Journal Entry 1: Why? To Help.
Jesus, if you’re not in it; I don’t want it.
Journal Entry 1: Why? To help.
My plan for life.
1. I want a real relationship with Jesus. If Jesus is to ask me what I want from him, besides being saved from my sins, I want his friendship. The apostles had this, still have this friendship this comradery, with Jesus. I want it, and I believe it’s what Jesus wants as well.
2. I want to be able to care for my family, teach them of Jesus, and when possible, show them the spoils of life like cruises, traveling, adventures, and more. The spoiling part is a selfish desire, but what man doesn’t want good things for his family?
3. I want to be a light in the darkness. This is a short answer for me saying I want to teach people about Jesus, and I want to help people survive this life. From journal to journal you will find that Christians, at least the ones I know, don’t get a free pass on life and all the struggles that come with it. We do get Jesus, a wonderful traveling companion, and he does make the wild roads of life more bearable. But you don’t get stronger on easy roads, you get stronger by overcoming difficulties.
Why?:
This journal is to mostly serve my later desire for my life, ‘Being a light in the darkness.’ In this journal and the pages to continue I will be giving you my reality as a Christian. I have some annoyance to those Christian stories, churches, and new age movements that speak of Jesus without telling you the truth. Christianity, to be short in this introduction paragraph, is not easy. Movies and even pastors tend to lend you this idea that once you give your life to Jesus it’s golden streets of perfection then on. It’s not. My journaling, hopefully, will be a bit of reality with Jesus and living this life on our broken world. With some truth and reality, I’m hoping, you will come to know Jesus loves you and, yes, this is going to take work to build such a relationship with him. With my journaling, I will be teaching and speaking through something I know, my own experiences.
Note:
My teachers that I have great respect for and thank God for their wisdom are John Eldredge and C.S. Lewis. There are of course many more, but these two have my appreciation the most for their bluntness, their faith, and their joy. Don’t mistake me, Christian life isn’t easy, but those who have that relationship with Jesus tend to laugh and smile even in the adversity. If, while reading these journal entries you want to grow more from student writing, I recommend true teachers like John Eldredge and C.S. Lewis.
Who Am I? Let’s do some catching up.
I come from a decent home, I think. We were not rich or poor, and for most of my life I had both of my parents except for about a year in my pre-teen years. My parents went through a weird moment where they divorced for about a year, and then, one Halloween night while I was grabbing up free candy, my parents were somehow rekindling their fires. This led to mom coming home with us, and then suddenly there was another wedding, and they were back together. Weird, but, hey, so is life.
Darkside:
Darkside of the family was mostly that my mom was an abusive alcoholic, and I was the focus point of that abuse. While I was young and small my mom physically went after me. After denting in a freezer door where her head was just seconds ago, she stopped that and started abusing me with the skill and touch only a mother’s words can do. Not the proudest years for us, but in the long run, I got saved, then dad got saved, and then mom got saved. Jesus turned our family around, especially my mother’s heart towards me and her need for alcohol.
Darkside:
Attempted suicide as a teenager, but in the end the gun didn’t go off. I’m thankful for that. Decided to run away instead. That did work, but not to much good. Ended up not fixing anything, had the police after me, and hurt my family. Thankfully, a few years later dad put a Bible in my hands, and we all ended up getting saved by Jesus.
Don’t think I’m going all gloom and sadness. That is a story I never enjoy reading.
Beauty and Joy:
Though my dad didn’t become comfortable with saying ‘I love you,’ for some years, he showed me love every day. My dad was there for me even when he definitely couldn’t understand his strange son. He taught me what it was to be a man, to be a dad that stuck around, and how to fight for those you love. My dad is one of my many blessings from God, and I make sure to tell him often. As I grow older and learn more of the world and culture I live in, I find myself thanking God more and more often for giving me such an awesome dad.
Beauty and Joy:
Though it took my mother and I twenty years to begin a relationship; the next twenty years she was my greatest supporter. She died of cancer a couple years ago, and though cancer sucks, I can at least say it was quick. When I die and finally get to go home, I hope it’s quick. But I did get to have a loving mother for the other half of my life, and I take it for the blessing that it is. Anyone who’s had a monster of a parent turn loving angel can understand just how beautiful of a blessing that can be. My mother died knowing and loving Jesus, she died with her husband at her side the whole time, with family and friend surrounding her, and every time I think of her I see her big cheeked, squinted eyes, smile; that full face smile some people are blessed with.
Beauty and Joy:
Next to the rough side of childhood I was also spoiled and given plenty of adventure. Go-carts, four-wheelers, tubing on the river or grilling on sandbars, we were outdoors most of my childhood and we knew how to have fun. I grew up in a backwoods trailer park where every mom was your mom, and every dad was your dad. We had massive grill outs, Friday night races, Saturday river runs, and more often than not spent a lot of weekends at my grandparents and their 12’ deep pool with diving board included. To this day I have a silly kind of love for water, and my greatest place of calm (though I rarely if ever get it in my adult life) is several feet under water. There’s a certain calm I love under the silence of water, the magical, weightless, feel to it.
Leap forward a few years:
I got saved when I was 19, in my bed, crying out to Jesus in desperate need of him and what I was promised, love. Life, for me, began to change drastically at that point. I didn’t become a billionaire and save millions. Would have been cool, but I mostly changed on the inside and who I was and who I wanted to be.
Now, at the grand age of 41 I am a father of 8 about to be 9 children. I’ve been married twice, my first marriage failed, my second marriage is ongoing and thankfully doing well. Money is tight, but needs are met. Kids are healthy, wife is loving, and I’m still learning a lot about building a relationship with Jesus. Hopefully, we’ll learn some things together, and in some areas, you’ll learn from my life, so you can skip ahead in areas I struggled.
This is it for now. A small glimpse of the man writing this journal. There will be more in following journal entries, so check back in.