Having age appropriate Bibles that children enjoy also helps. When kids can understand what they read, they are more likely to open God’s Word and spend time in it. I know for me, just having a Bible I liked to look at, was a big part of getting into it.

This morning I was reading Psalm 95 and was reminded,
 “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts.”

Today matters. Every day brings new chances to listen to God and follow His truth. As families walk together in Scripture, God uses that time to grow faith, shape hearts, and build a strong foundation that lasts.

And you can’t hear His voice, if you don’t read His Word. 

Lead Pastor, Jonathan Parnell kept composure. He confronted Don Lemon, calling the protest “unacceptable” and “shameful”, saying it was wrong to interrupt a Christian worship service. He asked them to leave. He kept emphasizing that the church was having a worship service.

Of course it was wrong to interrupt the service. It’s inappropriate to do. I completely disagree with how this ‘protest’ was started by those on the left. They are blinded by their hardened hearts and celebrate unrighteousness. These ones who claim to be Christ followers, if they truly are, have lost the Gospel. They have replaced a Biblical and Christian Worldview for discord and deception.

Cities Church looks to be a sweet community that is well led by faithful men. As a Children’s Pastor, one of the first places I often go when checking out a church online is their info about their kid’s ministry. At Cities’ it looks like they invite children into the service with their parents. Check this out:

At Cities Church, we believe that our fundamental calling as parents is to
be the smile of God to our children. We are charged by God to bring our
children up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord (Ephesians 6:4).
God has designed us as parents to show our children what he is like. And
God is fundamentally a Happy Father—a Well-Pleased Parent. Therefore,
we want the pitch of fatherhood and the melody line of motherhood to be
Delight, Pleasure, Joy. We want our children to experience our delight in
God as it overflows in our delight in them. We want to receive the gospel,
display the gospel, and invite our children into the gospel.

This is so sound. My prayers go out to these families who had to experience this yesterday. Seeing children, obviously scared in the videos of the protestors makes me angry. It encourages me, though, to see those standing on the truth in the face of lies and hate.

And that’s the problem we come to. The other side of this believes THEY have righteous anger. They believe that they are standing for good. I know Christians on both side of this issue. Christians can disagree strongly about justice and policy. But Scripture is very clear about how we treat Christ’s church, how we speak about fellow believers, and how we conduct ourselves in worship. I would not want to be the one who tries to disrupt the Body of Christ.

Not wanting to take Scripture out of context… but this is a wise warning:

Guard your steps when you go to the house of God. To draw near to listen is better than to offer the sacrifice of fools, for they do not know that they are doing evil. ²  Be not rash with your mouth, nor let your heart be hasty to utter a word before God, for God is in heaven and you are on earth. Therefore let your words be few. ³ For a dream comes with much business, and a fool’s voice with many words.

 The Holy Bible: English Standard Version (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2025), Ec 5:1–3.

What would I do in a situation like this? I hope that I would be like Jonathan Parnell and be calm and speak truth.

People get ready.

When I go to preview the email, and send a test to myself, it is there. But I just can’t edit it.

So I decide to see if I can pull the email up in chrome inspector and maybe I can copy/paste it from the ‘preview’ window to the ‘editor’ window. I see that each paragraph is collapsed behind a <p> tag so that’s going to be a lot more difficult and take time that I really don’t care about for making a one word edit.

Note: if you’re somehow reading this, and you also happened to GET my email blast… I recognize that “last night” was not our AWANA night. Today is Saturday. I wrote the email copy on Thursday… therefore my jump in the space time continuum.

BUT

I was pleasantly surprised when opening the editor software up in Inspector mode that some developer left an easter egg in the source code. Just a tiny comment above the header tags of the site. This:

Nice. Just a fun Creed left in the backend of the code.

Good Job ROCK developer Team

δόξα τῷ Θεῷ 

To God Be The Glory

Summary and Review

Freed to Lead is the story told by F3’s co-founders of how F3 Nation was created, even before they knew what they were creating. It talks of lessons learned along the way, and how the 5 core principals and mission statement was created. It talks of the answer and solution to a question they did not originally know. They stumbled into a solution to a problem described as “Sad Clown Syndrome.” This edition is the second edition which also includes several PAX essays from men around the nation.

Key Points:

1. F3 Was Born Out of a Shared Recognition That Something Was Missing

The founders didn’t start with a clear plan… they started with an honest realization. Modern men, despite comfort and success, were still lacking purpose, connection, and meaning. F3 emerged as an unintentional solution to Sad Clown Syndrome, meeting a deep, unspoken need through shared hardship, authentic relationships, and purposeful leadership.

