Hello Men!
It's been a couple of weeks since our men's retreat and so I thought I'd follow up on things. First, I'm trying to get things together for a Summer '09 Backpacking trip. Go to our main Men of Cedar page - HERE - and you'll find a Video News segment about the trip and also a calendar you can click on to help us find a date that works for the most people possible. Please email me with questions. I also hope that we don't squander the good new or re-newed connections that were made at the retreat. I trust that some good new friendships were made or deepened. Take that gift and keep it alive by just giving another man a call and go do an outing of some sort. The weather is finally going to get nice so go for a hike! There are also some good movies coming out this summer, so catch one with with a group of guys. Perhaps a group would be interested in grabbing a pizza and going to one of the movies together. Let's stay connected in fun ways as well as just hoping we chat at church.
I thought I'd finish by sharing part of a dream I had this last week. I'm a big believer that God sometimes speaks to us through dreams - not all dreams, but some. I don't know for sure if this was a "God-dream" or not, but I wouldn't be surprised.
The dream started abruptly with me, two good friends, and a lot of other guys at the bottom of a steep mountain. We were going to climb it together. I didn't know any of the other men besides my friends, and no one seemed particularly friendly. They were just focused on getting ready for the climb. It wasn't clear to me why, but I didn't know what kind of climb we were undertaking before I arrived. I came with all the equipment for a run-of-the-mill packing trip (you can tell backpacking has been on my mind): tent, pack, trail boots, variety of food and snack, water bottles. What became painfully clear, though, was that this was a mountain-climbing trip - as in ropes and hammers and hooks, and spiked climbing shoes. Yikes. Everything I have with me is pretty much useless and could even hold me back in a climb like this.
We spent the night in a cave at the base of the first cliff we had to climb and it was there that I confessed to my two friends that I don't have the right equipment (one friend, who shall remain nameless - might read this and know that he's heard me make the same real-live confession before...). I don't know why I'm the only one that doesn't have the equipment for the climb. So I feel stupid, and inexperienced. My friends tell me, "Don't worry about it. We have the stuff for the climb. We'll all work together and it will be fine." Easy words that I doubt. But the next morning we're off.
At this point - has this happened to you? - I realize, in my dream, that I'm dreaming. The anxiety level of the dream reaches a point where the dream fog is pierced. Reality invades. But I don't want to wake up, so I start thinking in my dream, "I'm going to keep dreaming, but I'm going to change this dream so that I do have the right stuff with me; so that I can do this!"
It doesn't work. I wake up and, as always, I can't re-start a dream I want to. Always the crappy dreams can restart on their own, but never one you want to go on with.
I'm not completely sure, but I think this dream was about feeling a lack of confidence in my own abilities, in my own skin; feeling like I don't have the right stuff to "climb" some mountains in my life right now. Maybe God is reminding me that he's given me other people to help me on the climb. That, no, I don't have everything I need by myself and that I can't fake it when the climb is steep. But I'm not alone. - Curtis
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