, but it's never the same, right? It's never been the same. Each time it's a little different.

Even this last one, right? We didn't think we were going to have it. Prayed over it as the guys were in there having their talk and God said yes.

The wind was blowing. I was like, Lord, are you sure? He said yes. So it's like, okay, we went out there and yeah, just sparks everywhere, right? But the conversations that we have during that time, it's a great bonding time. So it's a time when honestly, the guys let down their guard a little bit and they kind of come out of their shell. Sometimes there are some guys that force them to by calling them out. Not that anybody's done that, right?

But it is, it's a really good time to get to know the guys, to share a bit of yourself with whoever God puts in your path. Darrell Bock Right. And to get a visual on this particular experience, you may know what Nikita Kolov's Russian nightmare looks like. You don't know what he looks like when a fire is, you know, like the flames are, you know, he's just standing there with his arms folded like, ain't no fire going to scare the Russian nightmare.

And the flames are just coming right in his face. It was something to see, wasn't it? Scott Cunningham Oh, yeah, we had flames a good 25, 30 feet high, you know, the sparks from the fire.

Who knows? I mean, it's a wonder we didn't start a real wildfire. Darrell Bock And the amazing thing is you would have thought, you know, I would have thought if there was a bunch of women at that thing, they would have all run, okay?

Because it was pretty scary. And not only did nobody run, but then the conversations went really deep and really honest and people shared some amazing stuff. And again, you know, where would you get that kind of a bonding experience, you know, except around a campfire that was just wild? It was a wildfire. Scott Cunningham And it's not anything that we create other than the environment for it, right? God shows up in the way he chooses.

And like you said, the last two years, last year, you know, one of the gentlemen, he started to speak up about some things after a good bit of folks started to leave. And it was just an amazing things you couldn't imagine people were dealing with. And it helps you to see that you're not alone in this, that like, you're not the only one that's going through these things.

You know, nothing that you're experiencing is outside of the norm. The enemy is coming after each one of us and there is a fire burning. Darrell Bock Right.

And to get it out in the light, however, that works. Because I know at the one, and Ricky Cornwood would say this on the air himself, he had never told that story in his, I mean, and it was an unbelievable story that was boot camp before last. He had never told that story to anyone. And there he was around a campfire sharing things.

And the amount of freedom that was available to him as a result was amazing. Again, this is a shameless plug. The boot camp is coming up, right? Right at the end of this month, March 31, through April, is it the 3rd?

3rd, yeah. So go sign up now, Matt. Matt Ladd When I heard the stories from the stage that the other men had, and then during my prayer time, I'm getting a download from God on where my life is and how I have wounds and I have a place in his story. To know how I heard from God is one of those things. He really does communicate with us. Register today at masculinejourney.org Register today at masculinejourney.org Yeah, so we sometimes we have rain.

Sometimes we have poison ivy. But just the inspiration for that bump, though. I love that song. It brings back memories from a kid. But our awesome producer, a few weeks back on Joyride, was kind of given a camp experience like, where's everybody at camp? And I was like, that sounds like the dude from Hello Muddah, Hello Muddah. So that was my inspiration. It took me from there. It was like they started talking about activities and that song and stuff.

But that's where that came from. But we're hoping Keith will come. He'll sign autographs and everything if you come. So it's been I really like his new take on the Joyrides. The more he does, I think it's very entertaining. Amazing Keith-ini. It's amazing.

Absolutely spectacular. So fun. So one of the things that a lot of us enjoy at boot camp is the fishing, right? And so, Danny, you got a little inspiration on our fishing adventures there at boot camp. Yeah, the clip is from a river runs through it. And it's the scene where the two sons and the father are fishing out in the river. And it ends with their presenting their prizes for the day. And the father kind of gives them a one-up, as fathers do sometimes.

It's just a cool story. That really is spectacular. And of course, because it's a very visual clip, we've got to fill in a few blanks for you. So at the beginning, here's these men. They're fly fishing. And I mean, this is serious fly fishing, right, Danny?

This isn't the kind of stuff Danny and I do. I mean, they're casting 80 yards, crossing these beautiful casts, throwing these stone flies. And of course, they each catch one. And as they get to the bank, they are going to show their individuals fish. And so that's what the father's responding to. And of course, you know, it goes from there. I then saw something remarkable.

For the first time, Paul broke free of our father's instruction into a rhythm all his own. Okay. They're both marbles. I'd say the Lord has blessed us all today. It's just that he's been particularly good to me. You know, growing up, I always liked to fish. But I saw a guy one time when I was about 12 or 13 with a fly rod down at the pond behind my dad's house. And I thought, what a cool thing to learn to do. And fast forward 40 years later, I expressed this to my wife. And she bought me a fly rod. And so I'm out in the yard. We're still living in Asheboro messing with this thing, watching YouTube videos and scared to death. I'm gonna pierce my ear, all kinds of different stuff. So fast forward to my first boot camp. And I had this fly rod.

And I've always been kind of self-conscious about things. And so there's a lake down in this place. And so I'm thinking I'm gonna go fly fish. Unbeknownst to me, there's lots of fly fisherman in this crowd.

And Robby happens to be one of them. And so I thought, well, they're out there fly fishing. So I'm thinking I'm gonna get out there and make a fool out of myself. So I debated on whether to even get my fly rod out. So I come down and I finally get the courage and put the fly rod out. And Robby gives me some pointers. And one of the greatest piece of advice so far has been that nobody has ever caught a fish without their fly in the water.

And that's pretty good wisdom there. But what it has done for me is the activity was, we had several people out on that dock a couple of times that we met early in the morning. But there was a bond and a camaraderie with that and with some of the other guys.

