Living Hazzardously

Little pieces of our journey with Jesus

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 He connected, he cared, he died.

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So many dreams I have had, each one makes me stop and reflect. I remember the bible stories of troubled rulers… kings and princes, and how the interpretation of the dream leads to success or failure… but what is the proper interpretation of a dream? Who can tell?

“For years, my mind was consumed by the mechanics of the trade—HVAC, calculated career moves, and getting a Minnesota boiler’s license before I even fully understood what a boiler was. But today, I’m not thinking about the trades. I’m thinking about a dream that woke me at 3:00 AM… 

But boilers are not what I want to write about today… I want to write about my dream. Not the dream of having freedom to travel, see the tetons or hike colorado mountains… I am talking about the dream that wakes you in the middle of the night and keeps you from sleeping… not a nightmare, A DREAM!

My dream last night woke me at about 3 am and would not allow me to drift back to visit, rather I was “Awake, Alive and Enthusiastic” AGAIN! These dreams seem to come more frequently as I get older, but usually my dreams contain details of my many projects and plans… This one seems to be advice, a reflection or maybe a warning…

Let me set the stage: His name? Tom. One of my old bosses, one of a very short list that actually seemed to care about me and took the time to visit with me about life… but I always wondered… who visits with Tom? Does anyone stop and listen to him? For years we talked about his passion to hike in the Colorado mountains. I never made it there but we shared the same passion and excitement about ultra light weight back pack camping and silly motos like “LEAVE NO TRACE”…

In a way, that’s how he lived his life, no trace, quietly sinking into a gin bottle. He died at age 66. 

I had a few influential bosses over the years but Tom? He always seemed to have genuine concern. When he passed away I was living up north and had not heard from him for years. This disconnect when I move away seems to be more normative than the exception. I left highschool, I don’t see or hear much from my classmates. I moved from Ramsey to Belle Plaine, that’s pretty much the end of all those folks as well. I leave a job and all they say as I walk out is “Hey, can you make sure to leave the door key? We are running low.” I don’t get invitations, cards, flowers and other social items that establish community connection. I just drift in like an unfamiliar scent on the wind and then disperse into the ether as a vague, unfamiliar encounter. 

That’s why Tom had such a deep impact in my life, He connected, he cared, he died. 

Back to my dream last night: 

Jess and I were out and about and we stumbled into Tom and his wife, they both had big afros. (I have no idea why!) Tom had traditionally been a thin man but today he was plump, but not too plump… he looked healthy, and I mentioned this to him, I told him he looked great and I was glad to see he had gained weight after he retired… he looked at me and mentioned that retiring was the best thing he ever did and recommended I retire early… he said he never lived so much as after he retired. And then in a flash, he was gone, only his faceless wife remained in my dream, and she slowly drifted off into the mist. 

The sad part about Tom? I moved up after quitting my Job where he worked in 2018, he climbed into his Gin Bottle pretty hard before I left and he died in 2021… Three years after I left. While I was still working I saw a few other guys work until they were dying as well, each one built a fortress of retirement so tall and so powerful that they were all going to have a great, wealth filled retirement… None of them lived long enough to actually enjoy it, except maybe two out of I don’t even know how many guys. I saw them work into the age of retirement only to knock on death’s door and be invited in.

I recently found out I am dying… How? Someone told me the rumor… the truth? No, I am not dying… It seems there is a powerful rumor about this..  and it seems to be concentrated in a specific “community” of my recent past. I have been rumored about in the past, afterall… I went through a horrible divorce in a small town… but this community? It seems to be the “lifeblood”.

 But this sure makes me stop and think, nobody knows the last breath date or time, yet we all will pass over the threshold of this life to the next. Either into the beautiful golden streets of Heaven or the fiery lake of hell… I wonder how many of those old friends I will see again? Worked their entire life, built a kingdom, lived the American dream!

So many guys build a plush retirement only to find that the light at the end of the tunnel is an oncoming train. If we are on the wrong tracks, how do we switch them this late in life? The end. it comes to us all, but it’s not the end of this life we should be concentrating on, it’s if we are on the right set of tracks, and entering the right dark tunnel. 

