Being Vulnerable is not a sign of weakness but a sign of strength

P.S.A attendance is highly recommended. March 27th mark your calendars. F3 St. Louis very own Miyagi and Aerobie has brought light to a sensitive subject that’s right Suicide-mental health awareness. A subject we try and avoid talking about at all or till it’s to late. YHC will be on Q at the Panethon if you can’t make it to the west side of town Stang is on Q at Tomahawk and will also discussing the subject.

I am encouraging you to step up and share your experience. Whether it be about yourself or family member or even a friend. YHC will testify how this subject has effected my life. Please remember what we talk about in COT stays in COT it’s okay to be vulnerable. We are stronger together rather than alone.

Quotes
Don’t be ashamed of your story it will inspire others. Author Unknown

“You don’t have to control your thoughts. You just have to stop letting them control you.”

”I hide all my scars with an I’m fine.”

The bravest thing I ever did was continuing my life when I wanted to die. – Juliette Lewis

The world is a better place with you in it.

Suicide doesn’t end the chances of life getting worse, it eliminates the possibility of it ever getting any better. – unknown

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8-week Study group on Present Perfect

Image result for perfect presence gregory boyd Dates: 3/18 – 5/20

If you are looking for a for a study that is more about building a relationship with God rather than deep scriptural study then you may want to be a part of this study the next 8 week.  Please take a moment and read the reviews of the book and click on the link below to learn more about what we will dive into the next 8 weeks.

Why:  My word for this year is “Living” as in learning to live more in the presence of God. Through that intention God has placed this book, “Present Perfect”, a tool to learn more about this idea of being present with God.  After reading it, the lessons are so powerful and foundational to my life that God has inspired me to write a study manual and lead other men to experience and grow together through this concept of presence

Who: I’ve purposely not hand picked guys for this Journey because I know there are guys that I wouldn’t think of that God is calling into this study.  I’m looking for a max of 6 guys that feel called to engage in a deep way and are seeking to grow in their intimate, abiding relationship with God to join me on an 8-week journey.  This will not be a large group bible study rather rather more a practical application of God’s word.  If this is a calling that you feel God calling you too then email brianbrenner09@gmail.com or call me 804-240-1509 to secure a spot and get your book ordered from amazon (LINK and read the reviews.)  If the timing is not right for you then I would challenge you to read the book on your own time and maybe participate in round 2 in the future.

What – Study Format:  

  • In preparation for our group time together each Monday you will read a chapter of the book (about 15 pages) and review and engage study guide for that week  <LINK>
  • In our discussion, we will learn from each other what impressions the teaching had on you and the affect of the exercises have on helping you get closer to God.

When:  Starting at 5:15AM – 6:00AM on Monday 3/18 through Monday 5/20 (taking off spring break week 4/15)

Where:  TBD (only for the 6 guys to know…)

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40 Day Challenge 2019

Ok PAX……time to get challenged and ready for summer.

For the next 40 days its time to be uncomfortable.

This is simple and to the point and you will get better so its all worth it.

Starting 3/6/19 and Ending 4/14/19 ——->>>>>40 Days

  • 1st F  Challenge = 40 Merkins every day
    • Not including workout merkins
    • can mix and match (Wide, Regular, Diamonds)
    • Get them in!!!
  • 2nd F Challenge = Work on Concentrica weekly
    • M – show some love
    • shorties – spend some time
    • PAX – attend 2ndF lunch or coffee
  • 3rd F Challenge = Serve 1 time at one of the following within 40 days
    • Saturday Gfit – contact Deacon
    • Saturday Guidance (CAH) – Contact Chicken Hawk
    • Monday or Wednesday Paradise Reading Center – Contact Crab Cakes

Email me me bjmullen60@yahoo.com and tell me you are in and I will hold you accountable.