• Leadership Is Learned, Shared, and Strengthened Through Feedback and Fellowship

F3 redefines leadership as something men grow into, not something reserved for the qualified or confident. Men are encouraged to step forward, learn as they go, receive immediate feedback, and be supported rather than sidelined. True leadership development happens in community, where men come alongside one another and refuse to leave anyone behind.

• Fitness, Fellowship, and Faith Work Together to Restore Purpose in Men

The Three Fs are not standalone ideas but a progression. Physical fitness draws men in, fellowship binds them together, and faith (or purpose beyond self) sends them outward. When these are balanced, men move from self-focus to service, from isolation to brotherhood, and from inertia to meaningful action.

• Men Are Meant to Be Deployed for Purpose, Not Parked in Comfort

At its core, F3 exists to reinvigorate male leadership in the community. Men are not meant to sit idle like unused bowling balls. They are designed for impact. By helping each man discover his unique mission (D2X) and encouraging initiative (I2), F3 pushes men to apply their gifts toward solving real problems, together, for the good of others.

Key Quotes:

Chapter 1 – The explanation

• What we knew, what we felt, was that something was wrong in the lives as men. Despite all the great things we had, we were still missing something…. Even without being able to describe this missing thing, we discovered that F3 somehow provided it. (Pg 2)
• They came alongside me, sustaining my fragile soul… reliance upon other men outplayed thinking that I could do it all alone. (Pg 7)
• “Morale Calls” A simple one-degree change in my day that led to a significant change in his. (Pg 8)
• “Unmasking” Rather than surface level relationships, I was moved to lead through deeper, stronger relationships. (Pg 9)

Chapter 2 – Why we are here

• Core Principles ! … The Q is free to design and run the workout as he sees fit. The Q gets feedback from the PAX about whether his leadership is any good. Feedback is generally immediate, abundang, and forthcoming, whether the Q wants it or not. (Pg 10)
• The Power of each F – A man stops thinking primarily about himself. He transitions from Survivor to Servant. (Pg 14)
• Hospitality leadership attempts to speak as many languages as possible… hospitality says don’t be late. (Pg 19-22)

Chapter 3 – Why are we here

• Improvising to CAPTURE opportunities… scrambling to build a road fourty-three feet in front of the men driving on it. (Pg 24)
• It’s a funny feeling when you feel totally unqualified to take a leadership role, but you suck it up and figure you’ll learn as you go (pg 27)
• We don’t look at the less-skilled leader and leave him behind. No, we come up beside him and encourage him to step forward and learn the skills to lead. (Pg 29)

Chapter 4 – Half the Mission

• Erode the Fellowship and the PAX will come unstuck from the workout… Bigger is better, but only to a point. Past that point, bigger is worse.  (pg 31)
• People and organizations (including us) are not actually very good at identifying problems… solving problems is different from identifying problems… Faulty problem identification leads to misallocated resources. (pg 37)
• “For me, ‘leave no man behind’ has always started with the men who have already been left behind.” (pg 44)

Chapter 5 – A Good place to stop

• F3 is about Fitness, not exercise (Pg 46)
• “I had lost how to love my neighbor. F3 taught me anew” (pg 50)

Chapter 6 – Sad Clown Syndrome

• Like a lot of guys we know, Tony lived a compartmentalized life… Tony managed to stay out of prison, but to what end? His life was a prison. (Pg 54-55)
• “I am more impressed by an FNGs first post that the OG’s 300^th” (Pg 60)

Chapter 7 – Bowling Ball Grip

• What our culture calls a mid-life crisis is actually a Sad Clown’s effort to self-prescribe a remedy for his joyless inertia. (Pg 62)
• A bowling ball is made for impact, but unless its holes are filled and it is hurled into action, it will only sit and gather dust.  (Pg 63)

Chapter 8 – POGO 40, the Sifter, and the Reacher

• Pogo 40 is about a man’s physical fitness, or rather, his inconsistent physical fitness (Pg 69)
• Emotional isolation suffered by a man without deep bonds of fellowship with other men… men don’t know how to make friends…Deep fellowship is what a man needs when his Sifter begins shaking. (Pg74-76)
• It should be no surprise that when men rely so heavily on their Legacy Buddies. Unfortunately, their lack of proximity makes them the first guys out of the sifter when the shaking starts. (Pg 77)
• The legacy buddy, the man date, and the work buddy. None of these relationships is built to last or to withstand the inevitable shaking a man’s life will take from time to time. (Pg 79)
• We believe the need Reacher fills is the lack of purpose in the life of modern man. (Pg 81)
• Whereas the antihero is all purpose and no restraint, the Sad Clown has more restraints than Gulliver strapped down on a beach, but no purpose. (Pg 84)
• We are born to protect and to love. We are born to stay and fight. None of us wants to life like Jack Reacher. We just want the lives we’re living to mean something. To have purpose. (Pg 84)
• Only by abandoning himself can he hope to re-attain this real sense of purpose. To do this, he must have faith in something he cannot see. (Pg 84)

