by admin | Oct 12, 2023 | Behind the Bucking Chutes
By Scott Hilgendorff / Cowboys of the Cross
Waiting to do cowboy church at a rodeo recently and just wandering around behind the chutes at a rodeo, I saw a young bull rider with a Bible in his hand. It’s not a common sight anymore so that in itself was encouraging. Was he giving it to someone? Did he want to share something from it with one of the other guys that might have asked him a faith-based question?
Nope, it was with him to read it.
In all the noise and commotion around him with music blasting, rodeo cowboys getting their gear ready and countless other distractions, he stepped off to the side and leaned on a low section of wall around the arena to open his Bible up and read from it.
He spent about 10 minutes with headphones in, ignoring everything around him, reading from his Bible. Afterward, I asked him what he had been reading and it was a chapter in Isaiah.
Even at a rodeo you can find a little of what is referred to as quiet time. ‘Quiet time’ is kind of a church-speak phrase but it takes its example from the Bible. In church terms, quiet time is usually time spent alone studying the Bible and in prayer, obviously with the idea that you’re doing it somewhere without distractions.
Many Christians strive to make this a part of their daily routines to grow closer to God as they talk to Him and learn from His word to us in the books of the Bible.
People didn’t have a Bible to carry around then, all of what we know as the New Testament, hadn’t even been started, so there are no specific verses directing us to make this quiet time with our Bibles. However, there are plenty of scriptures that give us an example of Jesus taking time away from the crowds to spend with God.
Several times, Jesus would go off by himself to spend time with God.
Mark 1:35 And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed.
The verse in Mark was between an intense period of time Jesus spent teaching and working miracles. He broke away from the crowds to be alone to pray. Then in Luke, early is his time teaching, he had just healed a man with leprosy and word was spreading of the miracles he was working. It was causing crowds to gather and follow him. The work he was doing was essential to God’s plan for salvation, but he still broke away to spend time alone with God.
Luke 5:15-16 But now even more the report about him went abroad, and great crowds gathered to hear him and to be healed of their infirmities. 16 But he would withdraw to desolate places and pray.
The clearest example is for us to make time to pray but as Christians, now armed with Bibles we understand is the main way God speaks to us, it only makes sense that we follow Jesus’s example and take time to not just pray but also read what we know to be God’s word to us.
And while the example Jesus gave us was to go away in isolation, even in a crowded place, this cowboy still managed to make a quiet place for himself to spend a few minutes in the Bible to put God first before getting his mind on the business of competing.
by admin | Sep 28, 2023 | Behind the Bucking Chutes
By Scott HIlgendorff / Cowboys of the Cross
We have a conservative and even Christian culture right now that is turning hard against anything that can be described with the term “woke.”
The obvious ones are the cultural topics around women’s issues that blur into issues about transgender rights that blur into issues about toxic masculinity. Movies and television shows seem to endlessly work these kinds of issues into their storylines while corporations work to champion various causes.
As they do this, boycotts are encouraged and a tactic is used that once seemed to largely only come from ‘the left’–cancellation. Cancel culture is becoming more widely used.
We have to be so careful that as woke agendas spread and efforts to push back against them grow, that somehow we don’t start canceling what Jesus teaches us that sometimes seems to go against our conservative values.
Anything from the pulpit that pushes us to support the poor can begin to sound like it follows a liberal view. Anything that pushes us to be kind to those who are different from us, even if they are trampling on our political freedoms, can begin to sound like it follows a liberal view. For the cowboy crowd, where strength, courage, toughness and independence are encouraged, anything that sounds like it pushes behavior we think of as weak, can lead us to want to rebel and push back.
2 Corinthians 12:9-10 But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
In a culture pushing back against what we consider ‘woke’, Paul admitting to his weakness begins to sound woke as well.
It’s easy to rebel against the idea of being content with weakness and taking insults. It’s easy to miss just who Paul is and what he is really telling us.
Paul turned his life around from being a persecutor of Christians to a someone who converted others to Christianity. Strength. He was shipwrecked and imprisoned awaiting death, yet continued to preach love and forgiveness. Strength.
Boasting in weakness? Strength!
Why?
Because it shows the world around us that when we are weak, and we all suffer times when we can’t handle a difficult circumstance, God’s grace toward us and His power to get us through that situation are made clear to others, giving them a chance to find a saving faith in Jesus. For us to be made strong by God, we first have to experience being weak.
In the months ahead, the worst thing we could do to our salvation and others’ is to start rejecting some of the teachings of Jesus because we don’t like it when he tells us to turn the other cheek or be kind to the person that hurt us.
It’s good for Christians to fight for their rights in freedoms, whatever country they are from. It’s best to do it while putting Jesus first.
Hebrews 13:8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever.
by admin | Jul 20, 2023 | Behind the Bucking Chutes
By Scott Hilgendorff / Cowboys of the Cross
Your plan might be to make it to the NFR or PBR finals. It might be to double the size of your herd. But God’s plan might be different. Guess which one is guaranteed to work out?
If you could do anything you wanted to do without having to worry about success or failure, how hard it will be to accomplish or what it could cost you to do it, most of us would jump at it, especially knowing the path to success was cleared ahead of us.
Sure, it could still be a lot of hard work but when it’s something we want to do, we are glad to put the work in. And while the path all the way to the end might not be clear, when we know there is a path to success already cleared ahead for us, then there’s really nothing to hold us back from getting started.
When we are doing what God wants us to do, that’s exactly what happens.
Ephesians 2:10 For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
God has something prepared for you to do.
We can easily forget there’s a difference between our desires and God’s desires for us. We have to learn to think differently.