Prefer to see you and shieldlock sign up together

THIS IS MEANT TO MAKE YOU UNCOMFORTABLE TO MAKE YOU BETTER

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CROSSROADS – Preparation for Easter – aka Lent

As Spring approaches one of the most significant days that kicks off Spring and then Summer is EASTER.

Do we really grasp the importance of Easter and what it means, not only for Christianity but for all people??

Crossroads is going to take the 7 weeks leading up to Easter looking at the key events of what is called HOLY WEEK. The Sunday to Sunday movements of Jesus and his followers that led to his death and resurrection on Easter which we celebrate annually.

Here is our schedule of Qs and the Holy Week day they will cover:

  • 3/5 – Cake Boss – Sunday also known as Palm Sunday
  • 3/12 – Gecko – Monday clearing of Temple & others
  • 3/19 – Twister – Tuesday Fig tree & Temple controversies
  • 3/26 – Sugar Daddy – Wednesday Plans to kill Jesus
  • 4/2 – Double D – Thursday – Last Supper & Gethsemane
  • 4/9 – Pusher – Friday Trial, Death & Burial of Jesus
  • 4/12 – Flat Tire AT CHICKENNWIZDIM – Easter Sunday The Empty Tomb!

Don’t miss out on this chance to understand this event and how it applies to each one of us…..not just a story but something that directly includes each of us!!

Peace!

Cake Boss

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F3-The Fort Prayer Convergence for FMSD

Matthew 18:20 “For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.”

John 16:33      “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”

After our Prayer Convergence back in August, several PAX suggested we start off 2019 the same way and I couldn’t agree more.

Who: All PAX of Fort Mill are asked to step up and live out the 3rd F. What better way to start off the school (calendar) year than to go to the schools, physically go, and pray?!? Most of us have children that attend these schools, neighbors, friends and family that work at these schools and some of the PAX work in these schools. Regardless of how we are connected to them, we are all impacted by what happens in these schools and this is a chance for us to live out what we are called to do.

What: The Fort PAX (at least 2, preferably 3 or more at each location!) converging at every school in the FMSD, to pray for the school leadership, every employee of the school, students, the safety of the school, etc.

When: Sunday, January 6th, between 1:00 – 4:00 PM, not the whole time, but a window to allow more participation.

How (do I get involved): Pick a school, grab a few fellow PAX and show up, ready to pray. We will post some details about format. Post the number of PAX and where you posted with the hashtag #F3TheFortPrays4FMSD when you are done.

Why: Evil looks for every opportunity to cause chaos in schools. We pray to keep any and all evil from these schools, administrators, teachers, children and families. We pray that God uses the believers in these schools to be a light unto those that do not know him (students and adults alike).

As of this pre-blast, the schools that still need coverage are listed below. Those with an Elementary & Middle on same campus are indicated. Think, divide and conquer on these**.

 

Elementary

Orchard Park

Pleasant Knoll **

Riverview

Springfield **

Sugar Creek

Middle

Fort Mill **

Pleasant Knoll

Springfield **

High

Nation Ford

 

Find Beacon on Twitter  @F3_Beacon  or email at tehicks2@gmail.com with questions or to commit to a specific school.  You can also commit here!

SYITG

Beacon

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Turn the Page, Part Deux

For the second installment of Turn the Page, we’ll be doing some “light reading” with The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer.  I encourage you to start now and take some notes… I expect we’ll all be challenged by this one.

We’ll meet at Eternal Church Offices on Tuesday, February 12th at 1900.

As men, and especially F3 men, we are called to fight the Goo.  I think this book is perfectly aligned with making sure that we don’t get lulled into a cheapened view of what it means to accelerate in the 3rd F.  Like all aspects of the DRP, it requires intentionality, which is what this book is all about. 

It isn’t about forcing the call, but about how we respond.  Looking forward to how we can all be sharpened.

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#Serving at Thanksgiving with Many Thanks

With great apologies for the delay in this backblast, here is a followup to our Thanksgiving meal drive. The PAX were truly inspiring in reaching out. We are all called to serve, and can do so in many different ways.

