by admin | Oct 24, 2019 | Behind the Bucking Chutes
The world we never got to see before sin entered it was free of weeds and thorns. Now ranchers and farmers have to contend with them all the time.
The Battle Against Sin, Part 1
By Josh McCarthy / Cowboys of the Cross
We’ve all heard it somewhere in the sport of rodeo: it’s “man versus beast” or “you versus the clock.” Or, for those of us out cowboying on some empty section of range, “it’s you against the elements”. All of these things are battles we face, things we prepare for, and take very seriously – as we should. In this series of articles, I want to talk with you about the most serious battle any and all Christians face, our daily battle against sin.
Before I go on I want to address the fact that this series of articles will be directed toward those who have already submitted to the Lordship of Christ and trusted Him as the one and only Savior from their sins, i.e. Christians. If you are curious what that means, feel free to contact this ministry for more information.
As with any battle, we need to know who we are fighting, right? If we drew a bronc we might talk to others that have been on him before or the stock contractor to find out if he’s trashy or a nice, honest bucker. Or that bull – is he going to “blow or spin”? (Bonus points for the movie reference.) If you’re out helping the neighbor gather some cows, it definitely helps to know the lay of the land, where the adjoining fences are, and surrounding neighbors’ brands.
So what is this thing called sin? According to GotQuestions.org, “sin is described in the Bible as transgression of the law of God and rebellion against God”. In Genesis 2:16-17, we see God’s first “law” to His creation:
And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it you will certainly die.”
Not long after, in Genesis 3:6-7, we see Adam and Eve violate this law bringing the curse of sin into all of creation.
When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
God’s original creation was “very good” (Genesis 1:31), we could say perfect or without sin. None of us knows what this world looks like, as every part of our lives is affected and infected with sin. If you don’t believe me, just ask any rancher who is battling any number of weeds in his pastures. (Genesis 3:18: [The ground] will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field.) Look how you treat the judge after a “bad call” or how we treat each other working cows. Heck, just turn on the news or check Facebook and you can see the whole of creation is cursed with sin.
Throughout the Church’s history, people a lot smarter than me have recognized three main sources of sin: the flesh, the world, and the devil. In Part 2, we will look at each of these.
by admin | Oct 11, 2019 | The Bull Pen
God can put the pieces together to form a picture we can’t even begin to see. A cowboy church devotion from horse man Jim Bull.
By Jim Bull / Cowboys of the Cross
I’ve known something for a long time and finally come up with an illustration that gives an idea of the complexity of life.
When you were a kid, do you remember putting together jigsaw puzzles that had a board with a curved border that all six pieces had one obvious spot for it to go? And do you remember putting every piece in the wrong place and turning it in a complete circle three to five times before either putting it in a different place on the board and spinning it again or putting it down and getting a new piece or giving up and finding something else to play with that didn’t hurt your brain?
Move forward a few years. Do you remember trying again to put together jigsaw puzzles? Only now you’re skilled and working with 500 pieces or one thousand or you like the challenge and go for puzzles with ten thousand pieces! You start with the boarder pieces or a specific color or whatever is your preferred method to make sense of the madness. Now it’s because you enjoy the challenge so you don’t give up, you just keep plugging along, piece by piece till you proudly look upon a finished puzzle.
Now we’re going to look at God. He takes all the millions of pieces of our lives such as who we meet and when and where we are, what we pay attention to. The good things and the bad; all the things that make up a life. It’s like the pieces are in a bingo ball scrambler cage, He reaches in and pulls one piece out and places it on a blank table with no border in the exact location it belongs. No twisting or turning or spinning or searching for a boarder or color. He just knows where it belongs. Then He grabs the next piece of the puzzle and places it perfectly. He is an amazing God!
But wait! That puzzle with millions of pieces is just your life! He also mixes your puzzle pieces with all of the people you are affected by or have an influence on or that influence you. Now it’s a puzzle with billions or trillions of pieces and it’s in 3D and he’s still pulling them all out of a bingo ball scrambler cage! You can look up awesome in a thesaurus and use every word it has and still not get the full picture of how great God is. Praise Him and worship Him for He is worthy! He knows your every hair, thought and action, inside and out. He is the master of your puzzle.
Luke 12:5-7 But I will show you whom you should fear: Fear Him who, after He has killed, has power to cast into hell; yes, I say to you, fear Him! “Are not five sparrows sold for two copper coins? And not one of them is forgotten before God. But the very hairs of your head are numbered. Do not fear therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows.
by admin | Aug 22, 2019 | Behind the Bucking Chutes
Christian Bull Rider Clete Bontrager says a cowboy prayer after cowboy church at the SEBRA bull riding in Marshall, Michigan, produced by Lost Nations Rodeo Company and Shiloh Walden.
By Scott Hilgendorff / Cowboys of the Cross
When you’re chasing your gold buckle dreams, do you see God as a means to success or is glorifying Him your purpose?
The answer will tell you a lot about your relationship with Him and changing your focus could bring about success in an unexpected way. Even what the world measures as failure or loss can be success when it points others toward a saving faith in Jesus.
Whatever we do, win or lose, it’s going to bring God glory, even if we never fully see how the pieces fit together.
Ephesians 1:11-12 In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, 12 so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory.
There’s so much teaching out there that overlooks the what’s in the Bible about struggles and the purpose they serve or the presence of sin that causes the struggles to exist in the first place. A few verses out of context can give us the idea that God will give us our heart’s desire. The only way for that to be true is if our heart’s are focused on Him and His desires for us.
When we seek God, and it’s His plan we’re following, he WILL give us what we ask because it is what he wants for us to begin with.
A verse that often has people thinking God will make wishes come true, suddenly means that yes, of course God will give us what we seek when it’s Him and His glory that we’re seeking.
