Howdy do Crew? I'm back! It took me a while but you See the Lord through his marvelous grace and mercy has provided a way for me to pull up a stump around this cyber fire we like to call Rangernet. Over the past several months, man Have I missed you guys! (and Gals too)! Back in April, as the new Sectional Commander took over, he required the computer that I had back. The computer was a Ranger Computer, it belonged to the Section, so they got it back. Being as most of the ministry that I was conducting at the time was closely related to work that was done on the computer, I was no longer able to function, so it had became obvious that I was no longer needed and I chose to step down. I didn't have to do that, but I found that I just wouldn't be able to live with it. It was a very difficult and trying time for me as I had just spent a lot of good hard earned money on keeping that computer in operating condition, I found that they were just going to take it and disassemble it, I was told that the hard drive would be needed for storage. After all of the blood sweat and tears that I had put into that computer, it had left a very bad taste in my mouth. My wife was extremely upset by that course of action and it almost caused me to just leave the ministry all together. I was having a hard time looking for Christian witness with that, but at the same time I was really trying hard to be wary of the witness that I was presenting. At that time I just felt it would only be appropriate for me to step down then. Yes, I had disagreements, but sometimes I can get hot headed too. I had to give that part of the ministry back to the Lord for His direction. Shortly before I had left the cyber fire, The Lord had directed me to go to a new outpost and plug in with it. The outpost I was at was in good hands. My hands were essentially idle there, they had 18 Commanders and 74 boys. The new outpost, the one in which God had sent me to, is 2 blocks from my house and really very little. But, see, God had something better for me in store, the new outpost was blessed with finding a wall locker within the church building from the old outpost # 39 that contained a wide variety of Ranger Stuff, but mostly uniforms and very well kept ones at that. The Outpost, We are # 39 of the Potomac District, we have 5 Pioneers and a Buckaroo. The boys attended their first Powwow this summer, all 5 of them and all were in a bright brand spanking new uniform for the formation thanks to old # 39 . I had not had too much time to prepare the boys for any of the skills events, but they did some learning there. They had actually won a certificate for campsite excellence and a 3rd place trophy for canoeing and rowing. Well, that charged them up some. There were parents who were expecting me to call them and come to pick their child up from the powwow, but it didn't happen, they were homesick all right, but I stayed up the whole night with them and they got over it. I was blessed by a brother from California who had made it possible for me to attend NTC and for that I'm eternally grateful. I still am going to have a total memory crash when it comes to doing an eye splice and a compass (Yikes!) but reaching and teaching those boys for Christ, that is the important part. Those things are all important and all, but without Christ, it doesn't matter anyway. The new outpost # 39 made me the Sr. Cdr. about a month and a 1/2 ago, because when I arrived there I had a vision, and direction, a pretty clear cut set of goals and objectives. I found that I had became Sr Cdr. in absentia, though, I was away on a mission with the Civil Air Patrol that weekend, the same one that Kennedy crashed his plane. We heard about it before the rest of the news did because we are regulated by the Air Force. My Wing, the state of VA, didn't get called because he didn't go anywhere near here. With everything I have been blessed, God has taught me many things I needed to know over the past 6 months, and I'm just thankful to be back! God Bless! Mike Burke _______ To unsubscribe, send "unsubscribe rangernet" to [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Eat the hay & spit out the sticks! - A#1's mule" RTKB&G4JC! http://rangernet.org Autoresponder: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