Immediate thanks to Figaro for the turkey donations, along with the 20 men who did not hesitate and within 3 days quickly donated to the cause… and whom most have chosen to remain anonymous. Special thanks to Cable Guy, Frat Boy and Crab Cakes for helping with delivery. More details further below. And additional thanks to Crab Cakes and M Kara for followup support to one of our families!

Many of us don’t truly realize the experiences of the poor and needy  until we are able to observe in real life. Most of stay in our one station in life, but it can be a privilege to experience others’ stations. (see next full story, try to get through it all)

One of the most meaningful and deep scenes in a movie I have watched comes from one of the silliest movies. In the movie “Overboard” with Goldie Hahn and Kurt Russell, Hahn’s female character (Joanna) plays a very stuck up, rich woman who falls overboard at night from her yacht while near WA (state). She gets amnesia. She is ‘claimed’ by Russell’s carpenter character (Dean) to ‘compensate’ for her refusal to pay him for his services performed by him in the days before.

Joanna ends up living a poor life with Russell and his 4 boys for about a month. She experiences things she would never had in her rich world.  She learns humility living a life with little money. Eventually her memory returns and she returns to her yacht.  But she no longer acts like the ‘debutante’ who her mother and privileged husband so want. They think something is wrong with her.

Later on board the yacht, Joanna has an interaction with her servant butler (Andrew) who has been taking care of her his whole life with no thanks for his efforts:

  • Andrew: (Andrew hands Joanna her earrings after they’ve drank tequila shots below decks with the crew) You best not lose these again, madam.
  • Joanna: (perplexed) Again?
  • Andrew: You will forgive me, madam. (clearly mocking her) “Andrew! I seem to have lost my ruby earrings somewhere between 64th and 68th street, find them.”
  • Joanna: (genuinely contrite) I’ve behaved so badly. (Andrew raises his eyebrows)
  • Joanna: You’ve done all these wonderful things for me and I never even once said thank you. I’m sorry.
  • Andrew: (embarrassed) Apology accepted, ma’am. (he turns away and to the sink)
  • Joanna: (following him) Everyone on this boat thinks I’m crazy. Do you think they’re right?
  • Andrew: (turning around to face her) Oh no, madam. Oh no. You… most of us go through life with blinders on. Knowing only that little station to which we were born. But you madam, have had the… rare privilege of escaping your bonds for just a spell. To see life from an entirely new perspective. How you choose to use that information is entirely up to you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlHlKi2dATw

The movie ends up with a happy ending with Joanna returning to Dean and the boys.

It is up to all of us to decide how we use information we have at hand. If you are called to serve, how are you actually serving? Are you truly seeking to serve? Are you open to learning about others less fortunate than you? Even more so, are you willing to put yourself in an uncomfortable environment to learn firsthand?

Here is a quick synopsis of this year’s turkey meals donation.  We had done turkey drives before, but some of the feedback we got was, not that it wasn’t appreciated, but that it was too much of a ‘giveaway.’ Best teach a man to fish, so to speak. But we’ve been in the Paradise community over 1 1/2 years now and we didn’t want to let Thanksgiving pass without some involvement. A plan was put together on Monday, announced to the PAX on Tuesday, enough donations received by Thursday, food bought on Friday and delivered on Saturday.

Thanks were in abundance from those receiving the meals. We had a few crying in appreciation. The names of the 10 neediest families were given to us by Kim Vinisette of SON Ministries who has been working in the community for years. F3 has a strong relationship with Kim. As we shared with the families, we asked them to also share to any others that could use food for the holiday.

We gave each family a nice presentation basket of initial food along with their turkey, an F3 flyer, a holiday card from F3 and a gift certificate of varying amounts (depending on family size) to buy additional food, ie. fresh food, dessert.

We arrived at the park Saturday afternoon and the PAX helped deliver.

