Sermons
Training, Mar. 9 — Erik Braun
I spent 50 minutes on the trainer on Thursday night (Mar. 9). It has been busy since then, so I haven’t had a chance to log the time until now (Monday night, Mar. 13).
The training was aimed at doing “Cruise Intervals.” Now, just to be clear, I have not finished reading Friel’s book yet. In fact, I have not had time to read it for a while. Instead, I have glanced ahead and looked at some of the workouts in the appendix. I have selected this workout because it focuses on a skill (Endurance) that I will need for BRAG. So, if anyone reads this who understands the dynamics of proper training, understand that I am trying to figure this out as I go. That said, Cruise Intervals involves working at a pace a little above lactate threshold for 10-12 minutes at a time. You then recover before repeating an interval. When doing these, the book says that you can go into superthreshold or even the aerobic capacity level of work. I tried to limit myself to working at superthreshold (163-166 HR).
So, here is the workout:
Warm up, 8 minutes.
Cruise Interval, 10 min., 162 Avg. HR.
Recovery ~2 min., 152 Avg. HR.
Cruise Interval, 10 min., 163 Avg. HR.
Recovery ~2 min., 152 Avg. HR.
Cruise Interval, 10 min., 161 Avg. HR.
Recovery/Cool Down, ~7 min., 136 Avg. HR.
Total Workout: 50 min., 151 Avg. HR, 170 Max. HR.
During the workout, I listened to a sermon by Erik Braun. Erik is the “senior” pastor of Four Oaks Community Church. Since he is younger than me, it is hard to think of him as a senior anything. I think that Four Oaks is one of the only redeeming qualities that I can think of in Tallahassee. Anyone who passes through Tally should stop in for church.
Erik was preaching on Worship. A very good sermon. Unfortunately, they no longer have a link for the sermon on their webpage. He gave the sermon on Sept. 11, 2005. He talked about worship as the ultimate commitment of a believer. You can find Erik’s thoughts on worship here.
While I am giving Erik some props, you can find his blog here. However, not all is great at the blog. Erik has his settings so that he now moderates comments. While this keeps him from having comment spam, not every comment submitted makes it onto the blog.
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Training, Mar. 6
I was back on the trainer last night. I did 45 minutes total.
5+ minutes warm up
15 minutes at subthreshold pace
2+ minutes recovery at aerobic pace
15 minutes at subthreshold pace
7+ minutes recover at aerobic pace.
I listened to another Mars Hill Church sermon by Mark Driscoll. I am still trying to decide whether I am a fan or not. This was a sermon on church administration as much as anything else. It was from 1 Corinthians, where Paul says that he is a master builder. I think that he covered all of the points, but his sermon is not in the style of “classical” expository preaching, along the lines of John Piper. I plan on listening to one or two more sermons to see what I think.
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Training, Feb. 9
I finally had the chance to ride again last night. I was on the trainer in the garage. I had wanted to ride my bike into my office, where I needed to pick up my car. My wife insisted that I let my mom drive me and then ride after I was back. I guess it was just as well, it was pretty cold last night.
I decided to try to understand what recovery pace should be. I still have done any baseline testing, but I tried to keep my heart rate under 100. That is in the 55-60% of Max HR range. My heart rate did spike up to at least 130, but my average was 98 for the hour of riding. It felt very slow. I did not sweat much, if at all. I guess that to recover, you really need to slow down. As I work my way through the Cyclist’s Training Bible, I will have to see if this is actually the right pace. It feels too slow.
I listened to a John Piper sermon on Romans 1:18. The thesis is that God is pouring (active verb) out His wrath. Piper highlighted three ways that Romans talks about the wrath of God: death, futility, and degradation. Death (both natural and spiritual) is the result of sin, particularly original sin. Futility talks about the frustration that we face as things do not go our way. Degradation refers to the fact that God gives people over to their sin when they refuse to do what is right. Romans refers to each of these as a consequence of sin.
The good news is that God speaks with two voices. In Romans 8:20, when Paul discusses futility, he also talks of God subjecting the world “in hope.” So in the midst of God pouring out wrath, He also speaks hope and salvation.
Great workout. Great sermon.
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Training Jan. 31
Last night’s training:
Cross training - played basketball with the youth team. We didn’t scrimmage the whole hour like we have been doing recently. We did some much needed work on fundamentals first. Then scrimmaged at the end, but I got some exercise in.
Cycling - the goal was 45 minutes, working on strength. To work on strength, I increased the resistance on the trainer by one notch, and then did intervals. I warmed up for 15 minutes, then did three five minute intervals that consisted of 1 minute standing at higher resistance, 1 minute sitting at higher resistance, and 3 minutes of recovery. After the last recovery, I did 15 minutes of spinning to finish the 45 minute workout.
I listened to a John Piper sermon on Romans 1:16-17. The sermon dealt with salvation for the believer being in the future and as a result of being justified by faith. It also dealt with the phrase “from faith to faith.” According to Piper, the phrase means that we are saved by faith at the beginning, but also by persevering in our faith. That initial faith then increases our faith. By living in faith every day, we receive more faith to continue.
This morning I finally dropped below 200 lbs. for the first time in a couple of months. The holiday feasts were not kind to my waistline. I need to lose more weight to get into shape for BRAG.
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Katrina, Naomi, and the Saints
Well, I suppose that it is inevitable that I eventually talk about Hurricane Katrina in this blog. It is inevitable for several reasons. First, one of the initial reasons I thought about creating this blog was to process my reaction to Katrina. Another is that it is the pivotal event in current affairs right now. Pretty hard to avoid references to Katrina these days.
But first, a little aside. I have been downloading and listening to sermons these days. I listen in the car when I am driving around town, or going on a long drive. I went on a long drive last week to a nearby city and back. Along the way, I listened to a sermon by a pastor in Tallahassee about the last part of the book of Ruth. One of the points in the sermon was that God uses events to bring about his will. In Ruth, God used a famine to His own ends. As a result of the famine, Elimilech and Naomi went to Moab with their two sons. While there, Elimilech and the two sons all died. Naomi wound up a bitter woman, and returned to Bethlehem with her daughter-in-law, Ruth. Through providence, God brought Ruth and Boaz together, they married, and had a son, Obed. Now Obed was not just any man from Bethlehem; he was the grandfather of David, yes that David, the future King. It goes on of course, that David is the ancestor of the Messiah. So God used the famine to bring about the eventual salvation of mankind.
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