Sunday the Best Day of the Week

Favorite Day of Week

                Ask most people you know the question; what is your favorite day of the week? For the most part the answer that you get will be Friday. Why is this you think? End of the work week, start of the party weekend, or start of the sports weekend are the answers that you will probably get out of most people. For me, if you ask what day is my favorite, I will tell you Sunday. When you give that as your answer most people look at you like you are CRAZY.

                About 2 months ago I realized quickly that there Sunday had rapidly become the day of the week that I just looked forward to all week long. Sundays for me have become a day of true rest or the Sabbath, but not in the way you would think about. You hear rest and think that it means lounge around watching football and just basically chilling. For me Sunday’s are the exact opposite of lounging around though. My family and myself are on the go almost all of Sunday starting right off in the morning when we wake up. Most Sundays are the day that we as a family sit down in the morning and have a good breakfast together to start our day.

                Then we move on to heading to the Church for fellowship and worship with our Church family. Let me tell you, this is just good stuff here. I completely love going to the Church and studying with my group and listening to my pastor speak the truth of the Word. The spiritual fulfillment that I receive on this day is something that I crave for throughout the week. This is something that I strive to feel every single day, but on Sundays being with the Church body and worshipping God together with my family just completes my week. Now don’t get me wrong, I am not just a show up on Sunday Church attendee who thinks that as long as I attend Church on Sunday I am doing all that is needed to please God. I have fully taken up the motto of Live in the Word, Under the Word, and in Prayer. It’s just that Sunday for me brings it all together. I often find that a lot of the stuff that I experience throughout the week and the questions that I have had are addressed somehow. For me that helps me to solidify what I have been studying and praying about all week.

                From our worship service, my family and I head to the house to have our family time. We have actually made Sunday a day that our children must spend time with not just each other, but my wife and I as well. Whether that is just watching a movie together, enjoying the pool, or playing a game together the point is that we are doing it as a family. I have found that even if we do nothing at least we are doing nothing together.

                Then we head back to Church to begin our Sunday night activities, which for the time being is participating in the S.O.U.L program right now. Myself and the boys are a part of the outdoor team in where we go into our community and focus on helping the people in our community that are unable to maintain their yards on their own for whatever reason they might have. Now I know I have said this before but I want to stress how good this feeling is. I am able to take my boys, who if I was to ask to mow my own lawn I would get nothing but complaints. Yet I am able to go to a complete stranger’s house and ask my boys to do yard work and they do it with nothing but smiles on their faces with no expectation of a reward. Now for me this is just God good.

                Our evening usually winds down after that with the kids getting ready for bed and my wife and I relaxing with each other. So again I will say to you, my favorite day of the week is Sunday hands down. For me it is an awesome day to reset, worship, and get ready for my upcoming week. Thank you and God Bless.

G.E.D.D

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Respect Your Wife

Respect Your Spouse

            OK so I will be the first to admit after a lot of SOUL searching, I am not perfect and I don’t know everything. There are things that I do on an everyday basis that I don’t even realize I am doing that upset my wife beyond comprehension, and unfortunately I am not very sensitive to her feelings on the subject. This is something that I have to work on hardcore, and I mean really start to consciously start thinking about what I am doing before I do it. Today I will outline a few of the things that I have done this week which even though I didn’t think it really affected my wife (or I knew and didn’t care), it had shown a level of disrespect to her that I was not even aware of.

