Cross Training Ministries Podcast

One of the main questions we get asked is how to help guys shift from being a Bible study group to becoming a band of brothers. Guys want a path. In this episode we give you one.

My notes:

• Camaraderie is a special type of friendship shared with fellow pilgrims
• Extend to men an explicit invitation into friendship, not to your next Men's event.
• If you want to move from classmates to comrades, get out of the church building. Men's Bible Study groups meet in church buildings, but friends meet any number of places.
• Want spiritual friends? Keep growing. You don’t so much seek for spiritual friends as much as you find them along the way. But you must begin to go the way.

https://www.xtrainingministries.com/

There is no way to pursue godliness in a broken world without self-control. Self-control is using all of the internal and external resources God has given us to steer our lives in the direction of godliness. Listen as Joe and Evan dispel the myths that surround self-control, and point Christian men toward the internal and external resources that promote self-control.

https://www.xtrainingministries.com/

In this episode Joe and Evan discuss one of the 5 dimensions of spiritual fitness: Competence.

Questions we answer:

• What is competence?
• Why is competence spiritually important?
• How does a lack of competence affect Christian guys? 
• Where specifically do men need competence? 
• What are the limits of competence? 
• What does it look like for guys to pursue competence together? 

Do you have clear convictions on the big questions of life? A lot of Christian men are in danger of floating through life with no clear convictions - or worse yet - convictions borrowed from the culture around them. Part of spiritual fitness is clarity - a Biblical perspective on life. In this conversation, Joe and Evan help define clarity and help guys grow in it.

My Notes:

• Clarity is a Biblical perspective on life
• Clarity protects us from a secular, me-centered mindset.
• Men need Biblical answers to fundamental questions, like: What is the purpose of life? What are the metrics of a life well-lived? What are the greatest dangers in life?
• Men need to bring their biggest questions to the Bible.
• Men should be aiming for a "point of view" in life, that is not borrowed from someone else.

Subscribe to our mailing list, and get 5 questions for guys pursuing clarity.

Get more spiritual fitness training at xtrainingministries.com

No man will make serious progress toward spiritual maturity until he is captivated by the glory of Christ.

In this episode we help guys understand what captivation is, and how they can begin to feed their captivation of Christ.

My notes:

• Captivation is a heart that is fiercely gripped by a vision of unparalleled goodness.
• Captivation of Christ is often more like a steady bubbling stream than a mountain torrent. 
• If you are uninspired by Christ now, what makes you think you will be in awe of him when you see him face-to-face?
• You can begin to feed your captivation by reading biographies of Christian heroes, meditating on the person of Jesus, and pursuing friendship with other men who are captivated by Christ.

Get more training in spiritual fitness at xtrainingministries.com

You spend a lot of time at work. And when you’re not at work, you’re often thinking about work. The truth is, you are going to spend a large chunk of your life - at work. 

Yet, for some Christian men there is a disconnect between work life and their faith.

I’m interested in helping you build a lifestyle of putting Christ first - and we can’t do that without evaluating your posture, your diligence, your character at work.

In this conversation with my friend Seth Stiles, we talk about faith in the workplace.

• How should Christian men think about their work? 
• How can you be a Christian witness in your workplace? 
• How do I work heartily without allowing work to become my identity? 

Seth serves as the pastor of Adult Ministries at his church, and recently received his doctoral degree with his dissertation on faith in the workplace. You can connect with Seth and find out more about the videos and seminars he offers by emailing him: [email protected]

Gaming is a multi-billion dollar industry. It’s an industry that is growing in both popularity and influence, yet the response from most Christian leaders has been….silence. Christians have no idea how to talk about gaming.

Reagan Rose wants to talk about gaming. Regan is the founder of Redeeming Productivity, a ministry that helps Christians develop a biblically-grounded understanding of personal productivity. 

In this episode, I ask Reagan:

• Can you be a growing Christian man and  play video games?
• What are the dangers of gaming?
• What does gaming have to do with the way men steward their time and attention?
• How can men decide ahead of time what games to play and when to play them?
• How can dads help their kids develop healthy gaming habits?

If you're looking for thought-provoking, biblically-based training on gaming - get a copy of Reagan's Guide to Gaming.

Being a godly dad is challenging. If you're like most dads, you walk around most days feeling like a failure as a husband and father.

But it doesn’t have to be this way.

Author/speaker/full-time growing dad, Kent Evans,  wants to help men like you. He believes that wherever you are as a father - you can turn around and live as a more confident, godly dad who leads his family - without regrets.

In this interview with Kent we talk about :

• The need for dads who are memorizing scripture.
• How the key to conversation with your kids is asking better questions.
• The role that spiritual friendship plays in being a godly dad.
• Common challenges that dads are facing.

Learn more about Kent at manhoodjourney.org

Do you feel like your prayer life is stuck in a rut? Are you the kind of guy who occasionally finds himself paralyzed by anxiety?

Trusted friend, Robert Barkerding, knows what it's like to wrestle with God in prayer. In this episode, Robert shares his story of learning to trust God’s sovereignty during the most difficult season of his life. If you’re a guy who feels stuck with a stale prayer life, then you’ll want to pick up his book The Miracle of Matthew.

If you need help building a lifestyle of putting Christ first, you can get the training you need at www.menneedhelp.org

Satan’s tool belt of lies is diverse. At times he tries to lure us into sin by waxing a shine on forbidden fruit. Other times he tries to keep us in sin by making us believe that God’s arm is too short to save and His ear too heavy to hear. He doesn’t care about how he snares us. The only thing that matters to him is that we end up tightly bound in a web of deception.

Want training on lie-detecting? Get it here: The lies of sin
Get training of fighting sin by reading Joe's book Surviving the Trenches - available in paperback, audio, and ebook.