Matthew 7:7-8 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
If a person with a terminal cancer diagnosis demonstrates joy and perseverance and points out to others it’s because of his or her faith in God and understanding of the Bible, they can find themselves at peace with their situation. It doesn’t mean they don’t pray for and believe that God could miraculously heal them. Sometimes that’s part of His plan. I’ve seen a bull rider go from expecting to die from lung cancer to the spreading disease completely disappearing between specialist appointments to talk about how they might extend his time here. I’ve seen a barrel man’s kidneys fail and the poison build in his body to the point they were preparing to move him to hospice to die, but suddenly find them working again and home from the hospital a few days later. And I’ve listened at church to the story of a young man in the congregation who had a disease that slowly suffocated him to death, sharing until the very end his trust and love for God.
Romans 8:18 I Consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.
Paul is teaching through this section about the security we have in our salvation and that no matter what we go through here or how hard it might be, God will use us to reveal Himself. When we understand our time here is short compared to eternity and when we understand that our eternal home in Heaven is perfect, no matter what we go through here, we can be encouraged by knowing it can help others find their way home too.
Our gold buckle dreams are worth pursuing in our time here when God is at the center of them and we know He’s using us to bring Him glory, but the rewards we might gain here pale in comparison to what is coming in Heaven.
by admin | Dec 6, 2018 | Behind the Bucking Chutes
Success or failure, God will use it all
By Scott Hilgendorff / Cowboys of the Cross
My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Psalm 73:26
It’s ok to fail.
You have goals you want to achieve. People in the rodeo and bull riding industry have unique sets of goals within the sport on top of the goals everyone sets for their lives. There’s a finals you want to qualify for, a time you want to beat, a bull you want to win a rematch with, a buckle you want to earn or a horse you’re training with goals for him.
When we don’t meet those goals, we can sometimes get frustrated or discouraged. It leads some people to quit. But if we look at our goals through a Biblical perspective, we don’t have to ever get discouraged, especially when we put God in front of them.
But here’s the kicker–that might change your goals completely. Once you look at how your choices can glorify and honor God or can carry out the Great Commission–that assignment God gave us all to share the gospel and teach and equip other believers–our goals or the reason for achieving them can easily be changed. That doesn’t mean you suddenly don’t try to qualify for a finals, but you find yourself putting God first in that journey.
Suddenly, the pressure is gone. You might even fail to achieve to accomplish what you set out to do, but the biggest accomplishment turns out to be how God used you in the process. Instead of being discouraged, you look back on the steps taken to achieve the goal, so the way that God was glorified in your choices and actions, and you find yourself feeling good about the experience.
Our failures can be God’s biggest success through how others can see Christ in us by how we handle a failure or how God uses our struggles with sin and temptation to help us. “My flesh and my heart may fail.”
Fail or succeed in our own minds, it’s His plan that will be carried out perfectly using us, His imperfect creation. Sometimes His plan is to let us fail to teach us and help us grow and sometimes that’s going to come out of us struggling with sin. As strong as we want to think we are, it can take real strength to admit how easily we let ourselves be tempted into sin…. That we weren’t strong enough on our own. We aren’t. That’s ok. Because God will be the strength we need to overcome what feels like a failure or a struggle with sin. And God’s grace will cover us when we mess it up. His love and grace is bigger than any sin or failure we feel we’ve experienced.
by admin | Oct 11, 2018 | The Bull Pen
By Jim Bull /
Cowboys of the Cross
Jim Bull is a horseman from Kentucky who writes, The Bull Pen for the Cowboys of the Cross website, devotions meant to teach and encourage through illustrations from life.
I finally worked up the nerve to talk to my now wife, Laura, on September 22, 1999. Just over three months
later was New Years Eve and we, along with her roommate, were hosting an End of the Millennium
party. Some of the girls’ closest friends were there and I had come to know and respect them. During this
party, one of their friends pulled me to the side to tell me how happy she was for Laura and me; how
great we were for each other and how great I was to her.
I remember the feeling of the grin that spread across my face. The assurance, from a woman I barely
knew, was a great boost to my ego but, more importantly, made me want to do better. A little
encouragement goes a long way to building relationships, your own, as well as people you know or
encounter.
Hebrews 10:24-25 says “And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good
deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another-
and all the more as you see the day approaching.”
My wife and I have been married for 16 years. In that time, we have had great moments of expressing
our love for each other. We have also had times of complacency, when we knew we loved each other
but failed to make the effort to show it unashamedly. I have had times when I felt I was a failure as a
husband because I knew my wife was feeling lonely and abandoned because I was wrapped up in work
and not putting forth the effort to show how much I needed her; how much I loved her. I have also felt
lonely, like a hired worker or a servant. It is in these times we were lacking communication and the
expression of our love, not that we were ever lacking the love itself.
Proverbs 31:28 says “Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her”
We are to tell our wives how blessed we are to have them. We should tell them all the wonderful things
we see in them; not just their outer beauty but inner beauty as well. We should tell them of the great
care they take of us, tell her you see her hard work and that you appreciate the effort she puts in daily
to take care of the family and household. Be sure to acknowledge her being a lady so she will continue
to be a lady.
After all this time together, after all the changes we have both made with our interests, habits and
looks, we are still blessed to have each other and work to acknowledge each our need for each
other. My advice to anyone in a relationship or looking for that special someone in the future is to not
be afraid of stepping outside your comfort zone when telling that person how you feel about
them. Also, we need to not be ashamed to tell friends that we see the way they are with their spouse or
girlfriend. Be supportive in the relationships of people you are around. You never know when you will
say something that they need to hear to motivate a fresh start to a stale relationship.
1 Peter 4:8 tells us “Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers a multitude of sins.”
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