I trusted the Lord at my mother's breast, but forsook him mightily most of my life. More on that later.
My Christian wheelchair ride is just fine these days, thank you very much.
They helped ignite a deep sense of trust in God. I do insist that Jean Calvin was brilliant. I know as a Lutheran I'm not supposed to say that out loud. Promise not to tell any of my elders?
Seriously-any time I run across some uppity Reformed type, I just remind myself: We got Bach. 'Nuff said.
I have quiet times, as well as noisy ones.
I read the bible a lot. More favorite theological books are listed below.
Jacob. Who else could have inspired the Lord to name him "the guy who fights with me?" What a riot!
I am not content. Passion is great, but burning with it isn't so great. If God intends for me to learn to be content, he'll teach me, I have no doubt. I admire the desert fathers and the monastics, but I'm not one of them.
Affectionate
Earnest
Satirical, wry sense of humor
Loyal
The reconciling faithfulness of the LORD, and how it manifests itself in all creation, especially those creatures made in his image.
My little boy
My vocation
Friends who pray for me
I enjoy humility, peaceableness, adventuresomeness, and joy in others.
I see absurdity and comedy everywhere, especially in human foolishness. I can be outgoing and bold when the occasion demands. I can be lazy and undisciplined sometimes. I'm not full of suspicion about everything and I don't overanalyze. I extend the benefit of the doubt and forgive at the drop of a hat. I can be slow to take a hint. I have spiritual gifts of encouragement, discernment, and giving. I can be pedantic sometimes. Troubled people gravitate toward me to share their problems. I am a reconciler. Injustice angers me, but beauty thrills me.
My favorite Christians are my godly aunt, Ione, and my former mother in law, because they probably pray for me more than any other people on earth.
I believed and was baptized as a child, but by the time of my marriage in 1998 I was a nominal Christian, too dim to discern that my wife did not believe. God convicted me after our son arrived in 2002, and I repented and returned to the church. I tried not to offend her unduly, and make her feel welcome to go worship with me, but she hardened against me. As I was reading bible stories to our little boy one night, she screamed at me for "brainwashing" him and asked me for a divorce. This was aggravated by an emotional affair she was having with another unbeliever. I tried my best to reconcile with her, but she divorced me in November 2005, and married the other man in May 2007. I grieve my own failures against her and pray she will repent and believe someday. I strive to be gracious to her so that the Lord may yet use me to save her. My relationship with her is outwardly cordial and there is no "drama". Only after her remarriage, and after struggling with prayer, scripture, and godly elderly counsel, I am content it is not only permissible for me to remarry now, but is honorable and desirable.
And God spoke all these words, saying,
I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
You shall have no other gods before me.
You shall not make for yourself a carved image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth. You shall not bow down to them or serve them, for I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing steadfast love to thousands of those who love me and keep my commandments.
You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who takes his name in vain.
Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, and do all your work, but the seventh day is a Sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, you, or your son, or your daughter, your male servant, or your female servant, or your livestock, or the sojourner who is within your gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day. Therefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and made it holy.
Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land that the Lord your God is giving you.
You shall not murder.
You shall not commit adultery.
You shall not steal.
You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.
You shall not covet your neighbor's house; you shall not covet your neighbor's wife, or his male servant, or his female servant, or his ox, or his donkey, or anything that is your neighbor's.
Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.
Where shall I go from your Spirit?
Or where shall I flee from your presence?
If I ascend to heaven, you are there!
If I make my bed in Sheol, you are there!
If I take the wings of the morning
and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea,
even there your hand shall lead me,
and your right hand shall hold me.
If I say, “Surely the darkness shall cover me,
and the light about me be night,”
even the darkness is not dark to you;
the night is bright as the day,
for darkness is as light with you.
Not many of you should become teachers, my brothers, for you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness.
Do not speak evil against one another, brothers. The one who speaks against a brother or judges his brother, speaks evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge.
If anyone says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.
Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor.
We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death.
Bible Trivia Time!
Complete the following Christly utterance:
By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you
(a) are a guide to the blind.
(b) approve what is excellent.
(c) search the Scriptures for your eternal life.
(d) have love for one another.