Romans 12:2 Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.
Our culture, the ‘world’ the verse in Romans is referring to, tells us how to measure success. In rodeo, it can be making it to the PBR finals or NFR. Locally, it can be seeing your client base as a farrier double or enough horses sold to build that bigger barn you need. It can be raising three kids that turn out to be good citizens.
What if that isn’t God’s will for you?
Paul is telling us we need to shift our thinking toward what God’s direction would be.
When we are trying to figure out what the right thing to do is, if we are being transformed as Paul mentions in Romans, then we know it will line up with scripture and that’s a good way for us to test and know if we’re doing God’s will versus following our own desire.
It could still be winning that rodeo on the weekend or qualifying for the NFR or it could be seeing your horse farm double in size. But if it is those kinds of successes, there will most definitely be opportunities through those to glorify God and point others to Jesus. It will never be just about ourselves.
And if we struggle on whatever path God has placed us on, how we struggle will glorify God. It will glorify Him if we learn from it and grow more Christlike and it will glorify Him if others see us approaching a challenge while remaining joyful.
Jesus has some encouraging words in John.
John 15:5 I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.
When we are following Jesus and his direction, there’s no reason we won’t find success. What we succeed at is determined by God and He we will get us there.
by admin | Mar 23, 2023 | Behind the Bucking Chutes
By Josh McCarthy / Cowboys of the Cross
“[March] is a busy time of year. Feedlots are full, calving is starting, and the lambing crew is still getting
the jugs ready. Cowboys are still wearing their winter long johns and five-buckle overshoes. It’s too soon
to take the mud and snows off the pickup. The days are getting longer, but nobody knows why. The
horses still have their hairy side out. It’s usually the last month you can stick a tractor up to the axle.
What most people do in March, is look forward to April.” – Baxter Black
If you’re in ranching, it’s the time of year that Baxter Black would call the month of mud. It’s when you
can get the first signs of warmer spring weather that can quickly change to a whiteout snow storm
that’ll take a week to dry out only to do it again. That kind of weather means a lot of mud and usually
doctoring sick calves in the process. One thing I was reminded of tromping through the feedlots the
other day was verses in Hebrews 12.
Hebrews 12:1 “Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every
weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,”
Especially the part about weight and sin clinging closely, it reminded me of the mud. Mud sticks to
everything; it’ll suck your boots right off your feet and makes it impossible for man or beast to move
around. It weighs you down and I don’t know anyone in their right mind that would say this time of year
that what we really need is just a little more mud around this place. We know that’s crazy but if you
think about it, that’s how we treat our sin.
When we give into our temptations, that promise fleeting pleasure. It’s like finding that biggest mud hole on the ranch and diving head first into it and loving it instead of what is actually good or helpful for us.
When we desire sin, we don’t see it for the mud hole it is. We believe the lie and see it as the best thing
since sliced bread.
This diving into the mud isn’t just something that happens before we become Christians. This is a struggle
for believers as well. Hebrews is addressing Christians when it says “lay aside every weight, and sin that
clings so closely,” And I’ll be honest, I struggle with this just like anybody else. As I write, I’m reminded of
my sin that clings so closely but praise God, we have a mighty Savior in Jesus Christ that doesn’t leave us
in the mud.
Psalm 40:2 says “He lifted me out of the slimy pit, out of the mud and mire; he set my feet on a rock and gave me a
firm place to stand.”
If we are Christians, then Christ saved us from our past, present and future sins. He has given us the
foundation of faith in Christ and the Gospel. He has extended grace to us and loves us enough to not
leave us in the mud of our sin even on days when we want to nose dive right into it.
Hebrews 12:2-3 “2Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before Him
endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. 3Consider
Him who endured such hostility from sinners, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart.”
by admin | Mar 9, 2023 | Behind the Bucking Chutes
By Josh McCarthy / Cowboys of the Cross
It’s calving time where I am and we’re just starting what cowboy poet, Baxter Black called the month of Mud so for anyone in the cattle business that means long days, short nights and plenty of time in five buckle overshoes. It really helps if a new calf will just jump up and start sucking, getting that colostrum and milk he needs to survive. The example of a new born calf is similar to that of a Christian . 1Peter 2 tells us, “2Like newborn infants, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up into salvation”
The pure spiritual milk is the Bible as Christians we are to desire reading God’s word and applying it to our lives. Much the same way a new born calf needs milk or it will die, a Christian not reading his Bible regularly will be starved spiritually. I’ve had calves that’ll jump right up after birth and get all excited and root around every part of that cow but never latch on. if they don’t get help, they’ll end up like the seeds on rocky soil in Matthew 13 “5 Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. 6 But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root.”
We need the root of God’s word. Sometimes a person will go to a church service or some type of
meeting, get all emotional and decide to “give their life to Jesus.” They might pray a prayer and feel really good for a few days but they’re like that calf that jumps up but doesn’t latch on, the moment is done, it’s back to normal life and they fade and become spiritually starved. I’ve seen it where for some reason a calf isn’t sucking, you’ll come up on him and the cow will have a big ol tight bag and the calf can barely move, if you don’t get busy quick that calf will die. The same thing will happen to Christians we just talked about–he gets all excited at the meeting but then never reads his Bible or gets involved in a local church. He will starve spiritually which is why the Bible is so important.
2 Timothy 3:16-17 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.
Psalm 119:105 Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path.
James 1:22 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.
These passages show us the importance of the Bible and hearing it preached at a local church on
Sundays. so I would encourage all of you to take it seriously, study it regularly, and take it in and apply it to your daily lives so you won’t spiritually starve.
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