Lessons learned include…planning to spend more on each family roughly in the $100 range, buying all the food necessary for a full meal, starting much earlier, getting other groups involved to help support the cause. Maybe next year we can increase the # of families.

I have some pictures but not at the ready. Will get posted here shortly. I want to get this BB out.

*** An additional good experience came from this endeavor. One of the families, a single mom with 3 girls, had next to no furniture in their apartment.  Crab Cakes and his M Kara came through as we identified their needs and their rooms went from having nothing to being filled!  Awesome job!  We are now working on another similar situation. Will post that info soon!

Great thanks once again to the PAX.

Aye! Bolt

 

 

 

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Giving Tuesday – Palmetto North F3F

Thank you for considering a contribution to support the community support efforts of your local Fort Mill and Rock Hill F3 Foundation.  For more details on the foundation itself please click <Here>.

During this season of giving please consider making a tax deductible contribution to Palmetto North F3F where the funds raised go directly into supporting the activities of the Fort and Rock pax.  Specifically these proceeds both the areas we are already supporting as well as the future service efforts in our region.  Our current efforts included:

  • 12th Man Ministries and the numerous Pax that work as mentors to help our student athletes break the performance based culture and help show them God’s love. F3F Palmetto North has supported the weekly dinners with athletes and their mentors.
  • Gfit is a weekly 1st, 2nd and 3rd F within the Paradise community where HIM step up to lead and to help mentor and be engaged in community with our neighbors
  • Reading Center is a semi-weekly, seasonal opportunity to read with the children and develop life skills for studying and reading to help children in the community get up to reading level
  • Rock Hill Children’s Attention Center is a center of children where we spend time bi-weekly with the teenage boys to engage in 1st, 2nd and 3rd F to help give them home and guidance.

Please consider a donation to support these and other efforts that your local F3F Palmetto North and any PAX will help lead across our regions.

Make contributions via PayPal – https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=BGSCH65PWDNV6

or send checks with ” Palmetto North F3F” in the memo line to the following address.

F3 Foundation, LLC

1645 Queens Road West

Charlotte, NC, 28207

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Support Thanksgiving Food Efforts in Paradise

***** Update Thursday 9:00 pm *****
Great thanks to the PAX who have donated, and in just one day 1/2, we reached our goal!  Please, no more donations, but, if you were considering, let Bolt know in case we want to add additional families to receive food.
If you would like to volunteer to help deliver (no 2.0’s on delivery, please) to the families, please let Bolt know ASAP. Delivery is being planned for Saturday from 1-3:00 pm (before the G-Fit workout). If needed we will deliver later Saturday, or on Sunday.
For this saturday….1-3:00 pm – food delivery…followed by G-Fit with the kids at 3:00 pm  please join us and bring the 2.0’s to g-fit!!!!

I will be purchasing food tomorrow.  Today, I was able to get 10 large baskets with Thanksgiving themed ‘liners’ (for a nicer food presentation) at a near-donation price from the Humane Society thrift shop. They have supported us previously, and offered to continue to give us sports balls which we use and distribute to the kids in Paradise. We will also be getting a supply of corn, beans and yams which we will not have to purchase. This means we will be able to give the families a larger gift certificate to the grocery store to purchase any additional food items that may want outside of our basic food items (ie. dessert, etc).

Thank you! bolt *****

 

Thanksgiving is nearly upon us,  and Bolt and Deacon are seeking PAX support (quickly) in a small effort to provide full Thanksgiving meals to families in Paradise.

F3 has had a presence in Paradise for over a year and half now. In past years we have had a community turkey drive. We are changing it up this year to provide (at least) 10 full meals to specific high priority families in need. We are working with Kim at SON Ministries to identify these families. But we must move quickly in our efforts with a target delivery of this weekend 11/17-11/18 and an absolute deadline of Tuesday 11/20.

<See also below schedule of events in Paradise over the Thanksgiving holiday>

Each meal will consist of a turkey and all side dishes (list below) needed for a full meal. THANK YOU TO FIGARO (Montrio Belton) who will purchase all of our needed turkeys! This means we just need the side dish item package.