I have little doubt that when St. George had killed the dragon he was heartily afraid of the princess. -Gilbert K. Chesterton
A happy couple: he joying in her, she joying in herself, but in herself, because she enjoyed him: both increasing their riches by giving to each other; each making one life double, because they made a double life one; where desire never wanted satisfaction, nor satisfaction ever bred satiety: he ruling, because she would obey, or rather because she would obey, she therein ruling. -Sir Philip Sidney, Arcadia (1593)
Relying on God has to begin all over again every day as if nothing had yet been done... -C.S. Lewis
If there were no hell, we would be like the animals. No hell, no dignity. -Flannery O’Connor
Christian: One who thinks the New Testament is a divinely inspired book admirably suited to the spiritual needs of his neighbor. -Ambrose Bierce
All men who are eminently useful, are made to feel their weakness in a supreme degree. -C.H. Spurgeon
Trouble shared is trouble halved. -Dorothy Sayers
Repentance is not an emotion. It is not feeling sorry for your sins. It is a decision. -Eugene Peterson
What the bible says about the church is actually considerably harder for a lot of people to believe than what the bible says about God. -Tim Keller
We want a God without wrath who took man without sin into a kingdom without justice through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross. -Reinhold Niebuhr
Jesus came to raise the dead. He did not come to teach the teachable; He did not come to improve the improvable; He did not come to reform the reformable. None of those things works. -Robert Farrar Capon
Christian scholarship is the Church's prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible, to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close . . . We would be sunk if it were not for Christian scholarship! Praise be to everyone who works to consolidate the reputation of Christian scholarship, which helps to restrain the New Testament, this confounded book which would, one, two, three, run us all down if it got loose. -Soren Kierkegaard
The church is the only outfit I know that shoots its wounded. -Chuck Swindoll
The world is such a sad and lonely place. I think that, as soon as every little baby is born, they should be issued a banjo. -Linus van Pelt, to his friend, Charles Brown
Some films I've enjoyed:
Babette's Feast
Blade Runner
Fly Away Home
Ikiru
Key Largo
Lonesome Dove
My Neighbor Totoro rent this for your little kids NOW
Never Cry Wolf
On the Waterfront
Pan's Labyrinth
Persuasion (Jane Austen)
Quo Vadis
Raising Arizona
Tender Mercies
The Miracle Maker
The Painted Veil
The Secret of Roan Inish
The Story of the Weeping Camel
The Straight Story
Touching the Void
Some books I've enjoyed:
A History of Britain by Simon Schama
A Refutation of Moral Relativism: Interviews with an Absolutist by Peter Kreeft
A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson
Beowulf (Seamus Heaney translation)
Bold Love by Dan Allender
Daily Treasury from the Psalms by C.H. Spurgeon
Death on a Friday Afternoon: Meditations on the Last Words of Jesus from the Cross by Richard John Neuhaus
Desiring God by John Piper
East of the Mountains by David Guterson
Everything that Rises Must Converge and other collections by Flannery O'Connor
Fidelity by Douglas Wilson
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
I Kissed Dating Goodbye by Joshua Harris
In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex by Nathaniel Philbrick
Knowing God by J.I. Packer
Longitude by Dava Sobel
My Man Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse
Pecked to Death by Ducks by Tim Cahill
Righteous Sinners by Ron Julian
Rights and Duties: Reflections on Our Conservative Constitution by Russell Kirk
Studies in the Sermon on the Mount by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones
The Discoverers by Daniel Boorstin
The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad by Fareed Zakaria
The Gospel in Dostoevsky by the Bruderhof
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
The Silmarillion by J.R.R. Tolkien
Trilogy by Francis Schaeffer
Two Years Before the Mast by Richard Henry Dana
I'm an Lieutenant in the US Navy reserve, but my service time is fulfilled and I won't ever be deployed. I have been a professional mariner since 1998. I love my vocation. It is honorable and vital. I am at sea for three weeks, and home for three weeks. That has unique challenges, but also unique privileges. If I worked ashore, I'd have 3 weeks of vacation each year. As a mariner, I get 26. It requires getting accustomed to a cyclical kind of lifestyle... kind of a "feast and famine", but if approached in faith it can often be grand. A man can really take a huge load off his wife's shoulders when he's home all day for three weeks. There are many more windows for family travel and adventures than most nine-to-five folks get to enjoy. There will definitely be times of loneliness and frustration, however. It might sound scary, but I have known several very godly and passionate marriages among my seafaring colleagues, with many kids and much contentment. If you are willing to lean upon the church, it's a wonderful lifestyle.
