I want to remember this simple yet profound time in my life.  A stone of remembrance so in twenty years I can look back and be stoked on where my life has led.  Today, you've broke ground on the future of your business and the Lord has built a solid foundation of support and fellow friends.  Remember November 2nd 2012 was a time to build, a time to mourn, and a time to rejoice.  What God has done is by far miraculous.  Praise Him!

Identity

35 years of life and I still struggle with identity.  Finally the point is coming where it's ok to be solid, to be confident, to lead with intensity and vision.  I always look to past friends, family, business partners to see their progress and match it up to mine.  Am I keeping up?  Have I reach my full potential?  What stratigec moves do I have to make to catch up?

And in all that I realize I'm trail blazing...I'm leading the industry...I'm the one they're keeping up with.  Do they watch my every move like I watch theirs or do they even care?  Am I a fool in believe that everyone else is like me and struggles with the same sins, and disbelief, and pains?  I question myself daily.

Maybe that's why I am successful.  Maybe that's why I have so much tenacity to push the envelope.  I don't know, I don't really think it matters.  What matters is that finding who we are and where we stand, it's elementary but important.  Now that I'm aimed with passion and vision, fully whole, it's time to begin that legacy we all want to live.

I'm standing confident in my failures, my utter disappointments, and my tragedies!  It's in these that I find my identity!  Without these there would be not challenge, no fight, no reason to press on.  Thankfully, I don't run this race solo and so many do...my teammate and total inspiration is that man who did what no other could ever do, He died the death that only He could, all to ransom me.

I love being dependent.  I hate being independent.  It's something that's taken years to change in me but it's much more beautiful to put the burden on a trust worthy friend than carry it yourself.  I'd rather be in the midst of poverty than be among the wealthy.  I'd rather lose everything if it meant I'd gain just one thing.

Jesus truly is all and in all.  Our dependence upon his faithfulness is transformational.  It's spectacular! I'd long to watch him work and move in my life and the lives before me.  When he is given the reigns in our lives only good and perfect things will come.  This I encourage all, press in and press on...in Jesus and in Him alone.

One thing I realize the more I live: relationship and love are more important than anything else in our existence. Having children trust and love you. Knowing they feel incredibly safe when you're solidly leading them. Children, when given te chance, will spend hours and days with their parents if they're shown real love and guidance. It's just all to common for kids these days to be set out on their own just to be thrown to the lions to be devoured by this cruel world. Please, if you have children of any age, give them the assurance that they're important and loved, with reservation. As parents we'll be rewarded! More than loving children the one most intimate relationship is with our spouse. God gives and God takes away, either way we bless His name. Life isn't meant to live alone, either friends, best friends, or our spouses will bring that togetherness we all long for. You'll never be joyful nor happy without the love you can find between two extremely close people. If its on vacation, out to a movie, or to dinner it's 10x's more fulfilling with those who you love and love you back. So in all lifes pains and continual tribulations seek and find those few select people that bring fulfillment to your life. Not those who take and never give back but those that give and bring joy and good things to your life. Living this life alone will be a disappointment, and a life lives with sorrow and loneliness. God desires us to live fulfilling full lives. If we seek after bringing peace to those around you we'll attract people, lovers, like-minded, and amazing people into our live. Amazing people that we can share this exciting and everchanging world we live in.

The big day is here.  July 10th.

There is no greater joy then to see the hand of God, our creator, move.  Today God proved Himself able to do more than I could ask or think.  Today, He caused my disbelief to fail and my belief to come to life!

There are only better days ahead.  Today is a day of victory and celebration.  I will rejoice and be glad in it!!!

Tomorrow, July 10th is a big day for me.  It's been 45 days since I left home.  It's been a long time after living there for 6 full years and only leaving for short amounts of time for vacation an all.  I wish to go back so badly.  Everything in me is dying to walk though those doors again, a different, changed man.

You see I have lived the last 6 years of my life in obscurity.  Total isolation but on purpose.  I've continually pushed away the voice of reason and calling of God to pursue my own fleshly desires,  Desires that so badly need to be fed each and every single day.  I figured the more I live this way to easier it will become.  But I was wrong as most would suppose.

Tomorrow is a day of beginnings.  A day that I get to see the hand of God move mightily and rightly.  God knows my heart, my faults, my deadly sins, and yet He calls me the one He loves.

I am the one Jesus loves.  I am to Him what breath is to oxygen.  The love He has for me is deeper than any love known.  Agape.  Unconditional.  Without understanding.  An amazing love.

He has this love for you.  He waits until you're at the end of yourself to prove it even more so.  It's when we are empty of everything that exists to us that we see His love so clearly.  It's when all has been lost and only death remains that we have eyes to see the glory of His immense love.

The truth, God is love.  It's the one thing I never want to exist without!

Thank you for loving me, I'm forever in your debt.

Deep down doesn't everyone want to do well?  I mean doesn't everyone want to believe that when we die we will be missed.  If and when we depart do we hope there will be thunder and lightening and the earth will quake?



Would you rather be known for:
Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. 




Or would you really be known for:
adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lewdness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy, murder, drunkenness, revelries.


If everyone would take inventory of their lives and begin to notice what they're lives represent would you have regrets?  Would you be ashamed?  Would you even care to want to change?  Is it even possible to change and even if it is is it even worth it?

I've found that in the midst of my sin, and in the depth of it, I'm the most unsatisfied and only longing for more death.  Believe me when I say sin is deep.  Deeper than we'll ever imagine.  We can go as far as we like and it will never end, never.  And only death awaits and you'll be remembered no more and there may even be rejoicing when you depart.  Rejoicing because the rest of this fallen world doesn't need to be abused and threatened by you any longer.

I implore you, seek only good things.  Submit to God and allow Jesus to come into you.  Repent of your ways because they only lead to death, and it's a horrible death beyond all comprehension.  But there is hope in the midst of your deadly ways...Jesus the Christ, He alone can bring every good thing, even an unimaginable rest in the deadness of your calloused  heart.

Be someone that will leave a "good" mark in this world for generations and generations.  It is possible, He is able.

After over a decade of not seeing my dad I made a trip to San Diego to see if reconciliation was possible.  It was possible.  More so than I thought.  I now have a dad!  My kids have a grandpa, my wife a father-in-law.

I've dealt with years of abandonment and bitterness because I was believing a lie that I was hated and rejected.

Jesus brings healing much deeper than I've known before in my last 15 years of this futile faith I've been grasping onto.  My heart has been battered and broken, my spirit bruised and torn.  Now reconciliation begins, strongholds are being broken, and bondage no longer has a grip.

There is hope after all.  After all is lost there is only life left to gain.  wow.

Hello Jesus... It's been awhile. Thanks for talking to me the other night. I've missed you terribly.