Disobedience to Prompting

In life God prompts us to do things, the sad tragedy is even me a so called church leader is disobedient at times. My grandmother, a woman of faith has been extremely sick for the last couple of years. A few days ago she was rushed to the hospital like numerous times in the past. As a result of my schedule I had two speaking engagements yesterday one that was 6 am in the morning I decided to leave today to go see her. I was not at peace with my decision but felt it was best since I was so tired. I felt like for safety purposes it was the best decision. About an hour in to my trip this morning my mom called me and told me that my grandma departed from this life. I am currently about 45 minutes away time of my arrival. As I continue to drive down the highway I have laying in my lap a card my beautiful daughter it reads grandmother I love you so much I hope you make it to Heaven safely. Although it is great relief knowing my grandmother was a woman of faith and did arrive to Heaven safely, I still have an overwelming sense of feeling of guilt that is overshadowing. I write all of this to say kiss the ones you love, cherish the breaths that you share together. Most of all when the Holy Spirit prompts you to do something, do it immediately in obedience. Sometimes in life you don't have a second chance to submit to a specific prompting.

BROKEN

Lately I have spent a great deal of time contemplating the issue of brokenness. Many people see brokenness as something that depicts someone as being weak, I see brokenness as something of beauty. I wholeheartedly believe until we are broken before our Maker, we can not fully submit to the will of God for our lives. I mean honestly, if we never faced the reality that we are broken people and are in desperate need for Christ to invade our lives and redeem us, what is the point of Jesus dying on the cross? There isn't one, through his sacrifice, the broken find wholeness. Think about it a farmer doesn’t plant his crop in cement, rather he chooses good soil, breaks it up, and then sows the seed. A butterfly could never fly without breaking its cocoon, and neither could a bird emerge without breaking its shell.

Isn’t it ironic that Jesus could not feed the four thousand until he broke the bread [Mark 8:1-8]

Isn't it ironic the sinful woman could not pour the costly perfume over Jesus until she broke the alabaster jar [Luke 7:37]

Isn't it ironic God could not reconcile himself to sinful humanity until he broke down the wall that separated him from us [Ephesians 2:14]

Isn't it ironic we could never know salvation without Jesus’ broken body [1 Cor 11:24]

In many ways we are no useful until we are broken

The sacrifices of God are [a] a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise [Psalm 51:17]

TORN

As I sit in a chair, processing today's events my mind races. I got word that my grandmother's life is about to come to an end. She has been a constant monument of what it means to be a fighter. She has fought through so many different illnesses over the years. As hard as it is to say good bye, it's absolutely the right thing to do. Regardless if it is moments left to her life, days, or even months I am truly inspired and convicted to carry her legacy on. Regardless of what life throws at me, regardless of what I am forced to face, regardless of what hills I have to climb, I have to keep fighting, because that's what I was raised to do.

A lesson on brokenness from a child

This past weekend my mom had the great idea to by my daughter a second hermit grab, due to her current hermit crab being "lonely." Ha ha, anyway needless to say the most tragic thing in my daughter's life occurred yesterday. We came home and in a matter of seconds I heard my daughter crying like I have never heard previously. I mean she has been hurt with injury numerous time whether it due to mixed martial arts or soccer and cried, but this time it was different. I ran to her room and saw the root of her brokenness. Her older hermit crab that she has had since September had died. Now obviously we don't know what took place to cause the crab's death, did it die from old age or did the new crab raise havoc on "Fred," the crab? Who knows, but one thing happened in the midst of the death of my daughter's crab. I realized for the first time in my little girl's life, she was experiencing a broken heart. Man, it tore me up. Then almost instantly I got severely convicted. My daughter was hurting for a crab of all things, but how often am I deeply broken for humanity? For instance right now as I sit in my warm house, next to the fire place, am I broken for my friends that lay their heads on the streets of my city this very night? Am I broken as a result of the article I read about women being sexually abused in Haiti? Am I broken for those that don't know Christ' love personally? I honestly wonder how this world would be different if we were broken on behalf of others?

Stressful Transitions

Needless to say that many of you know that my household is changing. In 5 months, The Mitchell household is expanding. Ash and I are really excited about the addition to our family. Along with our household changing there are countless other things that we have to do to get our house in order. It seems like every lense we look through lately, there is quite an extensive amount of stress that overshadows it. The first transition was removing my home office out of my home, so needless to say my garage looks like a used furniture store. Then we moved Lexi into the bedroom where my office was. It was a joy to see my little girl excited about her new room that is much bigger than her previous one. Secondly, honestly it seems like everyday we get some sort of bill in the mail. Finances have been very tough for us lately, Ashley currently finishing up her R.N. degree, and us unfortunately not having insurance to pay for the birth of our new child. The recent transitions are something that I have not known previously, my life was comfortable for quite some time. I guess honestly for well over two years now. As I pause, and slow down my pace, and attempt to block out all the levels of tension that stress brings...there is one reality that keeps me moving. The reality is that Christ hasn't brought me this far in life to abandon me. For those of you that are struggling, that are being weighted down by the shadows of stress, keep moving....Christ is present.

New Speaking Engagements

Hey guys, there are some new speaking engagements posted on my website. Would love for you to come out and be a part of the events.