            Monday- This day was my first day back to work after being off for most of July for vacation and surgery recovery. My morning started a 0355 waking up, showering, making my coffee, and heading out the door. My first UN thoughtful decision was not to take the dogs out to go to the bathroom. Some might think take the dogs out at 4 in the morning that’s CRAZY, and to tell you the truth that is what I thought also. The dogs were quiet and not making a fuss and my main focus was trying to be as quiet as possible to not wake up my wife while getting ready for work. But the things I don’t take into account are (1) my wife hears everything once I wake up and (2) I am not as quiet as I think. The other thing that does not even cross my mind is that even though the dogs are quiet and not making a fuss when I wake up is that eventually they are going to wake up about an hour after I head out to work and want to go to the bathroom which in turn wakes my wife up at about 5 am. This is something that I am going to have to make a conscious effort to improve on so my spouse can get a little better sleep in the mornings. The second thing I did on this day to just completely make her morning horrible was spill coffee on myself and not clean it up. I honestly thought that the mess went into the garage on not on the inside of the house, my mistake was the thinking part of this equation and not confirming what had actually happened. So as soon as I had the opportunity, I let my wife know that I had spilt coffee on myself while heading out the door to work, what I did not include was that apparently most of the coffee was on the inside of the house, all over her carpet and garage door. So basically by 7 am in the morning on Monday I had caused a huge mess and deprived my wife of sleep, and when the time came to answer for what I had done all I could think is why is she so mad at me I didn’t do it on purpose. Well that my friends is simple, I should have taken the time to show a little more respect to my wife by looking at what mess I had caused and cleaned it to save her the heartache. For this I am truly sorry, and I will find the strength to confirm things and not just ASSUME that it won’t bother my wife. Finally, after my wife cleaned the mess up and all was said and done, she asked me to clean the outside portion of the garage. I went outside and poured water on the spot on the ground to get it off the garage floor, but once again did not take the time to look at the door or door jam. HMMM, not very smart or thoughtful on my part. In the end my wife finally explained to me how disrespectful I was being and being the hard headed person I know I can be all I did was stand my ground that I was not wrong. Boy I can be stupid.

            Tuesday- My wife had a long trip ahead of her this day taking the kids to the airport to fly home. I made sure that when she got home that I had cleaned the door from the coffee stains and that the kitchen was cleaned for when she got home. You might be asking what I did wrong on this day, well here is the deal, she has strong feelings about our larger dogs being on the couches. We had broken our boxer of doing this about a year ago but recently Rocky has deemed that he belongs on the couch. While my wife is not OK with it we have not really gotten on him about it, well while I was on the couch playing my PS3 my Mastiff decided it was cuddle time with daddy. I being the typical person I am didn’t really think much of it at the time. Once my wife got home and we started talking about our day, our children started talking about how cute Harley looked on the couch today with DADDY. I immediately pretending like “I don’t know what these crazy children are talking about” when my wife just simply pointed out again that I was disrespecting her wishes by letting the dogs on the couch. Once again, lesson learned, I don’t always take my wife’s feelings into account when I let stupid things happen. I really wonder what the rest of the week is going to be like.

            I do know this, it is not just my responsibility but my duty as a husband to ensure that I am taking my wife’s wishes and feelings into account when I do things. This is something that I have to ensure that I make a dedicated effort to do every day, and for all who read this I suggest that you do the same, because in the end if your wife is not happy I promise you your house will not be happy either. So to Shannon I apologize for my retardedness and promise to make a conscious effort to respect your wishes, because as we learned in Genesis 2:18; Then the Lord God said, “It is not good for man to be alone. I will make a helper as his compliment.” (Woman) Thank you and God Bless.

G.E.D.D.

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S.O.U.L

Summer Of Ultimate Love (S.O.U.L)

            Well this subject is near and dear to my heart this year. I learned this acronym through my Church as a program where we take our children into the community and perform work projects to help out those in the community who cannot help themselves. This program is dedicated to showing our children that it is Godly and awesome to serve people in the community without hope of reward or recognition. Let me tell you something, it does have a reward that you would not imagine; pride, confidence, since of selfless service, joy, and overall love for your community. I mean for real, on my first experience with my outdoor team, I was able to take my 3 boys in 97 degree weather over to a complete strangers house and tell them we are going to help mow this gentleman’s yard who had been in an accident that laid him up in a wheelchair and unable to upkeep his land. Now my children don’t even want to mow my yard, which is in total under a half acre, without giving me issues. But to my surprise my children were out there moving sticks, raking leaves, and helping where ever they could, and enjoying every minute of it. This program is priceless, I mean come on now, teaching your children to just love the community that they live in through hard work and dedication, PRICELESS.

