Rise, Respond and Refuel

Journal 2005 05 27
Rise, Respond and Refuel

High winds keep the men in camp until 10:00am. Their usual pattern is to rise, break camp, travel until about 8:00am then stop for breakfast. A pattern that seems timeless to military men throughout the ages.

Their camp tonight will be in a location with just enough deadwood for a meager campfire. Two lone cottonwoods, dead at the top, provide fuel for the elk they killed earlier in the day. Only two elk were seen.

The landscape is changing as the men enter the area we know as the Missouri Breaks. This area is still undeveloped much as it was two hundred years ago. The river channel is about two hundred yards wide and the water is shallower, faster and harder to navigate because of all the rocks that have fallen off the steep banks into the river.

Lewis and Clark speculate that a low mountain range in the distance must hold the headwaters of the Missouri. They allow themselves to be excited at the prospect of reaching that destination so quickly and with relative ease. They will discover soon enough how overly optimistic their observations were.

Regarding the pattern mentioned earlier about rising early, breaking camp and eating breakfast later. Military discipline is known for PT, or calisthenics, as the first activity of the day. Roll out of the sack and get in formation for PT. Then breakfast and whatever else the day hold follows.

This pattern goes back to King David. He set the pattern in seeking the Lord before anything else each morning. Many examples of an hour of prayer exist and we are told that the record of the Old Testament is to be a pattern for us.

Those of us who have not been in a military unit have not experienced this discipline. Many Christians have developed this pattern out of discipleship, study and need.

If you struggle with an hour of prayer and physical discipline, today’s message is a reminder and example that God’s pattern for our lives is universally applicable to all men in all situations.

Rise, respond and then refuel.

I know I need to reschedule my life. An hour for prayer and an hour for exercise and clean-up requires a different schedule than the one I currently practice.

Do I want to do things my (haphazard) way or do I want to follow the pattern of those who God and history set for me to follow?