God's Country Boy: Mens Prayer Advance

Saturday, March 19, 2011

Mens Prayer Advance

   Well, it was my first one, and great at that. Here's the brief summary:
   We (Mr. Cyr and Malachi and I) all got out there, after many return trips to home, Walmart, and such, at around 5:30 on Thursday. There was one talk that night by pastor, then after half dragging Matt away from his guitar, him, Josie and I walked and talked in the wide desert till about 12:30, the moon being so bright that we didn't need any lights at all! The next morning I got up at 6:00 to help Mr. Hoodenpyle make breakfast, and boy, THAT was something. Gabe and I, well, weren't the neatest, despite all our desperate attempts to keep the majority of the pancakes ON the griddle, not in the general vicinity AROUND the griddle. A much harder task that it sounds. The batter was so soupy, when you tried to flip it, because the bottom was cooked and the top wasn't, when you flipped it, you splattered batter hither and yon. (splendid) Then, when Gabe would pour some more in, it would drip all over the place in-between the bowl and the griddle. (getting worse by the moment)
   So, breakfast (or what there was that was actually ON the griddle) being eaten, we listened to several more sessions that morning, ate lunch, (a MUCH cleaner escapade) had one more session, then it broke up for prayer, wherever you wished. Mr. Kindred and I went down the wash for quite a ways, found a shady tree to sit under, and prayed and read scripture for about twenty minutes, then hunted for rattlers to blast on the way back :)
   One more session that night after dinner, inter-sparsed with sword-fights around the fire and through the hills. Then all the men gathered together around the fire for prayer, where I, at around 11:15ish through 11: 35ish, zonked beside the fire, trying to pray. Ok, you have to admit, I had a right to be tired!
   Anyway, when the prayer time ended at midnight, I found I was not even the slightest bit sleepy anymore! So Josie and I put on some hot chocolate over the fire, and while the other men talked away, we practiced our fast-draw on the far side of the tent ( the pistols being unloaded of course) being soon joined by Brennan stuffing down muffins (we almost reloaded our guns for that....) :):) jk
   Then, at about 1:30 or so, Josie went to bed, and Mr. Arrington, Mr. Melton, Brennan and I sat around the fire talking and laughing at Mr. Arrington dragging a whole tree (literally) and putting it on the fire. He had found it lying dead in camp, and hauled it over. We asked if he knew of a bigger one, since obviously we were going to run out of firewood REALLY soon, and he said that yes, there was a bigger tree over there, do you want me to get it? LOL
   So I finally went to bed when the rest of them turned it at around 2:30, and didn't wake up until almost seven the next morning.
   So, after breakfast (much cleaner this time, due to the fact Gabe and I were out of camp searching for rattlers and taking pictures) we listened to another session and a discussion time, and then after lunch, cleaned up and left.
   Aren't you glad I didn't go into details?? :):)
   So, all of the topics talked on were nothing new to me, in fact, to the group we were in, it was almost preaching to the choir, but very instructive none-the-less. The thing that impacted me the most was our very deep, soul-searching talk at midnight with Matt and Josie, and several talks with Gabe about various topics around the camp and walking around, and my prayer time with Mr. Kindred. Extremely powerful.
   Oh, don't get me wrong, we had loads of other fun as well. Gabe and I taking on the rock fortress with foes twice our number, sword in hand, watching other people sword-fighting around the fire, Mr. Hudelson vs. Pastor turning into a wrestling match in the sand, roaring at stories at 2:30 in the morning of Mr. Arrington sleep-walking and telling his wife (who woke up wondering what on earth he was doing) that he was going to shoot a spider on the wall a foot across.....
   Yeah, I had a great time, despite the fact I didn't get to shoot any rattlers. :) :)