            Now lets take a look at the other meaning of S.O.U.L that presented itself to me this summer. Every year my wife and I get a chance to have our 3 children who don’t live with us full time to come and visit. This is something that we both look forward to and dread a little each year. The dread side of the house comes from the financial side of the house, which is to be expected when you have 6 kids in the house who eat like small horses. But having them here totally outweighs the financial burden put on the family.

            My summer started actually back in April right after my lap band surgery. I had finally received the call that I could come to work finally, something I had been waiting on for 6 months. It then was followed by the good news that we actually qualified for the first time home buyers tax credit that we had been previously told we hadn’t qualified for. This meant that we could now purchase a quality above ground pool in preparation for the kids arrival in the summer, which in the end meant cheap entertainment for all the children. Then came June. Oh June. So many things happened in this month that was nothing short of a miracle that I can’t even count. First off to start the month, I had another issue with a bowel blockage that led to me being hospitalized for 5 days. The day after I got out of the hospital my wife had me going to an adult bible study group that I was a little apprehensive about attending. Then on the day that all of my children flew into Houston, I accepted Christ as my savior and was saved. This was all in the same week, for me miracle number one.

            So now all my children are here and we are having a great time. We are all going to Church, for my oldest child it was not an option I made him go, and you know what, I am glad that I did. In a little under a month, my son Colby, who did not happen to have the chances to attend and awesome Church like the one that we do here, came home and told me that he had accepted Christ as his savior and had found his salvation. So during the week before he left to go home to California we had him attend the Churches connect class with Shannon and me, and on the Sunday before he went home, both he and I got baptized together with his brothers and sisters watching. Miracle number 2.

            The first week of July the kids connect class began on Wednesday nights at our Church. This was an opportunity to get my youngest 2 children into the class and start learning about Christ and their relationships with Him. By the end of the second week of the 4 week class, I was presented with my most precious miracle yet; my 7 year old daughter had accepted Christ as her savior and found her salvation. I mean come on now. If you have never had the opportunity to see a 7 year old accept Christ as their savior you are missing out. I mean Anna came up to me and said “Daddy, the most wonderful thing happened to me today. I prayed to God and asked him to forgive me for my sins and let and to let me be a Christian. And you know what, He said yes.” With a huge smile on her face the whole time. Miracle number 3.

            Now unfortunately for my family this Summer is coming to a close. My oldest flew out 2 weeks ago back to California and today my other 2 step children will be flying home to be with their dad. This will mean that we will have some damage control coming up with our youngest daughter. She has been attached to her older sisters hip since she arrived, and every year when she leaves Anna is torn up for weeks about it. But there is nothing to worry about because she now has someone else she can talk to and look to for comfort. God and Jesus Christ. I fully believe that this will help not only her, but my wife and I through this tough time in her life. The one thing I can definitely say is that after this year, my wife and I are definitely looking forward to OUR Summer of Ultimate Love 2012. Thank you and God Bless.

G.E.D.D

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The Gospel

Why I Read the Bible

                This is such good subject for me to explore on. If you would have asked me a year ago, I would have told you I was reading the Bible because I just love to read. Ask me today, and I will tell you that I read in order to study the word of God. Studying the word of God is so much different than just reading the Bible to read it.

                About a year back, I got bored and told my wife that I was going to read the Bible from cover to cover just to see how long it would take me. Now keep in mind, I can read full novels in about a day if I am truly interested in the book. So I borrowed a Bible from my wife and just started to read it. In about 3 weeks I had finally completed reading it and was completely horrified. I mean I picked up this book and found it to be one of the most captivating yet terrifying stories I had ever read. The Bible tells us about all God’s work and the life and trials of Jesus as well as the history of the Church. Now I know what I am saying is shocking to some, but please stay with me. What I had learned from this experience of reading the Bible from cover to cover with no guidance is that that is not the way to read the Bible for your first time out. I mean without the guidance or Christ in your heart, you see a God who in the Old Testament was ruthless in his conviction of wanting people to do what was commanded. I mean he started wars, wiped the earth clean, and if you disobeyed him you usually wound up dead. I was so shocked by the Old Testament that I could not get the message of the New Testament. I mean I was so jaded I could not even catch the understanding of John 3:16 which tell us “For God loved the world in this way: He gave His One and Only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life.” I was so concerned with what I had read in the Old Testament that the truth behind this statement was lost to me.