Chapter 9 – The Full Mission

• If Sad Clown Syndrom was the problem of individual man, the collective problem in the community of Sad Clowns was the lack of male leadership… it is not possible to follow an inert Sad Clown because he isn’t going anywhere… F3’s end-state purpose: the reinvigoration of male leadership within the community (Pg 91)

Chapter 10 – Magnetism of the First F

• If he is gaining today on the guys who were faster than him yesterday, he is making progress. Simple (Pg97)
• The point is to get the PAX to post.(Pg 103)
• For a workout to be successful, the Q has to challenge both the SugarRays (Light, Fast guys) and the Clydesdales (big, slow guys) without driving off the FNGs and the MerlotSplasher. (Pg 103)
• The key to the Starfish structure was for the leaders in the center to stay small and push the power, resources, and authority out to the leaders in the appendages (Pg 107)
• Individual Initative (“I2) was our Q System’s critical element… First a leader must teach what he knows…second a leader must make clear the mission… third, a leader has to reward I2 wherever and whenever he sees it, and take responsibility for any adverse outcomes that may result. (Pg 109-110)
• Make it Hard and They Will Come. If it’s Hard, it’s play. If it’s easy, it’s work. (Pg 114)
• Sad clown looks like unfortunately but what would a modern day warrior look like as he goes about the business of finding hard things we think he would look like the way any man would look while stalking through his community with mean mean stride, yelling at the top of his lungs and refusing to wear a safety helmet while he does it. (Pg 115)
• An important part of every practical exercise is the critique. (Pg 118)
• We believe that confidence and competence are leadership building blocks, which is at the heart of F3’s purpose. (Pg 121)

Chapter 11 – The Glue of the Second F

• A stronger and more stubborn his friendships are, the less likely they are to fall through the bottom of the sifter. (Pg 130
• Diminishing Returns to Fellowship (DRTF) erodes The Glue, so it has to be battled. (Pg 131)

Chapter 12 – The Dynamite of the Third F

• Fit and friended men turn outward. They become driven. They look for like-minded men with whom they can lock shields for righteous purposes. (Pg 146)
• The Reverse-Flow Incubator… The PAX had not only stopped bothering to pitch the projects beforehand, they had become only marginally interested in telling us about them after they were completed. (Pg 153)
• Instead of pushing service opportunities down we believe an organization should help its members follow their hearts mainly by getting out of the way. (Pg 154)
• “An important role of a father is to give a son a sense of permission – a sense of what might be done.” – George W.S. Trow (Pg 154)
• D2X – Just as we wrote F3’s mission to keep ourselves focused on solving the problem we believe a man must define his own personal mission to direct and protect his efforts. (Pg 157)
• Every man has something he does as well as the dolphin swims… For some reason, in our culture, it is not unique gifts that are celebrated, it is well-roundedness -the opposite. (Pg 159)
• Carnegie had 3 techniques in handling people, and the second one was to “give honest and sincere appreciation.” A leader is supposed to he “hearty in approbation and lavish in praise.” Especially to those who need it most. (Pg 161)
• Every man has a daffodil of his own… When Dredd applied his Dolphin to his Daffodil, he found his impact was dynamic and virtually effortless… D2X (Pg 163-165)
• This is in fact the point of the Reverse Flow Incubator. Instead F3 encourages each man to discover his own Life Problem and devise a solution for it. In other words, each man works out his own purpose… Once he has his Mission, he can find other men with a similar purpose in F3. Together they conspire for its accomplishment. (Pg 166)

Conclusion – Fight to the Finish

• While the weapons have changed the warrior heart has not. We still fight together, behind the shield wall, or we are overcome. Break the wall and you break the man. (Pg 186)

This has meant… no Regular Coke. No Mountain Dew. No sweetener/creamer in coffee. No sweet tea. No gummy bears. No dark chocolate. No Crumbl. None of the stuff that is normally (and still is) all around. I just haven’t.