*** As of 11/14 8:15 am, WE ONLY NEED 5 MORE FULL SIDE ORDERS! Full orders are about $30 unless you want to add few items, ie. dessert) ***

HOW TO SUPPORT

  • Purchase the side items on your own. IF YOU PLAN ON PURCHASING THE FOOD ON YOUR OWN, PLEASE LET BOLT KNOW IMMEDIATELY FOR TRACKING PURPOSES!
  • Partner up with another PAX to purchase the items.
  • Donate any money amount to Bolt via Paypal. Send to: thenewpauko@hotmail.com
  • Pledge: If you want to commit but can’t do PayPal, just let Bolt know ASAP and he will cover your pledge until he sees you next.
  • From there, meet up or schedule pickup with Bolt or deliver to 3728 Leela Palace Way in Waterstone near Tega Cay.
  • Assist in delivery to families in Paradise.

Paradise Schedule of Thanksgiving events

  • Sunday, November 18. Volunteer at “Harvest of Thanks and Poor Man’s Meal”, a community meal held at Jerusalem Baptist Church in the Life Center. It would be great to have F3 support at this community event. More details to come via Twitter.
  • Weekend 11/17-11/18 through Tue 11/20. Help to deliver our holiday meals.
  • Saturday, 3:00 pm,  11/24. Post at G-Fit with a holiday pizza/food party following.

Thank you to everyone for your support on this endeavor and to all PAX that have joined us in Paradise!

Aye! Bolt …….. Always open for suggestions!!!

Food side list –  (You can shop anywhere and you can alter this list as you see fit. Pics below are from Harris Teeter. This link may take you to the shopping cart: https://shop.harristeeter.com/store/C39878905#/cart)

Required:  8-10 lbs potatoes, stuffing @ 12 oz, green beans @ 30 oz, corn @ 30 oz, collard greens @ 30 oz, cranberry sauce @ 14 oz, gravy @ 18 oz, mac and cheese @ 3 boxes 20 oz.  This list includes mostly canned foods because delivery will be days before Thanksgiving.

Possible additional:  celery, onions, carrots, sweet potatoes, rolls/biscuits, DESSERT.

( I don’t think these screenshots have turned out too well. Will try to improve.)

 

 

 

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Charter Band-aids for Little Warriors – PreBlast

As most of the PAX in the Fort and Rock regions knows my 5 year old daughter (Emma) is a leukemia survivor. We still make a trip every 4 weeks to get blood drawn to check her counts at Levine Children’s Hospital. We also stepped up and raised money last year (Christmas time) for a fellow brother bout-time out of Area 51 son Jennings who has leukemia also.

It has come to my attention that the budgets have been cut in some of the pediatric departments and the first thing to go is usually the character band aids. You say how important is to have these band-aids? Well as far as the cancer kids go every time the have their PORT’s (Port is a small medical appliance that is installed beneath the skin. A catheter connects the port to a vein) which for some kids is traumatic they get a band-aid over it. For others that are done with treatment such as my daughter Emma has to go back for the next 21 years to get checked (mainly blood counts). This not always easy for instance this past Wednesday she was poked 3 times. Well at the end the band aid can put a smile on a child’s face. This also goes for those kiddos that have to constantly get blood work done not just cancer kids.

So what I am challenging you to do is every week you go grocery shopping buy at least one box or more of character band-aids girls or boys. Also Spread the word in every COT. I will tweet out what AO’s I will be at and if anyone wants to step up and help me collect that would be awesome.

I also challenge others in different regions to pull together and do the same thing. My goal is to gather as much as possible and split it between Levine Children’s Hospital and Novant Health Hemby Children’s Hospital (St. Jude Affiliate Clinic) before Christmas.

Let a simple act of kindness put a smile on a little fighters face.

AYE. Lets do this.

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