                Fast forward to the present. I started to attend Church with my wife during our kids VBS this year. On the first night of our adult study, I made my thoughts known to the group about what I felt the Bible was about. You know the horrific story I had read in 3 weeks. I was totally expecting to get crushed by the people in the group, but some agreed with me and all supported me. I was then told that I should have started the other direction. Start with the New Testament and work backwards you know. I had never thought about it that way. Well by the 5^th night of my adult study I had accepted Christ into my heart and found my Salvation through him. I also started reading the Gospel in a different way. I started with John, now mind you this was in June of this year; I am still in John because as I read through my Bible I find myself jumping back into other books of the Gospel to find out the references that support certain verses that I am reading. After I was saved and fully gave myself to the Lord I went back and read John 3:16 again and something jumped out at me; John 3:17-18. “For God did not send His Son into the world that He might condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. Anyone who believes in Him is not condemned, but anyone who does not believe is already condemned, because he has not believed in the one and only Son of God.” I mean for real, how could I not notice this sooner. I was completely blinded in my thoughts and heart but now I truly see and have been awakened. My pastor, and sorry Greg if I get this a little wrong, had stressed to us to be In the Word, Under the Word, and in Prayer. Since I heard this I have done everything I can to stay true to this. I go to church faithfully now in order to be under the word, I read the Gospel daily but more important that just reading it, I find myself trying to dissect and understand what I am reading, and finally I am in prayer throughout most of my day now. And you know what; I have never felt more complete, happy, and alive. I love God and his son Jesus Christ, my family, as well as all I come in contact with more everyday as my mornings begin.

                So for those who are scared to read the Gospel, I say this to you. Stop being scared, pick up the Great Book, and open your heart. This book will speak to you if you are willing to let it and it WILL TRANSFORM YOUR LIFE.

G.E.D.D.

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Community

What’s Wrong With Our Communities Nowadays

                I have spent the better part of the last 13 hours trying to figure out how to approach this subject. I definitely due believe that this is part of my daily walk with the Lord. The event I attended yesterday and participated in, showed me just how amazing Jesus Christ was to do all that he did for the world. I know that some of this blog might seem petty and irrelevant to some and maybe offensive, but if you actually take the time to read and listen to the message it should hopefully make sense.

When I was stationed in DC and drinking all the time, one of the things I looked forward to every year was the Chili Cookoff in downtown DC. This was an awesome event, you pay your money for the entry, have access to tons of awesome Chili samples (that you had to pay for), could go to numerous local bars (which all charged a cover, and you had to pay for your drinks), and you were able to act like drunken fools with those in your community that you would not remember the next day. All in all, after about 200 dollars, it turned out to be a great weekend that I could not remember most of. I mean come on now, that is the best way to act within your community right. Get drunk, start a fight, meet new people you can forget later, I mean what else could you ask for right. Now I will say this, if that last sentence made sense to you and you actually relate to it, WAKE UP and get a clue.

                I have recently learned that the best way to spend time with the people in your community is to serve your community without expectations. Eventhough I say this, I am finding it much harder to do than to say because there you can still get frustrated because you do have an expectation. I will say, before I was saved by Christ, if someone had come by from a Church group and offered a day or evening of FREE entertainment and food, I would have definitely been apprehensive and suspect. I mean in this day and age, who offers anything for free with no expectations other than to commune with the people in their community? I mean why in your right mind, would you take your own free time, go to a location where you don’t really know anyone, and offer to make them food and good conversation? That has to be what goes through most peoples minds when a community has this offer put in front of them by a group of God faring people. You might ask yourself right now, man this guy seems a little upset and you would be correct, but not for the reasons that you are thinking.

                I have been deployed to one of the most deprived and miserable places on the planet, and let me tell you something, when you have been to a place like Iraq and see people who are in real need of things you get a different perspective on life. I mean come on now, even in a place where you could get blown up just walking down the street, if you where to offer a free meal and games to play for the children, you would not be able to cook fast enough to feed all the people who would come out just to eat, play, and tell stories.

