Hi friends! On today’s episode of Draw Near to Me, we will begin part 6 of Travis’s faith journey. For those who prefer to read, today’s content is also posted below. As a recap, in part 5, Travis went on a men’s hiking trip in South Carolina. It was there that he encountered God after asking the question “God, do you love me?” It opened the door to true forgiveness and healing. By the end of the trip, Travis recognized the power of gathering men together to experience fellowship in a truly authentic way. Since this is a man’s testimony, my husband, Jeff, will narrate Travis’s story. If you enjoyed this post, please share it with others using the share button below. Also, please consider doing a free or paid subscription to Draw Near to Me so you don’t miss any future content. With that, let’s dive into part 6 of Travis’s story. Enjoy!
The men’s hiking trip in Charleston was a big breakthrough moment in my life. When we returned to Chattanooga, I told Mike that we needed something like that for the men in Tennessee. I asked the guy that ran the event out in Charleston to mentor me. He agreed and guided me through the process of doing one of those backpacking trips in Chattanooga.
That fall we held our first men’s hiking trip in Tennessee. There were about 13 people that attended. The hike was hard. A lot of the guys weren’t backpackers and weren’t used to it. The men that went now jokingly refer to it as the death march. We did 27 miles on trails that we did not know very well, with terrain that was up and down and up and down. It was a challenge, but there were still some great connections and breakthroughs that happened that weekend.
Even though we saw God move through that hike, I struggled with the fact that I still wanted more. I wanted a big ministry. The group in Charleston had 80 guys going on their trips and I was searching for that same experience. If we had 80 guys, we could meet as a large group in a centralized location to do worship and then break out into smaller groups of about 15 at night. That way, the men experienced both settings. That was my vision, but we got 13 instead of 80 guys to start out with. I thought, “Okay, it’s our first year, so it is kind of a trial run.” However, over the first three years of organizing the hike, our biggest group consisted of only 18 guys. It was nowhere near my vision for the ministry.
During the third year of the hike, my wife wrote me a letter and put it in my backpack. When I was out in the woods, I opened it and read it. Essentially, the gist of the letter was that she felt like I was putting more into my ministry than our family. Honestly, I was mad. I thought, “I’m out here in the woods. I’m trying to reach these guys. I’m doing what God’s called me to do and you’re gonna send me this letter?”
I needed to talk to someone. I pulled aside a really good friend of mine that was with me on the hike. He could tell I was upset. I shared with him what the letter said. Then, he looked at me and said, “Well, is she right?”
Instead of just agreeing with me, my friend had confronted me. I started crying. I said, “She is.” I suddenly realized that I was hiding behind a ministry. I did not want to face what was going on with my son. He was still severely disabled. Ever since he was a year old, he had a trach put in. We had 24-hour nursing in our home for a year until the trach got removed. There were constant doctor’s visits, constant surgeries, and constant worrying. Ministry was a great way for me to deflect. I could focus on helping others and move my attention away from me. It became an outlet for me.
That weekend I left really confused. I thought, “Okay God, what does this all even look like?” I felt like we had a good thing started, but I was frustrated because we only had 18 guys showing up. I had this vision for a big ministry. Things were not lining up. I got back home and talked with my wife. I began to wonder if it was time to take a step back. That was at the end of October 2015.
I took the month of November to pray about the ministry and see what God revealed. For the first half of the month my prayer was, “Alright God, if this is not what I’m supposed to be doing, take this desire away from me. I feel like You’ve called me to this, but if not, then take this desire off my heart so I don’t have it.” Well, the more I prayed that prayer, the stronger that desire for the ministry got.
During the second half of the month, I shifted my prayer. I said, “Okay God, the desire is getting stronger the more I pray about it. If I’m gonna do this, I need you to put some men in my life that are gonna be real. I can’t do this alone. I need some men to come alongside me.”
In all reality it was not as if I had no one. At the time, Mike was doing the ministry with me, but I wasn’t being honest with him. I was trying to run everything. I was kind of a control freak over it. I had an attitude that this was gonna be my ministry and this was what it was gonna look like. It was Travis’s vision, so I kind of ran with it that way.