Is it possible to change tracks? I think it’s time to change our destination, but the question for me is this… How does switching tracks look, this late in my life? Is it a derailment? Is it an unforeseen and unexpected “switch” in this dark tunnel? Is it stopping inside the tunnel and breathing the thick black smoke of the coal fired engine so as to reverse back out? 

For me, it looks like a deliberate halt. I have started the liquidation of all my projects… Selling all my diesel trucks, engines, transmissions, turbos, alternators, injection pumps and all the other “accessories I have accumulated, like a 6-pack of oil filters that got misplaced in the mess… Do I scrap my newly constructed smoker? (It holds 12 chickens at once and works fantastic!)  How about the garden? Or worse yet… What do I do with all parts I have in inventory for HVAC?  It’s  time to stop building bigger barns and sell the overstock of wheat!  

This dream I had is not the catalyst I needed to move forward, it’s only the confirmation God has provided to do the right thing and build my future before I meet him… FACE TO FACE… and talk to him as a man would talk to another man. 

This life is great, I love living, I have loved all my projects and I have been a very successful business man, but I also see the beauty in downsizing before I am forced to by my kids or an ailment that decides what I will be doing the rest of my life. 

But my question for you is this…. Are you so busy building a future that you don’t have time to live? Are you so tired from building your retirement that you can’t enjoy what you have? Are you spending the last healthy years earning your future that your future engulfs you today?

Even more than that, do you know where you will be when the door you knock on is death? When you step across that threshold that can not be “reversed” out of, will you see your savior or your conqueror?  

In the balance of life, there is only one true hope, it’s not found in a gin bottle, it’s not found in a lucrative retirement investment and its not found in a well thought out strategy… The one true hope is Jesus, so my advice? “Know Jesus and make Him the Lord of your life, not the retirement you have or the projects you make or the people you trust” 

When life derails, or you need to switch tracks or perhaps just stop and reverse out of the tunnel, do so in prayer… C.

Standing Firm in the Cross Hairs

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When Jess and I first stood out front of that old 1938 hospital building, we weren’t just looking at old blocks and broken windows next to sagging doors and a twisted deck. We were looking at Sam’s legacy. We saw a sanctuary—a safe harbor for people who are too often pushed into the margins of society.

But choosing to follow the Lord’s leading and walk in obedience to His will means leaning into the hard things and taking immense risks for what matters. Standing firmly in that gap has a cost. 

Sam’s Place provides help to people who are forgotten and not much “fun or virtuous to serve”. After all, those that are “profound” are fun, everyone knows they need help and virtue demands compassion! But what about those that are not “profound”? The ones that need a little bit of help? The ones that people shun because they stare while standing in the road… the ones that wander and don’t know personal boundaries? The ones that society doesn’t love? The ones that need a little bit of guidance… the ones on the margins of society? 

We envisioned Sam’s Place as a standard for the “Recovery First” model, not a place where you can live comfortably smoking your drugs with Neighbors and getting drunk (like it had been in the past). A place built to restore basic human dignity through safety, structure, and unconditional care.

But choosing to live “Hazzardously” and standing firmly in that gap will come at a cost.

I would be lying if I said it was easy. Battling relentless systemic friction from day one wears on you. We have faced an uphill battle just trying to get the county to acknowledge our Supplemental Service Beds. Even the Sheriff’s hands are tied by a frustrating lack of penalties, leaving us exposed while Prosecutors and Judges refuse to uphold the very laws and established rights that should protect us from trespassing and the abuse of “tenant rights.”

To keep this mission from going under in the face of that friction, Jess and I have had to personally anchor the entire program. We utilized our retirement—putting $200,000 of our own money straight into the startup and building improvements. We then backed that up with another $150,000 loan just to bring the facility up to a usable, dignified standard. Because of that sacrifice, we managed to lift the appraised value to $323,000. (do that math)

We’ve spent our nights chasing down grants, relying on the wonderful folks who see our impact and send in-kind or monetary donations. It’s the little things like dropping $6,000 in repairs just to keep a $9,000 van on the road. And through every single second of this, neither Jess nor I have ever taken a single dime of pay for our time, our labor, or our sacrifice.