                Not us in the United States though. You can go door to door a week early, take the time to make up flyers announcing a block party with free food, bouncy house, music, and good company and the community you went into will just not show up. Whether they make it their purpose to just not be home or watch you cook and just not come over, it doesn’t really matter the reason but in my mind it is just sad. I have held these same kind of events while in the military with the difference that it was called a fund raiser with a price on the food and fun, and tons of people will show up to blow their money. Why not do it for free. Do we avoid this because we are scared to talk to people who Believe in their faith in Christ? I mean are we scared that if we eat the food from the people from the Church that we might be infected? Come on now, get real. I think that our communities really need to start looking at themselves, are they truly a community or just a group of people who live near each other.

                For those who do take the deliberate time and effort to avoid a good time that is completely cost free just so they don’t have to be around those who are trying to be good stewards of Gods image, I say this to you. You will not deter me, I will not give up, and I will continue to extend myself in friendship to you and let you know the glory of Christ. Thank you and God Bless.

G.E.D.D.

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Put it on the Altar

Hello all,

I have been out of the loop for a few days due to a situation that came into my life, that I am actually basing this blog on. I have heard several times over the past few weeks while at service the saying "Put it all on the altar," without really understanding the meaning. Now I believe I have a better understanding of this saying.

This last week has literally sucked for me in a physical sense, but in a spiritual sense, it has been outstanding. First off the week began with an ambulance being called for me last Monday night due to some abdominal pain that I was having. Let me tell you this pain felt like I was going to die. I know that during this episode while I was in the ER I was definately praying out loud for Gods help.

I followed up from the ER visit with my normal Dr. that Thursday and was told that I had a bad gall bladder and that I needed to be referred to surgery. So the next day I spent the whole day at the hospital running tests and talking to the surgeon. We aggreed that I would have my gall bladder removed on Tuesday the 19th of July. After going back to work and explaining what was going on, I suddenly came to the harsh realization, I am not in the Military no more. What exactly does this mean you might ask? Well for one, it means that when you dont work, you dont get paid. HAHA new concept for me after being in the military so long.

So I decided to go back and ask the surgeon if he could push my surgery one week to the right so my paycheck would not be so affected. He told me no, that the gall bladder had to come out as soon as possible. So I called my wife and explained to her what was going on, and also to let her know that my next paycheck was going to be real bad, and to see what our options were. Well we could ask my parents for the money to cover us, could ask her parents, or take out a short term loan. Well after some discussion we went with option 4, which was to pray as a family and put it all on the altar and let God take care of us.

Let me tell you, it worked. At about 6 PM that night, I started to have another abdominal attack. This once again landed me in the hospital, which in the end resulted in the surgery being performed on Saturday. This in turn made it to where I could go back to work earlier to maximize my hours for my pay period.

Sometimes it truly is remarkable the way that God works. I know that He is watching my family and myself, and we love Him in the Agape way and will serve the Lord any way He directs us.

G.E.D.D.

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Love

It is only appropriate that I follow up yesterday's blog with the subject of LOVE. For most as we look at life, LOVE is such a fickle thing. What I found amazing listening to my sermon on Wednesday is that there is a very good definition of love in the bible.

1 Cor 13: 4-8

Love is patient, love is kind. Love does not envy, is not boastful, is not concieted, does not act improperly, is not selfish, is not provoked, and does not keep a record of wrongs. Love finds no joy in unrighteousness but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love Never Ends.

Now as you look at this, whether you are young or old, if you look at your relationships in your life where you have said that you LOVE someone, did your "Love" meet these qualifications. I will tell you this if you answer yes, and you are still not in that relationship, you need to reevaluate that relationship again, because as the last line says, "Love Never Ends".

Now what I have learned from the last few weeks in my walk, is that there is two types of love.

Agape - means to choose to seek the best for others. This is a love based in the mind. We can chose to show agape love by actively thinking about, and deciding how we act toward other people. Agape is the word used when the Bible talks about Christian love for one another. Agape love is talking about our behavior towards others, not our feelings.