I have degrees in Geography and Maritime Transportation from Texas A&M University and Texas A&M at Galveston. I love learning, but I think I'm done with formal education for a while. A Master's in Nautical Archaeology would be fun, but I have no plans for it. I could have stayed in academia, but I wasn't interested in cranking out more knowledge. We don't even use half the knowledge we've got. Walk into a college library and there will be tons of research books that nobody's opened since 1964. That's not to say I don't appreciate a good scholar.
I want to nurture my son's faith more, that he may thrive even in a divorce with an unbelieving mother. I'd like to be a deacon in the church someday, if I can be worthy. I want to advance to the level of ship's captain. I want to nurture a group of Irish set dancers in my neighborhood someday, and grow it into a regular event. After retirement, I'd like to volunteer a few years skippering a Mercy Ship going to needy parts of the world, with my wife alongside to help and enjoy.
Music is a big part of my life. I play Irish traditional music with friends. That's the kind that little old couples dance to in halls all over Ireland. I love history, geography, tall ships, classics, literature, writing, art, cinema, culture, and philosophy. I work out, but not religiously. I'm not a sports nut, but I enjoy being around their passion and learning about the games. I love to write and read. I love camping, backpacking, hiking, and a little mountain biking. I also like sailing and windsurfing, and flailing around on a surfboard. I love country drives to nowhere. At various points in my life, I've run a 10K, played golf rabidly, taken country dancing lessons, flight lessons, and French lessons. I love discovering new things.
I was born in Texas, USA. I have traveled to Greece, the UK, Belgium, Chile, the Galapagos islands, Panama, Costa Rica, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Bermuda, and many major US cities. My ideal adventure is to take a square-rigged chartered cruise around the Aegean sea, with a noted Christian historian as host, to visit ancient church sites in Turkey and the Mediterranean. Some highlights of past travels: stepping on the Areopagus in Athens, where Paul gave his address; excavating the Bronze Age palace of king Nestor, in the pelopennesus, and following the footsteps of characters from Homer's Iliad and Odyssey; snorkeling with blacktip sharks in the Galapagos islands; living in Washington D.C. and writing copy for a National Geographic Atlas of archaeology; steering one of the world's oldest actively sailing square riggers up the Mississippi river; navigating a 75,000 ton oil tanker into the straits of Valdez, Alaska. Home, however, is where your heart is--and where your treasure is, there will your heart be, also. The real adventure is in the human heart.
My vocation by itself imposes zero restrictions on where I live. I could theoretically live in Spain, Ohio, or Mayberry, and my employer would fly me to catch my ship no matter what. However, I can't relocate from suburban Houston, for the goals mentioned above. I have joint shared custody with my former wife, but my son's residency is legally tied to hers. Therefore, if I moved, I'd forfeit most of my precious time with him, which would hugely impact his spiritual life. There's no way I could ever do that. He loves the fact that I teach him about Jesus, and he misses that terribly when he's at mommy's house. If these circumstances hinder remarriage, I accept it gladly. This is a spiritual battle, against powers and principalities. I am fully committed. I'm asking God for a loving wife and helper. If he doesn't give me a beloved, I will praise him nonetheless. "Yet he slay me, I will trust in him".
I love my mother and father and my extended family, and strive to spend time with them, though they are several hours away. Mom and dad have fallen away from the church, but I pray God's work in my life will draw them back, and I see inklings of that already. If you are blessed with blood family who you love to spend time with, I will give up anything necessary in order to travel to visit them along with our children, as frequently as practical. I want to love them as you do. My vocation permits more travel than most.
I got saved 2,000 years ago by a man named Jesus. I enjoy life very much, because every day I get to thank him for saving me. I trusted him before I could walk or speak, but I spent most of my life ignoring him. At this season in my life, I read scripture and pray every day. The Psalms make me weep regularly. I worship with the Lord's people every chance I get. I'm in one small group with men over 60 years old, one small group with singles in their forties, a Sunday school with couples in their thirties, and a Sunday night bunch with single twenty-somethings. I dislike artificial boundaries. At work, I organize prayer meetings with my colleagues.