I was now finally praying for God to put more men in my life that would be real with me and help me walk through this journey. However, towards the end of that month, I still struggled with what that even looked like. One night, I went to bed and began toying with the concept of element 26, which is iron. It was a thought based on Proverbs 27:17
As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another. (Proverbs 27:17, NIV)
That night, I had a dream. In the dream I walked into this gym. There was a guy at the front counter who asked me what I was there for. I replied, “I’m here to get my life together.” He said, “Okay, well do me a favor. Look over at that guy in the corner.” I looked over in the corner and saw this guy on a weight bench doing a bench press. He was in great shape. He was using those old metal weights where you can hear the metal-on-metal clanking noise as he was lifting them.
The guy at the front desk then said, “Now look at that other guy.” Looking over in the other corner I saw this guy just sitting on the bench. In stark contrast, he was out of shape. I turn back around, and the guy at the front said, “Both of these men are paying for a membership, but only one of them is putting in the work. Now, watch the guy that’s working out again.”
I shifted my focus back to that man. As I was watching this guy, I heard that very, very distinct clank noise again. It was metal on metal. When I turned around, the front counter guy had a sheet of paper pulled out. On it he had written the word CLANK, C-L-A-N-K, down the piece of paper. He then began writing next to the letter “C” the name, Caleb. Then he went down the list. Next to the L was Luke, the A was Aaron, the N was Nathaniel, and the K was Kristina. Laid out in front of me were the names of all my boys and my wife. He then slid the paper over to me and said, “This is gonna take a lot of work.” Then my dream ended.
I woke up feeling even more confused. I thought, “Okay God, I get that my family’s gonna take a lot of work, but what does that mean about my ministry? Are you telling me that I should step away from it?” I was not sure if the dream meant that I needed to let go of the ministry to just focus on my family .
I fell back asleep and a new dream started. I was walking back into a cave. In the distance, I heard that same clanking noise again. That metal-on-metal sound. As I walked around the corner, there was this big guy with an anvil in front of him. He was beating on this big chunk of iron with a hammer producing that clanking noise. The man then looked up at me and he said, “This too is going to take a lot of work.” Then the dream was over.
This time when I woke up, it was the clearest message from God. I knew that He was telling me that, like my family, the ministry was going to take a lot of work but I was being called to do it. In the last few days of that month of prayer, I began to ask something new. I said, “Okay God, this has been my vision. I don’t want it to be my vision anymore. I want this to be your vision.” I began desperately asking God to take over and make it His ministry and not my own.
My prayers for the ministry changed from that day forward. We began to always pray for two things. The first was that it was God’s ministry not our own. The second was that God brought the men there that needed to be there. Whether that was one or a thousand, we were gonna minister to them in the same way no matter what.
As I wrapped up that month, I asked for God to take the lead and for Him to put people in my life to mentor me. That was when I was put into contact with a gentleman named Robert. He was a former Green Beret and the regional director for the Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA) in the Ocoee region of TN. He spoke at a ton of men’s events and was that man’s man kind of guy. You almost put him on a pedestal. Every time he spoke at our church, I really admired him.
I don’t remember exactly how me and Robert initially got in touch, but when we did, I asked him if he would be willing to go get coffee sometime. He agreed. When we met, I explained to him my story and what I was going through. I even told him about the letter that I received from my wife. At that point he started laughing and said, “Oh, I remember that letter!”
Robert shared that in the past he had hidden behind his ministry. In the process, he had kind of put his marriage to the side as well. We had almost the exact same experience, even regarding the letter. It was so cool that he understood that aspect of my journey. I gained many insights from my time with him.
Things began to change. After praying about it, we decided to alter the format of our event. We realized that the backpacking format, like the one I had experienced in Charleston, was too hard on a lot of the guys. They could not do it physically. I felt bad and didn’t want to leave guys out. As a result, that was the year that we changed the retreat. We found a place that was accessible for everybody. Instead of hiking, the men could simply drive up and park at the site.
So, in 2016, we launched what is now known as our Element 26 men’s ministry. From there, God would lead the way.
To be continued.
If you enjoyed this post, please consider sharing it with others by hitting the share button. If you are not already a subscriber, consider doing a free or paid subscription so you don’t miss any content and to support my work. Thank you!
Introductory music credits: Music from #Uppbeat (free for Creators) https://uppbeat.io/t/the-lakes/parade License code: 10C7QKHLBMEY3IPF
Share this post