Today

Well, it’s been a week since The Thirties Retreat.  How’s it going?  Fourth of July marked the second anniversary of the Snyders beginning to put our marriage back together after a big detour through Cherie’s illness.  Fourth of July holds deep meaning and hope in our household.  So, Saturday night, on the eve of this momentous occasion, we had the biggest fight of two years.  Both Cher and I feeling hurt, misunderstood, disrespected… just ugly.

So, an hour after that I’m sitting on my back porch, in a sea of suburbia, looking up into the stars holding onto an ice cold Icehouse and trying to connect with the Father, hoping that one of the two strategies would provide some life.  As I paused I could hear the accusations swirling… “You are such an a**hole.  Why would you try to sit down and work out the family budget with your wife on the eve of your anniversary?  What’s with the anger?  See, you did it again.  You are just full of sh*t.”  The list goes on.

And then I remembered… “Be present in this moment.  Be here with the Father. I bind a spirit of regret of the past, I bind a spirit of worry of tomorrow and forbid these twin thieves to steal the life that You Father are giving me today. I choose you. I remain in you.  I yield to you. I find my life in you.  Father, forgive me for my part in it, even that part I fully don’t understand in this moment.”

Remarkably, the Fourth of July was rescued.  I can’t fully explain how or through what combination of grace and choosing love.  As I look back I realize that so much of it was retaliation from what God did for me and for others in the Thirties Retreat at Globe and Anchor Ranch.

Men, stay the course.  Remember you are not alone.  Remember the words of one of our mentors,

If you are not in crisis you are living well“.

Stand against the twin thieves and receive the grace coming to the Father as a son today.  Remember the 110 tree rings on the slices of the towering pine we felled together.  Those rings are a better timeline…. A year at a time.  A decade at a time.  Remember that living “today” present to God, 365 days becomes a year.  And doing it 3650 times becomes a decade.  Life comes in “today’s”.  And as CS Lewis has taught us, the only two places that God exists is in the present moment and in eternity.  The enemy is constantly seducing us, with good motive or ill, to live in the past or future and remove us from the present, where we can live in God, be tapped into His Life and His resources for us as the Sons of God, the Sons of Thunder…

Choose Life.

Today.