Worship is life. Jesus Christ made everything, from mitochondrial DNA to crawdads to nuclear physicists and even, surprisingly, theologians. The entire cosmos depends upon the cross of Golgotha where he shed his blood. If someone chained me up where I could not take communion ever again, I would probably die, which would be okay with me because then I'd stop sinning. God is in control and I have no problem with that. We have free wills, and that's the problem. We're saved by works, but nobody except Jesus does any. Baptism is a gift from God, period, regardless of your age. So is the Lord's supper, regardless of mode, means, or ministers. The church is a harlot. Christ the Lord adores her. "Adores" is a pathetically inadequate way to describe how Christ feels about her. Marriage is like Christ and his church and that is terrifying and thrilling. That's romance.
Are you a professional who has done well and glorified God, but starting to realize that a career by itself just can't give you everything you want? Want to see what faith and family is all about and try the other side of life? Looking for the great unknown? Feeling domestic and want to swim upstream against the world, which says men and women are identical, having more than 1.5 kids is a sin, the "good life" is "having it all, all the time, all at once?" Feeling burnt out by those lies? Me too.
I believe I'm called to be a husband and a father. I want a humble, compassionate partner to share the joys and trials of a Christian household. Our home would be a "little church", where scriptural thanksgiving, laughter, and reconciliation are found in abundance; it would be a place of hospitality for the people of God and the needy, starting with our children. Frankly, it's such a beautiful vision that I don't feel worthy of it; yet, I pray to be made worthy, knowing that the Lord is kind even to the ungrateful and the evil.
If the Lord grants more children, I want to support their mother full time in the home for their loving care. I admire college-educated and highly accomplished women, but that by itself is not absolutely crucial for me. An entrancement with the beauty of the family vocation is what I desire most. That doesn't mean a mom chained inside the house. I will generously support my wife to further her professional knowledge and accomplishments, but if there are huge things you still want to achieve which would severely conflict with a household vocation, you would probably not be content with me. Go adventure then, and glorify God as you do!
I love children and welcome them into my home as my own. I welcome the rest of your family in the same way.
I'm 34. With my desire for more children, a wife my age or younger is an ideal match, but a few years older is okay, too. If you can't have children, I am pro-adoption. Both my brothers were adopted.
Despite all these silly criteria, hopes, and idiosyncracies, there's a mysterious Trinitarian chemistry in love and romance, and I never want to quell it with my interminable lists. A Christian marriage is wrought by the Holy Spirit, and I don't know where He comes from or where He goes. I'd prefer enjoying Him rather than trying to detect Him like a geiger counter.
I love the great treasury of Christian tradition, and will not depart from it. However, I am open to all earnest expressions of biblical Christianity, and I love all the Lord's people. I'd love to try home schooling, but I'm not adamant about it. I was public schooled and have no resentments. Forgiveness is the whole matrix of all relationships. If Christian people can't live that, I don't want to be called a Christian. Marriage is the ideal place to model it.
Did you know that our society is invaded by millions of heathens every year? They're called "children", and they need to be shown what love looks like, so civilization may continue onward to its glorious consummation in Jesus Christ.
A few random tidbits about me:
I don't have cable or satellite, but I do have a DVD player. I think it would be cool to maintain a relatively low level of TV-watching in the first year of a marriage.
I can smell hatred ten miles away.
I write prayer notes to people in my congregation and mail them in from my ship every week.
I sing hymns loudly and in tune.
The only woman I have ever kissed was my former wife. Other than her, I've been on maybe two dates my entire life. Intimacy is not something I give away quickly.
I don't chat on the internet. If it weren't for a couple of awesome Tom Clancy games and a few great theological resources, I could probably do without a computer altogether. They have their moments, though.
I keep a sort of spiritual journal online, in web log form, and usually only share the link with my closest spiritual friends. I generally write for my own amusement, rather than for a big audience, but it's nice to be appreciated by others now and then.
Jesus Christ, have mercy on us, we are sinners.
PRIVATE PHOTO PASSWORD: AHOY
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