Pro 6:20 My son, keep thy father's commandment, and forsake not the law of thy mother:
Pro 6:21 Bind them continually upon thine heart, and tie them about thy neck. Pro 6:22
When thou goest, it shall lead thee; when thou sleepest, it shall keep thee; and when thou awakest, it shall talk with thee.
Pro 6:23 For the commandment is a lamp; and the law is light; and reproofs of instruction are the way of life:
The father dimension of leadership and the mother dimension of leadership are very different.The things I tend to major on with our sons differ from their mother's concerns.
There are are things that she stresses that I wouldn't be as inclined to think of.I make sure they stand up straight, look people in the eye, and speak the truth; she worries about whether or not they have on clean underwear.
I talk to them about "major" things; she teaches them courtesy.
The Father has given us commandments that provide guidelines for a moral foundation and our walk with Him; but the Church, which is our mother, teaches us to apply certain principles in our lives in order to maintain our hearts and ways before Him.
I see a trend among some that want to only adhere to the Father's "commandments," and forget the Law of their Mother--Church standards, if you will. We need both.
Saturday, December 31, 2011
Sunday, December 18, 2011
Lessons From an Old Coonhunter
When I was just a lad of a boy, I got to know an old hillbilly who was, in his own way, a genius.
He didn't have a lot of education, at least the academic kind, but in his element, he was a brilliant man.
He was a woodsman without peer who could find his way unerringly out of the deepest holler on a night when the stars weren't shining. I never saw him lost.
He was a dead shot with a rifle, making it a point to shoot squirrels through the eye so as not to ruin any of the meat.
He kept his old double bitted axe honed down sharp enough to shave with, and could fell a tree with incredible precision, dropping it exactly where he wanted it, with every chip looking like it had come out of a cookie cutter.
But perhaps his greatest area of genius was in training coon dogs. Old Donnie hardly ever got out of his zip code, but well known dog men and coon hunting legends from all over the country found their way to the old house up on Peckerwood Flat where he lived to lay their money down and drive away with another winner trained by the old man from the forks of the creek. Many a young hound born and trained there went on to become famous in the hands of competition hunters and big time promoters.
The old boy wasn't all that sociable, and was so opinionated that he was something of a loner, but I was determined to learn from him, and kept on until I made a friend out of him.
He taught me a lot of things about coon dogs, and quite a little bit about life as well.
One thing he told me over and over again was that if I wanted my hounds to be straight--that is, to run coon and coon only--DON'T hunt them with a bunch of trashy dogs.
"If you want him to be straight, keep him in straight company."
That advice has served me well in training coon dogs as well as in life.
Solomon said in Proverbs 13:20:
He that walketh with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.
A good friend, Brother Ron Wofford, is fond of saying, "Show me your friends, and I will show you your future."
Sadly, I have seen some good friends start running with the wrong crowd, and today they're treeing possums and catching skunks.
You are not only known by the company you keep, but you are made by the company you keep.
Influence is a powerful thing...consider carefully who you choose to align yourself with.
They will help shape your destiny.
He didn't have a lot of education, at least the academic kind, but in his element, he was a brilliant man.
He was a woodsman without peer who could find his way unerringly out of the deepest holler on a night when the stars weren't shining. I never saw him lost.
He was a dead shot with a rifle, making it a point to shoot squirrels through the eye so as not to ruin any of the meat.
He kept his old double bitted axe honed down sharp enough to shave with, and could fell a tree with incredible precision, dropping it exactly where he wanted it, with every chip looking like it had come out of a cookie cutter.
But perhaps his greatest area of genius was in training coon dogs. Old Donnie hardly ever got out of his zip code, but well known dog men and coon hunting legends from all over the country found their way to the old house up on Peckerwood Flat where he lived to lay their money down and drive away with another winner trained by the old man from the forks of the creek. Many a young hound born and trained there went on to become famous in the hands of competition hunters and big time promoters.
The old boy wasn't all that sociable, and was so opinionated that he was something of a loner, but I was determined to learn from him, and kept on until I made a friend out of him.
He taught me a lot of things about coon dogs, and quite a little bit about life as well.
One thing he told me over and over again was that if I wanted my hounds to be straight--that is, to run coon and coon only--DON'T hunt them with a bunch of trashy dogs.
"If you want him to be straight, keep him in straight company."
That advice has served me well in training coon dogs as well as in life.
Solomon said in Proverbs 13:20:
He that walketh with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.
A good friend, Brother Ron Wofford, is fond of saying, "Show me your friends, and I will show you your future."
Sadly, I have seen some good friends start running with the wrong crowd, and today they're treeing possums and catching skunks.
You are not only known by the company you keep, but you are made by the company you keep.
Influence is a powerful thing...consider carefully who you choose to align yourself with.
They will help shape your destiny.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Worldliness and the Call of the Wolf
I have been breeding coon hounds since I was a kid, and have had some success. Hounds from my breeding program are in many states, and have won in competition, which I don't personally participate in, as well as pleasing the old back at the forks of the creek coon hunters.
One thing I have done in my efforts to better the breed is to stay true to some of the old, houndy characteristics that many modern breeders have abandoned in their quest to streamline their hounds for nothing but competition hunts.
The big square muzzles, blocky heads, long, low-set ears, and deep, melodious bawl mouths are getting harder and harder to find, as many younger hunters are only interested in the winner's circle.
In the early days of the Bluetick breed, the founders set forth a breed standard, and clearly spelled out these qualities as critical. And certainly I understand the difficulty of trying to get high performance as well as maintaining these time honored traits.
It is difficult to maintain because every generation of coonhounds you raise is subject to what I like to call "the call of the wolf." Our hounds are genetically descended from wolves, and the wolf traits are always trying to resurface .In every litter, there will be some pups that have the shorter, higher set ears, the sharper, thinner muzzle, the voice that doesn't quite have the right tone and quality.
You have to select your breeding stock from those pups that meet the standard you have set, even if some of those lesser offspring have good performance qualities also.
It is much the same in our quest for a walk in the Spirit.We have a nature that craves the things of the world, a nature that continually pulls at us. Without deliberate, consistent, diligent efforts to stem the tide of worldliness, it will, as surely as night follows day, make inroads among us.
In our quest for the "winner's circle" of numerical growth, we cannot ignore the call of the wolf.
One thing I have done in my efforts to better the breed is to stay true to some of the old, houndy characteristics that many modern breeders have abandoned in their quest to streamline their hounds for nothing but competition hunts.
The big square muzzles, blocky heads, long, low-set ears, and deep, melodious bawl mouths are getting harder and harder to find, as many younger hunters are only interested in the winner's circle.
In the early days of the Bluetick breed, the founders set forth a breed standard, and clearly spelled out these qualities as critical. And certainly I understand the difficulty of trying to get high performance as well as maintaining these time honored traits.
It is difficult to maintain because every generation of coonhounds you raise is subject to what I like to call "the call of the wolf." Our hounds are genetically descended from wolves, and the wolf traits are always trying to resurface .In every litter, there will be some pups that have the shorter, higher set ears, the sharper, thinner muzzle, the voice that doesn't quite have the right tone and quality.
You have to select your breeding stock from those pups that meet the standard you have set, even if some of those lesser offspring have good performance qualities also.
It is much the same in our quest for a walk in the Spirit.We have a nature that craves the things of the world, a nature that continually pulls at us. Without deliberate, consistent, diligent efforts to stem the tide of worldliness, it will, as surely as night follows day, make inroads among us.
In our quest for the "winner's circle" of numerical growth, we cannot ignore the call of the wolf.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