There are moments… usually in the afternoon, when I want something sweet. That pushed me to do something I never do. Eat fruit. I’ve been filling that sweet need with grapes and apples, usually rotating them every other day so I don’t grow tired of them. The snacking habit is stillthere, but the craving isn’t nearly as loud. I haven’t felt bloated. The aches I’d come to accept as normal aren’t showing up the same way.

If I had to speculate, I’d say my energy feels steadier because I’m not riding the spikes and crashes I didn’t know I was on. My digestion feels calmer. My joints feel quieter. Even my posture feels better, like my body isn’t carrying as much inflammation or tension. It’s subtle, but consistent… less stiffness when I stand up, more ease when I move.

Fourteen days in, this doesn’t feel like I’m depriving myself of anything, but it feels like the right spot for right now. I had made a goal for 1 month. We’ll see if I continue longer.

That’s what HaHa said during the start of COT afterwards. If my memory serves me, today was my 5th Widowmaker on New Years Day. The F3 Alpha guys have a gem of an AO in Webb Bridge Park. And yes, the names have been bantered back and forth. Some are calling it Black Widow now, and others Widowmaker. I get the reasons why. I get it.

But, the hill is really bad.

And yet, I am drawn back to it. I am working on my running and endurance, but breathing is frankly the worst part of the up and down.

The beatdown consists of a set of exercises at the bottom (26 for the year) and then run (walk for me for most of it) up to the top and then back down. Both trips up and down, there is a 5 Merkin (Pushup) tax to be paid at the midpoint manhole cover.

I completed 11 trips. Slow and steady. I think someone said they finished 14. That’s amazing.

I see F3 Gwinnett guys like Pigskin out there with a bum shoulder… modifying, yet killing it. Commander and Chopsticks seemed to enjoy it. Precious is a beast and looks ready to join the Alpha Blue Ridge Relay team tomorrow.

Acceleration is measured in more than 1 way. HaHa challenged us to take the new year as an opportunity to change. Disruption is the first Q source Point. Nothing Changes if Nothing Changes.

Add one brick to the wall for the year.
Now to do my 100 Burpees for MABA. Slow and Steady.

I did not read as many books in 2025 as I did the previous year. I started out the year trying to finish seminary, which I did, but the classes involved a lot of LONGER books which ate up a lot of my mental bandwidth and free time.

There were a lot of books about Reagan, and several world leaders as I took a class with Al Mohler on how Biblical Worldview shapes leadership. Maybe I should post my final paper from that class where I wrote about the Strategic Defense Initiative and how Reagan led through that time period.

In no particular order, here’s the list of some of the notables

• The Bible (Just 1 time this past year)
• Spurgeon on Resting in the Promises of God — Charles H. Spurgeon (compiled by Jason K. Allen)
• Christ-Centered Preaching — Bryan Chapell
• Spurgeon on the Power of Scripture — Charles H. Spurgeon
• Spurgeon: A New Biography — Arnold Dallimore
• The Culture Map — Erin Meyer
• Mistakes Leaders Make — Dave Kraft
• The Work of the Pastor — William Still
• Leadership in War — Andrew Roberts
• The Conviction to Lead — R. Albert Mohler Jr.
• A Manual for Preaching — Abraham Kuruvilla
• Reformed Preaching — Joel Beeke
• The Preacher’s Catechism — Lewis Allen
  The Work of the Pastor – William Still
• Ezra & Nehemiah — Derek Kidner
• Nehemiah — T. L. Betts
• Tozer for the Christian Leader — A. W. Tozer (compiled by David Gibbs)
• Lead Like It Matters — Craig Groeschel
• The British Are Coming — Rick Atkinson
• The Beirut Protocol — Joel C. Rosenberg
• American Lion — Jon Meacham
• Destiny and Power — H. W. Brands
• The Last Kingdom — Steve Berry
• The Libyan Diversion — Joel C. Rosenberg
• Atlas Maneuver — Steve Berry
• The Wright Brothers — David McCullough
• The Pioneers — David McCullough
• From the Earth to the Moon — Jules Verne
• Raising Gender-Confident Kids — Dr. Jeff Myers and Kathy Koch
• Edge of Honor — Brad Thor
• One Word That Will Change Your Life — Jon Gordon, Dan Britton, Jimmy Page
• Handbook to Leadership — Ken Blanchard et al.
• Dead Sea Squirrels (multiple volumes) — Mike Nawrocki

I missed a few in there. I missed some on my Good Reads account too. It is a snapshot of the year.