And we talked fly fishing. But one of the things I was telling my wife just the other day was just so cool was Robby's got this older tackle box. Now, it's not a bright, shiny tackle. When he opens it up, the light comes out. And you hear the, whoa, just an amazing thing.

But Robby's so generous with his time and his talent and his treasure with things. And just, but it was just like, I had tackle box envy. I still do. I really do. That is just the coolest thing. But it is that bond in time, the campfire or whatever, the airsoft, which you were president when we first played that and we got you killed again.

So sorry about that. But it is really cool that the activities are, because we're men and we love adventure. And we usually have some adventures and more shenanigans than most.

We do have a good time. Rodney, I know you didn't, your clip is not on fishing. But I always sensed, like Rodney's, it used to be I was always the first person at boot camp because I'd have my line in the water. But I have been trumped.

I have been trumped by, yeah, on Tuesday before the thing starts. But Rodney, that seems to have awakened something in you that in both hunting and fishing with the boot camp thing. Yeah, I've always had a desire to fish and hunt, did some more fishing, very little hunting in my life. And then my son gets into it and I'm just sitting there going, man, I wish I was my son because he's got a real zeal in his ass for it and wants to do it. And I'm coming out here to boot camp and I'm like, well, this guy, Robby Dilmore, he really likes to fish and hunt.

And so it's like just gotten me into, okay, well, I'm going to try this. I'm kind of like you, Danny, I'm buying fishing rods, I'm buying guns and figuring out how to do it. I've been around people who've done it all their lives, listed the stories, watched things, but just being around others that do something that you like to do, you kind of learn from that and you kind of get an edge. So like you have learned to fly fish from Robby. Well, I went out dove hunting with Robby and it took me a couple of years to get dove. When you only go out one day a year. Without shooting me nowadays.

It doesn't count when the doves are sitting there nice and fat and happy looking at you like, hey, shoot me. No, actually, Rodney's gotten good. I mean, the last time we went, man, he smoked me bad. It was good though. It was really, really fun. And it's really, really fun to see that come alive in a man. I mean, it's just part of those adventures, right? That make us understand we've got what it takes to some extent. And so you actually even went out to Kansas, was it?

Yeah, we just went out to Kansas back in February. Let's see what he shot, man. I was like, what? Go ahead.

Tell us all. You know, we shot geese mainly. So that was the first thing we went after were some geese. And the weather was really, really nasty. It was what was about 10 degrees.

And we got up the first morning in about 30 mile an hour winds all day and got up to under 20. But it was just when you're out there with a bunch of guys doing that and relatives and friends. And it was just a blast doing it.

But a bunch of geese. And then we went pheasant hunting, which some of these guys had never went pheasant hunting. I had been on a pheasant hunt in a preserve where it's, you know, you got to kick them up.

This was actually wild pheasants. And it was great. Got several.

Mine, just trying to get it to the taxidermy now to get it mounted. It's a dirty job, but somebody has to do it. Yeah, it was fun. You know, again, I just see these things of, you know, how men, you know, begin to go on the adventure. So Andy, you're like the poster child for taking up adventure and going on that with God. And, you know, how much has that meant to your relationship with God?

Oh, absolutely. I mean, I had an opportunity through my job to start traveling. And it really exposed me.

It started, when I started reading Wild at Heart, I began to realize that I'd become too artificial, too much, you know, sports and all that stuff. And really getting back out, I still haven't done all the stuff. I mean, I live in Boone and should be, you know, fly fishing and stuff more. I want to do more of that. But just getting, I love road trips.

I love seeing scenery. Dad, that's kind of something my dad handed down to me. And God has just been there with me. I mean, it's amazing if you invite him or he invites you, however it looks. But he comes. Darrell Bock So I got to tell this story about my friend Bob Young.

Anybody who knows a Christian car guy knows my friend Bob Young, my Christian junkyard guy. So he calls me from Daytona. You know, he's been out fishing.

He's hit the races. But he goes like, Robby, man, the wave, the water's running like crazy. And so I said, well, let's just stop right now and pray that you catch a whale, right? And so I pray with him right there on the phone.

And well, the next day, he sends me a picture. I kid you not, man. There's a whale right off the beach. Darrell Bock Oh, wow. Darrell Bock You know how Stacey Eldridge or whatever talked about that she saw a whale as a way of God winking at her? So he goes, man, I thought, that's the biggest shark I've ever seen. And then all of a sudden, I saw the water come out of the blowhole. And I was like, man, Robby. Darrell Bock That's awesome.

Darrell Bock But the deal is, man, that God is out there. And when you engage that site, your Wilder, whatever it is that God has you, he meets you in some cool places. And to see that come alive in guys, right, is just an amazing thing.

I mean, I don't know how many guys have come out there. They've never shot their gun. And so we've got, coming up to the after hours, we have some gun clips that are unbelievable. We have some airsoft clips.

We have clips that might shock you from blazing sandals. But they belong after hours. I'm just saying. Darrell Bock These activities, too. We do different stuff. We had a time when we had the boys academy coming, and we had a game of softball that was just glorious. I mean, we had the best time.

It was a really tight game, played it back and forth. But there's other stuff that comes up. There's a couple guys here that have challenged each other to do a game of pickleball that we hope to see maybe this time.

Guys? Darrell Bock Is there a pickleball court at the boot camp? Darrell Bock Well, there's a tennis court.

We can adapt, can't we? Darrell Bock Can we adapt? Darrell Bock We'll talk about that on After Hours.

Darrell Bock So After Hours is going to be spectacular, because I know the clips we have. So if you go to mastandjourney.org, you can click on the After Hour shows. Oh, my goodness, are they wonderful. But more than that, right, boot camp is an amazing time. Now, God comes after our hearts in amazing ways. But you got to go to mastandjourneyradio.org and sign up. We hope we'll see you there. Thanks for listening.