Born to Fight: The Requirements of a Christian Disciple Are Incredibly Parallel to Those of a Martial Artist

By Ron Hullett

The requirements of a Christian disciple incredibly parallel those of a martial artist. We were all born to be fighters. Its a fight to overcome temptation to do wrong and temptation not to do right. Lets train together through the pages of this book.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Feb 15, 2018
• ISBN: 9781973618881

Ron Hullett

Ron Hullett was born and raised in Tyler, Texas, one of seven children. After graduating high school in 19777, he worked as a welder for three years. Ron surrendered to the call of God on his life to be a youth pastor in 1980. That fall he enrolled in Bible College in Missouri where he met his bride to be and they were married in the summer of 1983. Upon graduating from college in 1984, he began serving as a full-time youth pastor in Arlington, Texas. After eight years, the Lord moved Ron and his family back to Missouri to be youth pastor in the church he attended while going to college. Twelve years later and the Lord saw fit to move the Hullett family to Florida. This is where Ron currently serves as youth pastor. He is the father of two beautiful daughters. He is grandfather to five terrific grandsons. Ron is a second-degree black belt and Alumni of the FBI Citizens Academy. Ron’s summery of all of this? “All I can say is, I AM BLESSED.”

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Copyright © 2018 Ron Hullett.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

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ISBN: 978-1-9736-1887-4 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-1886-7 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-9736-1888-1 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2018901618

WestBow Press rev. date: 02/14/2018

Contents

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Chapter 1 Enjoy the Beating?

Chapter 2 Is There Not a Cause?

Chapter 3 Back to Basics

Chapter 4 Know Your Opponent

Chapter 5 Training Daily

Chapter 6 Nine National Champions

Chapter 7 Becoming an Instructor

Chapter 8 I Used To!

Endnotes

Acknowledgments

You will read about these people in the pages of this book but I would like to extend an extra thank you to My precious Mom, my sister Lois, my dear friend Chris Stewart and my Instructor Mr. Tony Isaacs and all my fellow trainees. Our many Breaking Point Team members. And certainly my very supportive wife Cindy and daughters Brittany and Natalie. Your impact on my life is irreplaceable. I thank God for each of you.

Introduction

Life has been paralleled with many things: a journey, a mystery, a quest, a race, an obstacle course, a highway, a puzzle, and more. The great Apostle Paul, in 2 Timothy 4:7, sums up life as a fight, saying, I have fought a good fight.

Earlier in 2 Timothy 2, he charged young Timothy,

You therefore must endure hardship as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No one engaged in warfare entangles himself with the affairs of this life, that he may please him who enlisted him as a soldier (2Timothy 2:3-4)

Learn how to fight, or that bully will ruin your life. That bully is none other than Satan himself.

Did you know that we can actually grow fond of being whipped? That’s right; you like being beat up.

Would you allow me to share how it is that nine national champions could be in one school at the same time? What is the key to being a champion, a victorious fighter?

We are without a doubt in a war, the fight of our lives. Paul warned the Ephesians, For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places (Eph. 6:12) Wouldn’t we love to be able to say, like Paul, I fought a good fight?

Our heavenly Father has used animals, birds of the air, and even a potter working a lump of clay. Our Lord told Jeremiah in Jeremiah 18:2, Arise and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will cause you to hear My words.

If the Lord could use a potter with a wheel and a lump of clay to cause us to hear Him, could He not use a martial artist as well?

I would be honored to come alongside you through the pages of this book and share the priceless parallels that our heavenly Father has given me through years of martial arts training, instruction, and competition.

There is most definitely a battle going on inside of us. Our flesh tries to bully and overpower our spirit every day. The one we feed and train will win those battles.

I say then: Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; and these are contrary to one another, so that you do not do the things that you wish. (Gal. 5:16–17)

To the victor go the spoils. It’s not a plastic trophy that we aim to secure but a crown presented to us by our Father Himself!

Are you a fighter? Were you at one time? Let’s get back into God’s gym, or shall we say dojo? Strength, courage, determination, steadfastness, commitment, and endurance are just a few of the very beneficial characteristics developed by a fighter. We need this.

Let’s be the warriors we long to be. Let’s train together.

Let’s fight!

1

Enjoy the Beating?

I Want to Be a Fighter

Karate wowed me from the first moment I witnessed it on television as a little boy. I watched Kung Fu, Bruce Lee, and Chuck Norris. I had no idea at that young age that Chuck Norris would one day pay me a visit. We’ll talk more about that later.

I do remember thinking to myself, Oh, I wish I could do what they do. I wanted to be able to kick high and punch fast and hard. I wanted to be able to do those jump kicks and spin kicks. I wanted to be able to grapple and take guys down in close quarters. I wanted to be able to smoothly disarm them and hold them in submission. I wanted to be able to fend off bullies and protect my friends and loved ones.

However, karate lessons cost money something that our family didn’t have a lot of. Okay, that’s a cop-out. As much as I, usually the smallest guy in my class, wanted to stop the bullying, I feared the bully karate instructor. I quietly thought that I needed to possess at least some kind of fighting skills to join a karate class. I was afraid that these guys would pound on me simply because they could, and so it remained a dream for years.

There are many who don’t get involved in the church because they don’t know what they don’t know. They miss out on so much. Others miss out on knowing them as well, anticipating bad experiences perhaps because of previous bad experiences. They completely misjudge the situation. If every individual person is different, then for that reason alone, it would be impossible for every church to be the same. Our arrival makes it different still. But still too many put it off for what they think will be a better time some day in the future, maybe. They continue to miss out on so much for so long.

At the age of twenty-one, I enrolled in a Bible college to prepare to be a youth pastor. This is what I knew God was calling me to do. While I was there, the karate flame was rekindled. I was told that this school had a Taekwondo class that trained students to use karate in order to share the Bible. Justified! I thought. Learn how to beat people up for the glory of God! Yes! The class was instructed by a dynamic Christian man. He was six feet, four inches tall and weighed two hundred and twenty pounds. He was a black belt. He had won multiple national championships. He was a bad dude, but he loved the Lord! His name was Mr. Tony Isaacs, and he was always more interested in talking about Christ than karate. Surely he wouldn’t mop the floor with my head just because he could—and he could.

We should do this, said a few of my freshmen buddies.

I wanted to do it, but I had been out of high school for three years and didn’t know what to expect from college professors. Would there be enough time for my studies and karate? It would have to wait.

Oh, so close. Just like in our own spiritual lives, so much has to just wait another year. Someone else invites us to church, to a small group study, or to a church activity, and we pass it up once again. And we had a great excuse I’m sure. Oh, well.

The First Day

One year later, I had learned some of the ropes, so to speak. I learned how to manage college life and balance my studies and recreation time while also working