Some Plant, Some Water, Some Harvest: Kingdom Work in the Ohio Woods

For a number of years now, I have been leaving North Carolina in late summer for a weekend trip to Ohio. My visit is work-related, but it's Kingdom work. I am a pro-staffer for Ironman Outdoors. We do hunting retreats for men around the country with the purpose of connecting men to Christ through the outdoors. As summer starts to wind down, we start preparing for the fall hunting retreats with work weekends. Today as I'm writing this, I have just returned from a work weekend trip where I have spent a few days in the woods and fields of Ohio. My body and my back are sore but my Spirit and my mind are refreshed.

Hard work does a body good. And this work is a fantastic diversion from my normal job which is mostly done at a desk. You seldom get views like those seen in the pics below from a desk. There was a pack of men that descended on Ohio this weekend along with me to prepare for our guests next month. We tilled and planted food crops, built and moved stands, and assembled new stands. The work started as the sun came up and ended when the sun went down making for long days in the summer sun. 

The company of men surrounding you on work weekends like this makes the work seem like play. These are the kind of men that make you a better man. They are the type of men you hope your daughter marries someday. The type of men you pray your sons grows into. God-fearing men. Men with strong convictions. Men who follow hard after Jesus. Normal, unassuming men. "Others-minded" men. Engineers and salesmen. Factory workers and career soldiers. Men who know how to run tractors and equipment and know what it takes to make a crop grow. All of them Kingdom minded and working hard for the Kingdom in their respective fields. Not one of them perfect and willing to tell you so.

The transparency of the men who make up the ranks of Ironman Outdoors staffers might be shocking in some church cultures. It is part of what makes the ministry unique. All of our hunting retreats end each night with a manhood discussion. It is not a Sunday school lesson or a sermon. It's an authentic conversation about what it means to live as a godly father and a godly husband and how we strive, though imperfectly, to do both. 

As we sat around the table eating together on our last night in Ohio, a manhood discussion of sorts was taking place. A grandfather was talking about the trouble his sixteen-year-old grandson was constantly getting into. He was praying for him continually and trying to mentor him, but not seeing much change. A new fellow who came with a pro-staffer from South Carolina was telling the group about the forgiveness God gave him for his wife. He said it healed their marriage. We talked about obedience and what it means to be a true disciple of Christ. Still, others spoke about the challenges of their work and home lives.

In the coming months, as we circle up retreat guests in the living room after dinner, I have no doubt many of these stories will be told again. It's part of what we call "taking off our camo." All of us struggle with similar things and hurt in similar ways but pretend like we don't. We wear "camo" in hopes people won't see the real us. Taking off our camo means leading with vulnerability in the manhood discussions. It means sharing our own struggles and brokenness while pointing to the Savior who overcomes it all. All the while leaning on the Holy Spirit to do the work only he can do. We just plant the seeds.

Our job as pro-staffers, much like our job as disciples, is to just show up and do the work. Then when the work is done, we pray over the fields and we pray over the stands. We pray that God moves in powerful ways through the manhood discussions. And then we depend on God for the increase. 

I Corinthians 3:7-8

It’s not important who does the planting, or who does the watering. What’s important is that God makes the seed grow. The one who plants and the one who waters work together with the same purpose. And both will be rewarded for their own hard work.