So when we strategically listed the physical building for sale to protect our cash flow and keep the mission alive, the public backlash cut deep. We were met with toxic rumors and ugly comments from people claiming we were somehow trying to “get rich.”

The irony is incredibly sharp, but our focus has to be sharper. We listed the brick-and-mortar precisely so the organization can survive. Living Hazzardously doesn’t mean giving up when the noise gets loud; it means making the agonizing choices needed to protect the soul of the mission.

We want to say this clearly and unequivocally to our blog readers, our community, and everyone who believes in us: Jess and I are not retreating. We are digging in and  fortifying.

We are shutting out the outside noise and looking directly past this temporary friction. We are here to build a sustainable, long-term legacy that ensures Sam’s Place remains a permanent beacon of hope for Bigfork. The building is just a shell—the mission is our heartbeat.

I fight for your guys, because Jesus saved my soul. What else can I do aside from serving our Lord. C.

The sun rises today on a new day, a new hope, a new tomorrow!

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The sun is less than two hours from breaking over the trees for the day, I sit and wonder how this day will go and what new challenges I will face. It’s funny how God does things, I would do them so much differently than he does, but in the end, He always delivers the best, every time. 

I basically closed Springlake Heating and Air after many successful years and thousands of satisfied customers. My knee, the lack of technicians, the limited infrastructure of the north woods… It took me Twice as long to install a furnace than it did only 2 years ago. I can’t make money working a maximum 4 hours a day… the pain of going up and down a flight of stairs carrying parts and tools back and forth… I tried to make the trips more efficient to reduce the number of trips and it didn’t help because I can only carry so much stuff in one trip. I found myself risking damaging peoples houses by carrying too much stuff or the trips themselves were harder because I carried too much weight… I just can’t do this efficiently on one leg… My heart broke every time I turned down another customer in need. And so Jess and I decided I just can’t continue…

BUT The sun rises today on a new day, a new hope, a new tomorrow! (I feel like this should be titled “Episode IV, A new Hope”) Yes, there is hope. Hope in a renewed day. Hope in a brighter day. Hope in the future. Without hope? There can be no joy. Without hope there are only memories of the best days. This hope came from a most unexpected place, a most unpredictable time and completely out of nowhere…. 

I remember 2014. I had lost all hope in finding a good wife, a partner that would bare the burden of life with me … Dating in your 40’s is not fun, nor is it easy… I gave up all hope and decided to buy a small house, fully embrace the bachelor lifestyle and live as a single man. I made plans to dig out and install a ramp into the basement where I could start working on bikes and stuff. Real “guy stuff” life. Basically transform my house into a shop (I still dream of this plan)… live like a man would live if he could… but then Jess came along from a very unexpected place, in a very unexpected way with a very unexpected set of challenges. Together we formed “Livinghazzardously”.

No “Regerts”. 

Jess…. She is my “Lady Galadriel in Lothlórien” that gave me the shining “Star of Eärendil”. The shining star that guided “Chuckie Baggins” while trapped in the sticky webs of Shelob’s “bachalorism”. The dark of that night was lifted as I traversed my way through the challenges of Mordor on the life quest to serve our savior, Jesus. Call me a dork… and yes I had to look all those names up.  

And so like the days of old, today I have hope of a brighter future for Spring Lake Heating. Perhaps things will turn out alright afterall? Perhaps the break I created by closing things down was the break I needed to start the next chapter? Perhaps the next chapter is actually greater than the last? 

Anyway, today is a very special day for me as a grandfather, so I will cut this short, I have work to do. I have a renewed hope, I have a joy in my heart that reaches to the moon and back ( I know, it’s super dark outside, the new moon is here). 

In Service of the one true GOD. C.