Phileo- means to have an affection (sentiment, passion or feeling) for. A fondness based in the heart. What the Greeks meant by Phileo love is what we normally think of the words "brotherly love" meaning today.

Now what we find is that most people have good intentions in love, but the majority of that love is of the Phileo type and not the Agape type. Eventhough it is in the best intentions, you can not have happiness and peace unless you surround yourself in Agape type relationships. Because as the gospel says, Love Never Ends. Everything else in life will come to an end but Love will not.

I put forth this challenge to all, reevaluate your relationships and see which category of love they fall into now. If it is a Phileo love that you feel for the person, do whatever is needed to change that into an Agape type of love. Trust me you will feel better.

Thank you and God Bless.

G.E.D.D

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Relationships

Good Morning,

My Walk with the Lord yesterday was awesome and challenging. To start with I had to take my son Colby to the airport in Houston so he could fly home to California. This was my yearly visit with him, and every year it gets harder to say goodbye and let him go. There was a difference this year though, I know that this time I was sending him home a better young man than when he arrived. You might wonder how I can be so sure of this, the answer is simple, during his visit here this time he made the decision to accept Christ into his heart and start his own journey with the Lord. In addition to his Salvation we were able to take him through the steps to get Baptized and join the Church body that we belong to. That in itself was awesome, not just good, but God Good.

Now while I was driving the 3 hours back from Houston I had the opportunity to listen to a podcast of a service that I had to leave during 2 weeks back from my Pastor which dealt with the Stewardship of Relationships. My wife had told me that I had missed out on a very powerful message, so I decided to listen to it, and let me tell you, she was spot on. The majority of the message dealt with Adam and Eve and the Serpent in the Garden, but the main points of the message had to deal with Godly relationships verses UnGodly relationships. Now let me tell you, my Pastor is was on his game this day, he delivered a very driven, passionate, and transparent message. He did not pull any punches. It was driven home that relationships start in the home and that it is not just my wife and kids responsibility to ensure that they are chosing to be in Godly relationships, but also my responsibility to make sure that they are engaging in healthy, Godly relationships. Some of the things from this sermon that were brought to the front can really make you take a look at your life. First off the Gospel tells us that God created man in his own image, perfect and innocent. The Gospel also tells us that he created woman to compliment man, because God realised that man being alone was bad. So what happened in the Garden. The sermon brought to light that there were many issues with relationship with Eve and the Serpent to start with, but it was not all Eve's fault. The relationship between the Serpent and Eve was a perfect example of an UnGodly relationship with many signs to this fact. The second point brought out and really driven home is that Adam was there the whole time watching this relationship develop and did nothing. So who was really the one to blame. For me I would have to say that Adam was the one to blame, at any time he could have to Eve to stop this relationship, but by being complacent and letting this relationship develop, he eventually did exactly what God had told him not to do which led to the expulsion from the Garden. I will tell you, this was a powerful Sermon and eventhough it got a little harsh, I believe it was something that everyone needed to hear. Below is a link to the podcast of this Sermon should you so chose to hear it.

http://fbcrosepine.org/graphics/UploadFile/6471/Doctrine_of_Man__Stewardship_of_Relationships_.mp3

I can tell you that I have re-evaluated alot of my personal relationships, and have started to remove the relationships in my life that are UnGodly. As the Sermon says, if the relationship is not drawing me towards God then it is drawing me away from God, and therefore it is UnGodly.

There will be more to follow today. This was all I could fit in in my first couple hours of the day.

G.E.D.D

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Hello

Hello all,

I just wanted to take this chance to say hello and give a general idea of what this blog site will be about. I have recently began my journey as a Christian and have completely dedicated my life and family to Christ. Through this blog site I will be posting scripture, expressing my feelings on the passages posted, and asking for feedback and other opinions. I am hoping that this will be a good way to help spread the Gospel and build fellowship. There are only a few simple guidlines that I ask to be followed.

1. Be respectful
2. Use appropriate language
3. Encourage Transparency (No Opinion is a Bad Opinion)
4. Drive the conversation

This is my first attempt at blogging, and I hope to spark some good conversation as well as help to build and strengthen everyone's faith. Thank you for checking in and following.

G.E.D.D.

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