Blessed is an understatement

You know in life when you have big moments that you'll remember forever? New school, first love, wedding, moving and whatever else. Well I believe I had one of those "I'll remember forever..." moments yesterday with my wife

IT WASN'T AS BIG THO...

We were packing and the stress of it started taking over, so we decided to take a break from the packing stuff. For whatever reason we decided to take a nap, and when we laid down my mind started racing. Is this the right choice, am I being a good husband, does Mel REALLY want to follow me to OKLAHOMA!!

Literally as soon as I started thinking all these things my wife leaned over to me, kissed me and said "I love you so much babe" and rested her hand on my arm.

EVERY STRESS WENT AWAY INSTANTLY

God's been doing stuff like that a lot lately, and I thank Him every day that I have a wife who's behind me no matter what, and because of her reassuring self, I'll remember yesterday until the day I die.

I love you babe :)

Skeptical... ism?

I have my opinions on the pros and cons that come along with running a Jr High and High School combined church service, and whether my opinion is right or wrong is besides the point, but I'd be lying if I said I can't help but pick apart a service when I go for the first time. Not because I don't agree with church, because I do, given the fact I just got hired at one, but like I've mentioned before, I have little patients for people who mess up the whole idea of what Christianity is all about by being "too Christian" or "lame Christians" as I call them.

But this last Wednesday, I went to my brother Justin's church. He works at CCV San Dimas, and has been there for a bit. They have recently merged both Jr. High and High School together to one big service on Wednesday nights. Mel and I were talking before about the things we didn't like about merging since we both weren't fans of the services we have been to in the past that do it that way. I can tell you honestly that all our thoughts of how the service would have gone were way off.

IT WAS SO RAD.

Though it took a little while to get the students in since they started with the message (which is to be expected of students that age), as soon as the Director there, Jeff, started getting into it, the students were all in. There was a great testimony from a guy named Adrian who told us of his troubled upbringing and how he relied on God to get him through everything. Made me realize how lucky I really had it. When Jeff closed in prayer the band started playing. Jeremiah Mullins, the worship director, immediately took control of the mood and the students. I have not seen students worship the way they did in a while. The authenticity of the students was obvious and the fact that they were louder than Jeremiah even when he was singing into the microphone gave me chills.

GOD IS WORKING IN THAT PLACE

I tell you this because its exciting. Praise God that cool stuff is going down over there! I have been working at IHC for the last year and I have seen God work in INCREDIBLE ways in that place, and it gets me super stoked to know that there is something just as rad going on a city over. IHSM has grown so much this last year and it has been an honor to be a part of it and I know my brother will be able to step back a year from now and take pride in what God is doing where he's at.

God was, is, and always will be good my friends... that I promise.

You Never Know...

As a lot of you guys know I work at Starbucks. I see lots of people each and every morning and I get the honor to serve people coffee... MOST OF THE TIME.

More and more I've realized how picky we as consumers have become, and in return, I have realized it's that pickiness alone that has has turned half of us into some sort of hypocrites. Allow me to explain, and to start this off I want you to know I am just as guilty as anyone I'm talking about here:

It surprises me how upset people get when things don't go their way, especially at Starbucks. If there's a long wait or their drink happens to be made wring, they throw a fit! We've had coffee thrown at our front door, I've been called a worthless pice of you know what, and to be honest I could go on for days! On top of that it blows me away to see how many of those people either go to my church, go to a church, or drive away with some sort of Jesus sticker on their car! How have we as Christ followers become so prude? Even today, like I said I'm just as guilty, I got upset at a lady because the computer wasn't taking my credit card! Looking back I feel so bad!

We need to remember that as Christ followers we should be living above all that. We should be living a lifestyle where no matter where we are, we are representing Christ, not one that demands to be catered to at all times no matter what!

I always think that what if Jesus was in disguise, like that Family Guy episode where he's the Record shop owner, and I treated him like I treated that lady today... that would suck! I want to stay as far away from that as possible!

Let's go back to the basics people... Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength, and Love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these"

Let God Do His Thing

We're getting down to the day we move. Mel and I were talking the other day about how God's been working in our lives, and how all of our confusion and stress this last few months has finally made sense... so I thought I'd fill everyone else in on how everything has gone down so far.

Before we got married, we were looking for a house. We had actually gotten to the point where we had 3 offers down on 2 different places. Things were looking great until our Real Estate agent LITERALLY dropped off the face of the Earth. We haven't heard from him in about 5 months now. We were so bummed! So as our search for a home came to an end and we realized we were going to be stuck in a studio apartment until July, we realized we may as well move up our wedding date... because really what was a few months more of saving REALLY going to do. We were originally going to get married May 1st, on a Yacht and could only fit 150 people on it. We quickly realized that wasn't going to happen, so we decided to have the wedding at our church here in Chino. Honestly it was the best choice we could have made... Our wedding was so much fun. BUT, a week before we got married I was told my internship was going to be up in May, so all of a sudden my income was going to be cut in half. I couldn't avoid the stress that came along with that news.

I tell you all of this because everything we didn't get; everything we were questioning started to unfold. Two days after we got back from our Honeymoon, I posted my resume online, being open to wherever God may lead us, and praying SO SO hard that we would get even a hint of a reply. No joke, about 45 minutes later we got a call from a guy named Tim from New Community Church in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Through conversation for a few weeks, we flew out there for the "formal" interview and got hired! Starting April I will be the Director of Student Ministries there. God totally moved and we've just been going along for the ride!

I look back at all of this and wondered how we would have been able to do any of this if we had a house... the stress of trying to sell right after buying would have been ridiculous. And if we had waited to get married until May, we still wouldn't have even posted our resume yet. The fact that my internship was going to be up in May, and I start my new job in April is BEYOND ME.

It goes to show that our God has an amazing plan for each and every one of us, and if anything, from our testimony alone, I would encourage anyone who is relying on God to lay their paths straight to keep relying on Him!! He has a bigger plan than we can see and we owe it to our amazing God to allow Him to FULLY take over... Let's go back to the basics guys... God is bigger than us. He cares about us more than we know. So why spend so much time worrying about what is going to happen next?

Let God do His thing...

New Stuff Man... New Stuff

Wow, God's been moving that's for sure. I'm not too sure of what to think. We're moving real far away and allowing God to intervene and run our lives. We're moving to Oklahoma, and get an opportunity to build a student ministry in Oklahoma. We're SO STOKED! Pray for us!