Mental Gymnastics

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gymnastics

(used with a pl. verb)

(used with a pl. verb)

a.

Complex intellectual or artistic exercises: mental gymnastics.


An intellectual challenge!

Last Saturday, I spent most of the morning and part of the afternoon at the ordination counsel of a good friend.He had served as an intern pastor at our church while attending Bible college and seminary. He is currently an assistant pastor of a church in our fellowship.

So I participated in a three and a half hour session of questioning him on his understanding of the Word of God, his ability to use Scripture to defend those answers and I hope challenging him to study some areas where his answers were "weak".

Since I am a fundamentalist, I believe in the inspiration of Scripture, and that Scripture should be our final authority for faith and practice. I find it a stimulating exercise to watch and participate in this process. I derive as much enjoyment from the mental challenge of attempting to answer the questions as I do from hearing a good man do well in defending his beliefs.

Questions about the God/man Jesus Christ, His ability to sin or not, His relationship to the Father, etc, and then backing those answers with Scripture is a real intellectual challenge. He got questions regarding the Canon of Scripture, inspiration, etc.

Practical questions about ministry, such as the role of music in the church, his understanding of the divorce and remarriage issue,

He was challenged on his personal prayer life, his personal witness, what he was currently reading, .............

Anyway, I had a great time. Because he handled the Word of God effectively in answering the questioners, because he clearly has a solid grasp of Biblical knowledge, and probably the most fun was forcing myself to mentally answer every question he faced, that was a real challenge and one I throughly enjoyed.



And yes the counsel did recommend to the church that they proceed with the ordination.

A summary of the last few weeks.

Our CO vacation started on a Monday afternoon. We drove to southern Iowa, picked up the stuff we were hauling west for a friend. Stayed at my folks place Monday night. Left bright and early 6:08 AM headed west. Stopped several times going across that wasteland which is Nebraska so that the driver could stretch his legs and the rest of the crew didn't kill each other.

When we got into CO we took 71 south to Limon, drove through a thunderstorm with some light hail, and then took 24 on the angle into CO Springs. Arrived at the friends home around 7:00 had a bite of supper and were done unloading about 24 hours after we loaded the stuff in Iowa.

Stayed at a very nice hotel courtesy of my brother who works for one of the major hotel chains. He got us a very nice room for about 40 dollars, regularly $120? Did lots of touristy stuff on Wednesday, and Thursday, drove up Pike's Peak on Thursday. Did not enjoy that experience. I'm a flat lander folks. When I look out of the truck and can't see anything but blue sky beside, below and above me, I get just a little shaky in my boots. My kids were laughing at me. They've seen me drive in a blizzard with one hand on the steering wheel and a MT. Dew in the other. I was steering with both hands and white knuckles on Pike's Peak.

After we survived that experience, WB a friend I've met through some of the blogs I frequent, invited us to his home for buffalo burgers. We had some home raised hamburgers so we gave them to him to try. We throughly enjoyed the evening.He and his lovely wife were very gracious hosts. The view of the mountains from their deck is gorgeous.

On Friday morning, we started back east. We meandered north and east somewhat cross country, winding up in Ogallala and camped at a county park below the damn at Lake McConaughy. Forgot to calculate the loss of one hour of time, and arriving at a cousins home right at noon. She was gracious enough to serve us lunch. We then drove across central Nebraska on a state hiway, instead of the interstate, since my brother lives north of the interstate, and going south to go north makes no sense to me, beside I hate traveling that stretch of interstate anyway. Arrived at my brothers house about 6:00 pm, in fact we stopped in a nearby town and brought the pizza with us, out to the farm.

Went to church with them on Sunday, got home about 7:00pm Sunday night.

Now, since arriving home the level of activity has actually increased.

On Monday morning at 5:00am we loaded two semi-loads of hogs, then hauled corn to the ethanol plant all week. On Friday I went in at 6:00 so that I could leave by 3:00. Our church was hosting the men's retreat at the camp we support. I got to the camp at 4:00 and helped cook 450 pork chops till 6:30, ate quickly, then got to the 7:00 service. The music was great, nothing like 450 guys singing "It is Well With MY Soul", sounded awesome. The speaker was an old friend who "quotes" Scripture. Although he calls it saying Scripture. It's is amazing. He says entire passages. I've heard him do the entire book of Revelation, straight up, 1:10 minutes worth.

I got home about 11:00pm, We loaded two more loads of hogs at 5:00am. Did the rest of my chores by 8:30. Hurried back to camp by 9:30 practiced with the pianist at 10:00, sang "His Eye is On the Sparrow" at 10:30 in front of about 300 guys, then went out to the grill and helped do 300 hamburgers and about 250 brats. As soon as lunch was over I hurried home, hooked the pickup up to a friends trailer, and went out hunting picnic tables. Got 9 of them back to my place, ran out to the main farm for chores, got back home at 5:15 to a yard full of homeschool families. Helped get the grill going for a cook your own meat evening meal. Went and took a very necessary shower because I smelled like hogs. And then fellowshipped with the fellow homeschoolers till they left.

Chores on Sunday morning, church with our speaker saying Scripture (Galatians), then a noon fellowship dinner followed by another session with him saying the book of Philippians.

Didn't sell hogs on Monday, but had a meeting about trying to stop the sodomy lobbys push of sodomy permission certificates in Iowa, got home late.

Skip to the end of the week, went in at 6:00 again, left about 3:30 drove about an hour and ten minutes away for a family reunion on my fathers side of the tree. The lovely Mrs. farmer had taken the truck, trailer, kids and a ton of stuff right after noon. She and I were in charge of not only the whole reunion, but six meals for about 50.

We served Mrs. farmer's killer chili and sandwiches for supper Friday night. Got up early and made Swedish pancakes, bacon (cooked ahead of time in the oven) and an egg bake casserole and plenty of fruit.

For the noon meal I cooked yard fowl (chicken breast) on the grill with garlic bread, with fresh garden vegetables and salad.

For Saturday night supper we had pork chops on the grill with my mother's famous potato salad, fresh corn on the cob, angel food cake, and home made ice cream with one of the cousins providing a special treat of Guarana (Antarctica) a Brazilian pop, for all the Brazilian transplants and missionaries.

Sunday morning my mother made some of her world renowned coffee cake.

And the piece de resistance for Sunday noon, two 16 lb chuck roasts, with baked potatoes.

In between the eating we had a great reunion, with someone from each branch of the family tree opening the Scripture for us, sweet fellowship and some very good special music by family members. I'm already being questioned about the next one.

We loaded hogs again at 5:00 on Wednesday. And I've been mowing every evening in my off hours getting ready for this weekend. Our annual church cook out, trap shoot and fellowship is tomorrow night.

Other than that, nothing new around here.