This year, I have a goal for 80 books. I want to read a few moer Rick Atkinson books. I think I have all three of the WW2 series on slate. Several Theology books. Several more Fiction books on the stack to finish.

What are you reading?

This year I decided to track my F3 beatdowns in a different way… not with an app, a spreadsheet, or a streak counter, but with something physical.

I bought several small/lego sized cinder blocks off Amazon. They’re tiny! But each one is meaningful. After every F3 workout, I write the date and the AO on one block. Then I add it to a growing wall.

Each block represents a single beatdown. One morning. One decision to show up. One deposit of work.

Why a Wall?

Fitness has a way of tricking us into thinking it’s about big moments. Everyone loves to talk about PRs, the milestone, the transformation photo. But in reality, fitness is built quietly. I choose early mornings with my brothers of F3. Choosing Hard. In the Gloom. A wall isn’t built all at once.
You lay one block. Then another. Then another.

Some days are harder than others. But walls don’t care about how impressive a single block looks. They care that the block is laid well and in place.

Deposits, Not Declarations

Each F3 workout is a deposit.

Not a declaration that I’m “fit.”
Not proof that I’ve “arrived.”
Just a contribution.

Fitness isn’t a one-time decision. It’s not something you achieve and move on from. It’s a daily act of trusting that today’s work matters even when you can’t yet see the results. F3 is more about showing up because you know others are there too. The wall reminds me that no single workout carries the load. The strength comes from consistency, not intensity alone. And it’s a collective group that accelerates to create community impact.

A Visible Reminder

There’s something powerful about seeing the work.

When motivation dips, the wall is there.
When progress feels slow, the wall is there.
When I’m tempted to skip, the wall asks a simple question:
Will you lay another block today?

Every date written is a memory of effort. Every AO is a reminder that this work is done in community… not alone.

This year, I’m not chasing perfection. I’m building a wall.

One beatdown.
One block.
One day at a time.

The Genesis Flood by Whitcomb and Morris was a challenging read, particularly in its technical discussions. I definitely admit that I am not qualified to evaluate every hydraulic or geological claim they make. Still, despite its difficulty, the book presents its arguments in a way that allows even non-sciency types like me to grasp significant portions of the case being made.

It is an exhaustive treatment of the Flood question and, rather than claiming to have answered every objection, it points toward areas where further research could strengthen and refine the argument.

While I did not understand everything perfectly, I came away with a clearer grasp of the central ideas and a deeper appreciation for the scope of the discussion. Ultimately, the book reinforced my long held young earth convictions. I believe a real catastrophe occurred in earth’s past, and given the limits of direct observation, the Biblical record provides the most coherent and compelling explanation of that event.

Important to point out that God is offensive to sinful man. There are presumptions and presuppositions baked into Evolution and Millions of years. All the prominient founders of the modern theories of evolution were opponents of the entire Biblical view of the world and of man (Page 442).

The doctrine of geological uniformitarianism, is a case study of the slippery slope. Christian scientists gave away ground of the sufficiency and authority of Scripture and Lyell and Darwin ran with it. They were, “emancipated from the shackles of Biblical chronology” (Page 97). Within the span of a single generation, geologists had led the Church to change its views on the flood three times (Page 109).

“When one decides to reject the concept of real Creation, there is no scientific stopping-point short of what amounts to atheism” (Page 237).

Particularly, I appreciated the discussion on appearance of age and what accounts as mature creation. Whitcomb and Morris argue that a degree of maturity at creation was necessary for the world to function as God intended. Some believe this would make God one who has deceived or has created ‘lies’ about creation, but they are careful to distinguish this from the idea that God created a false history.

Functional maturity implies usefulness and completeness, not deception. At the same time, they do not rely on mature creation to explain most geological features. They attribute the bulk of earth’s apparent age to the historical catastrophe of the Flood. The Flood as a global/total catastrophe is SO IMPORTANT in the current state of the globe.

Overall a great book. One that I can’t believe I didn’t pick up sooner as we were a homeschool family. May have to make another trip to the Ark and Creation Museum soon. That would make a great family trip with several from our church. It’d be fun to see it through the eyes of our kids.

Now for the bad news… I read the 50th anniversary edition which was published in 2011 ~490 pages with the two appendices. I have sense realized there is a new book published by Answers in Genesis titled The Genesis Flood Revisited. Amazon has it’s print length at 670 pages. Whew. Not sure my brain will allow for the “Revisit” in 2026. I am working on a list of books that I want to read. We’ll see.